bakerstreet | The Nonsexual Intimacy Meme

The Nonsexual Intimacy Meme

The Nonsexual Intimacy Meme

Intimacy is NOT necessarily about full sexual contact. Intimacy is all about two people forming a connection and bond between them. That involves becoming best friends, trusting each other, knowing each other, understanding each other. Intimacy is grown and developed, it can't be rushed.

Nonsexual forms of intimacy can add a great deal of depth and variety to fiction. On one end of the spectrum, they provide extra steps to support the journey from meeting a potential mate through romance, sex, and marriage. In the middle, they convey the import of family and professional connections, distinguishing those from more casual acquaintances. On the other end, they form much of the glue in primary relationships for people who don't base their ties on sexuality. Sex and romance are valuable, but they're not everything.

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Hair care. Brushing, braiding, washing, cutting -- all of these involve a lot of careful touching in ways that many people enjoy. Hair braiding is a bonding experience in some cultures. In fact, grooming is a bonding technique for social primates in general. People without close ties to others often treat themselves to regular salon visits as a socially acceptable way to meet the need for touch and interaction.
Shaving. This involves an unusually high level of trust, especially if the person is using a straight-edge razor or something else with an exposed blade rather than just a buzzer. Although it can apply to women, shaving is one of the few forms of physical intimacy that is most closely associated with men due to their facial hair. Initiaton into shaving is a major milestone for becoming a man, not just for boys during puberty but also for transsexuals during transition.
Bathing. This varies by culture; in America most people bathe alone but some other cultures practice communal bathing. A bath is usually more intimate than a shower, although a public bath can be non-intimate and small shower stall can be intimate. It's also different when two people wash each other (an exchange of intimacy and affection) than when one person washes someone else (more of a caretaking or protective gesture).
Feeding. A classic romantic motif involves lovers feeding each other, but it works as a way of providing and caring for someone in any context. Like bathing, it can also clue whether both parties are participating equally or one is taking care of the other (temporarily or regularly). This one has an existential flavor since survival depends on food supply.
Seeing someone without their adaptive equipment on. This includes glasses, dentalware, prosthetic limbs, a wheelchair, etc. Adaptive equipment is part of one's presentation to the everyday world, and taking it off can be as intimate as removing clothing, for many people in many contexts.
Holding Hands: There can be many reasons for this gesture. Physical closeness, offering comfort, or staying together in a crowd, all may have you reaching for someone.
Undressing someone. This can be kind of a one-way experience if the recipient isn't awake, and is often awkward for both people if they are awake. Sometimes it happens because hands are out of commission, but a more common example is someone passing out drunk. Overheating is another good reason. Different circumstances can imply different levels of intimacy.
Sharing secrets. This especially applies to talking about personal issues that aren't widely known. An exchange of secrets is a common ritual between "best friends" among girls and women, but appears elsewhere as well. Some things are only discussed among people with a common reference; veterans may be more comfortable discussing war memories with each other than civilians.
Ordering for someone in a restaurant. Acquiring food, without asking the other person what to get, shows a knowledge of their needs and desires. Providing food is also a gesture of support and sustenance.
Providing moral support at a major event. Helping someone get through a funeral, a trial, or other intense but not crisis situation is usually performed by a very dear friend. This is a situation where lovers or family members may be too close to the matter to be much use.
Crying on someone. When you cry, you tend to let your guard down. Most of the people close to you will see you cry at some point, so that can be a milestone in a relationship. Actually crying on someone, letting them hold you, is even more intimate.
Serving in a primary role for someone during a wedding. This includes the best man or maid of honor at a wedding, or stand-in for absent parents, etc. as well as the traditional family roles. One aspect of intimacy is sharing each other's lives, including ceremonies and transitions.
Comforting someone after a bad breakup. Moments of great vulnerability can bring people closer. While this role sometimes falls to family, breakup repair more often goes to a woman's female friends or a man's male friends.
Listening to someone's heartbeat or breathing. Close body contact, enough to carry soft personal sounds, tends to be comforting as well as connecting, as it touches on positive childhood memories for most people. It is shared between parent and child, sometimes between siblings, and later between lovers. Tight nonsexual partners may also do this.
Putting someone to bed. Interestingly, this activity can happen among people who are just getting to know each other -- most often if someone passes out drunk, but exhaustion can have a similar effect. It's a gesture of caring to put someone to bed rather than leave them where they drop. A milder version involves draping a blanket or coat over a person asleep on a couch or the like.
Sleeping in the same bed. This is an act of shared vulnerability and intimacy. Lovers customarily do this; so do some siblings or friends, especially as children. People may also be driven to share a bed, sleeping bag, etc. for warmth or lack of other accommodations in challenging circumstances.
Watching someone sleep. There is more vulnerability on the part of the sleeper, and more intimacy from the watcher, when only one person is asleep. Parents often watch their children sleep. Lovers sometimes do this with each other, which can be cute or creepy. It's also a guard position, useful for showing that one character seeks to protect another.
Waking someone up from a nightmare. A subtler form of rescue than more physical actions, this is still a gesture of protection and caring. It often leads to comfort afterwards. A typical courtesy between parent and child, or lovers, this can also be an early threshold for characters thrust together unexpectedly if one of them has sturdy daytime walls and a lot of issues. It is common, but often unspoken, among war buddies or veterans, many of whom have nightmares.
Sharing clothes, jewelry, other personal items. This is common between siblings or close female friends. Sometimes roommates do it too. Wearing someone else's shirt or bathrobe is typical in romantic relationships, so can suggest a similar level of intimacy even in the absence of sex.
Cleaning someone else's living space. This shows care and knowledge on the part of the cleaner, and trust on the part of the recipient. You have to know what NOT to throw away or move. It's typical of family members and roommates. Coworkers may clean each other's desk, office space, etc.
Living together. This is a big step, even if it's just for a little while. Housemates are in each other's pockets; it's hard to keep secrets. Family members and lovers often live together, but housemates who are family-of-choice form a category of their own. If you don't want a romantic partner, a permanent housemate is a good choice for someone to share your life with.
Childbirth. Attending the blessed event entails providing a lot of moral support for hours under high stress. It can create a bond with the baby as well as with the mother. When planned, this opportunity is only offered to the closest family members or friends, barring professionals. But it can happen by surprise in very awkward circumstances, a popular motif in fiction.
Saving someone's life. Quick action in a life-threatening situation demonstrates how much one person values another. This can create a strong sense of connection, and sometimes obligation. It often, though not always, entails personal risk for the rescuer. This is fairly typical for military buddies or police partners, etc.
Risking your life for someone. Placing someone else ahead of your own life shows their importance to you unequivocally. This often, though not always, involves trying to save or protect another person. While it can create a sense of gratitude, it frequently causes anger as well -- someone who loves you will generally object to you endangering yourself, even to protect them. Military and police buddies protect each other regularly.
Making emergency decisions for someone. This reveals both how well you know the person, and how much you care about them -- whether you know what they would want, and act on it even if it differs from your personal preference. Unlike some of the other options, in this one the initial action is often outweighed by the aftermath. Both characters have to deal with the results of the decisions, good or bad.
Deathwatch. Dying can be as intimate as giving birth. Staying with someone while they pass is an act of love; so is providing moral support to someone sitting deathwatch for a family member or other person. Many soldiers and police have done this for someone.

(taken from here)

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That made him think about it for a minute. About what would happen if he died and his dad was left here all alone. He knew his dad loved him, the Stilinski men had no problem saying the words to each other or showing it with hugs and physical affection, but he wondered if he'd take it as hard as he'd taken his mom dying. "That's what locks on doors are for."

"I'm feeling the love here," he said, rolling his eyes. "I see how you are." Except he did. In the end he had welcomed him and taken care of him when he'd been at a low point.

"You do that cocoa thing for him? I'm betting that would take down the stress of the job he's doing." He means it, so there's that. "Does he know? About things here?"

"I do what I can for him." Whether it's a mug of cocoa or a shot of whiskey, Stiles tries to take the best care of his dad that he can. He loves him and he doesn't have any problem telling him that repeatedly. He'd be lost without his dad, so he could actually feel for Isaac for a microsecond. There was a difference, though. He'd never felt the fear for his dad that he bet Isaac felt for his. Love or not, he'd never been touched by his dad in any way that wasn't affectionate. Even the pushes or half-hearted swats at him to get him to hurry along were done with that almost smile at the corner of his lips. Stiles knew where he sat with his dad.

"What about Derek. Does he know that you... have nightmares?"

Isaac thought about that, wondering if he could have done more for his dad after his brother died. Maybe if he had, things would have been different. He looked away, even white teeth pressing to his lip as he thought about that. "I should have done more." It might not have turned out any differently with losing him, but the time before that could have been better.

His head snapped up, eyes wide. He shook his head hard. "No. He's got enough to deal with right now. It doesn't... they don't happen often. They're getting further and further apart and he doesn't need to deal with that right now."

"Maybe he should know." He was Isaac's Alpha, after all. Didn't that make him some kind of magic babysitter or something? "Maybe he can help." Probably not. Stiles didn't hold much faith in Derek being able to be anything beyond a bruiser. He was the brawn, not the brain. He just stood around, looking scary and breaking things. He couldn't picture him trying to walk Isaac through anything.

"So what? You're just going to come here next time?" He didn't have a problem with it, but being woken up by a werewolf scrabbling into his room was a little freaky.

"How," he asked, laughing softly. "He doesn't handle his own emotions, how is he going to handle mine? Besides, he's dealing with Erica and Boyd missing, and everything else going on, he doesn't need me whining at him," he said, straightening and trying to blow it off. "Besides, I don't want him thinking I'm a liability or something, you know?"

He winced, shrugging. "I didn't mean to do it today. I can try and not do it next time? It'll maybe be a couple of weeks before it happens again. It was right after Boyd and Erica disappeared that it happened last."

"How are nightmares a liability? They happen. I don't think of myself as a total waste of space because of a few bad dreams. Just... talk to him. If he's a dick about it, then fine, he's a dick about it." Stiles was hoping that Derek would take some responsibility for the teenagers he'd changed.

Was it perfect, no, but if he'd wanted perfect, he shouldn't have bitten a bunch of insecure teenagers. He wanted them, now he had them. He could just play Den Mother or suck it up.

"I didn't say that, did I?"

Isaac's leg bounced, the nervous energy showing in the way it shook his body. He nodded though, gnawing at the cuticle on his thumb. "Yeah. I'll talk to him," he murmured softly. "I'll see what he says."

Which made him nervous as hell but he couldn't think of a way being honest was inherently bad.

"Yeah well, this is me asking then? Come on. I don't ask most people, I just barge into their lives these days so here's your chance." He looked up at him, grinning. "Last chance."

"Asking to what, leave me alone? I figured that opportunity had gone out the window when you wouldn't quite your babysitting detail." Well, that and because he was neck deep in this. Scott was over his head, but no way would Stiles leave him to deal with any of this on his own.

"As long as I don't wake up with you in bed with me, I might be able to avoid trying to kill you."

He laughed at that, a small, chuffing sound. "We're not going to get all emotional here that I turn to you, are we?" Because he was bad at that. It turned into aggression and sarcasm and no one got it right.

"Wait. I can't snuggle up to you," he asked, smirking at him. "You and your rules."

"I think I can stay dry eyed for this conversation." He gave Isaac a bland response, rolling his eyes at the other teen.

That remark got a look best reserved for Harris. "No, you cannot snuggle up to me." Especially not in bed. Things happened in that bed that didn't need the addition of a second body to make it more awkward.

Isaac stared at him for a long time, looking utterly confused.

"Do you even know how to take a joke? Fucking hell, Stilinski, chill the fuck out."

Rolling his eyes, shaking his head. "Trust me. You're not even my type." And he was sticking to that argument when Stiles made faces like that about a damn joke.

He was chilled out, mostly. But hey, thoughts of people in his bed when he seemed to be the only person in town not getting any just wasn't fair. Or fun. Or... shut up, Isaac.

"Whatever. Joke away. Just keep joking. Because the idea of someone in my bed is just hilarious."

Isaac isn't slow, he's just not the social creature he could be. So what he took as him being insulted suddenly dawned on him as something else entirely.

"Jesus, Stilinski. I don't think anyone thinks that but you," he pointed out. "I don't think your sex life is a joke. You've made a choice and that's your decision and, get this, I respect that. Take that for what it is," he said. "But yeah. You want something serious, someone to care about. That's not a joke."

He shouldn't be mollified by that, but he was, somewhat. He gave Isaac a shrug, hands plucking at his pajama pants as he fidgeted. "Dude, my sex life is a joke. I know that. I just..." It sucked when anyone but him brought it up, because they'd only be doing it to make fun of him, right?

"Don't know what you're talking about." Sure he does. There is none. That's the joke. "Besides, seriously do you think everyone around you is just out banging everyone? I mean, sure, some are but not everyone."

He's trying! "Hey, seriously? See, Greenberg? Him and sex life is a joke."

"Greenberg's at least had sex." With his cousin, which was part of the joke, but still...

He knew that holding out for something more than just sticking his dick in something was likely to have him a virgin still at thirty, but that wasn't going to change any time soon.

"His sister doesn't count," he noted, nearly wincing at his own joke. Okay that was kind of bad. "If he has a sister, I would be almost sorry for that."

"So, how do you plan to meet this elusive lady lucky enough to be chosen." He paused, sighing. "And give up on her."

"Cousin, actually." Fortunately, Greenberg did not have a sister. One Greenberg per school was bad enough.

That was the question, wasn't it? He shrugged, hand rubbing over his head. "If it's meant to happen, it will happen. I'm not going to go sniffing up every skirt I see." Eww. "I go out. I meet people at parties. I have a few female friends. But nothing's clicked."

He glances at Stiles. "You're not being a jerk about that, are you?" God, he wanted that to be a joke.

"Was that a dog joke," he asked, giving Stiles a sharp look. "Okay. So go out more. Don't be here when I come falling through your window," he said, trying to tease.

"Nope. Pretty sure it was a second cousin, but still."

He gave Isaac a bland look, shaking his head. "No, it was a guy comment. I don't have anywhere to be." His laptop was here along with, well, food and his bed.

Isaac stared at him for a long time. "We should go out. I maen, doesn't have to be tonight, but we should do that. Somewhere. With people around who aren't just you and me."

"That would generally be what 'going out' meant, unless you have some other thing in mind as a meaning that I'm not aware of." His brows had lifted at the suggestion, not certain if Isaac was somehow pulling his leg or not. "You. And me. Out in public? Doing what?"

"Or, you know, I could slap you upside the head for being a dick. Either sounds fun to me." Rolling his eyes, even as he shrugged.

"I don't know. Club? Dancing? Anything that isn't alpha packs and wondering who's next?"

"Dancing? In public?" He turned his head a little to the side, giving Isaac a wary look. "You thinking of going to Danny's club to do this?"

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