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It’s not easy getting cucked Contrary to the consensus online, which sees a cuck in every message board, there are few worthy pretenders to the horns This is because real cuckoldry is a lifestyle and not a label; as a kink, it involves dedication, relish, and the same hierarchy of passion that might elsewhere distinguish a connoisseur from a minor foodie True cucks – cucks who are cucks because they get cucked on purpose – practice their own abasement with care They learn the customary etiquette of betrayal, the techniques for turning an intruder into an invitee A man who watches his wife have sex with others must be an adept of masculinity’s lowlier registers – pathetic enough for a rival to best him, but not too pathetic as to dip into the danger zone of the incel, who could never marry in the first place As you can imagine, much finesse is involved   Darryl, the tragicomic cuckold of Jackie Ess’ eponymous 2021 novel, is a white man in his forties living in Eugene, Oregon He enjoys well-done hamburgers, prodigious doses of GHB, and watching other men sleep with his wife, Mindy ‘It’s like seeing a guy hit a hundred home runs at once,’ he says, and the baseball analogy is apt Under so much of American culture (its sports, its politics, its economy), there exists the startlingly crystalline structure of male competition Only in cuckoldry, however, do you win when you lose Observing his wife have sex with Bill, a masculine ideal with pro-union politics, Darryl feels an ‘ecstasy of shame,’ an ‘ocean roar feeling’ These proclivities suggest a certain generosity of spirit, or at least libido – Darryl’s pleasure exists only in hot tessellation with the pleasure of others Still, the book begins with its protagonist a little bit morose: ‘How come I can’t be like Bill,’ the cuckold complains ‘How come I can’t be like Mindy’ Desire has turned into greed for his wife’s personhood This is how we know we’re back to the same old conventions of heterosexual marriage   Darryl goes to a nearby river to overdose