Chapter 1.
The human mind is truly something to behold. It doesn't matter how many experiments we perform on it. we will never fully understand how it works. Let us say you're watching a movie, half way through the main character falls off the edge of a tall building and he's holding on for his life. You tense up, you fear for his life because you have developed an emotional attachment to him. However, deep inside your mind you know that this character isn't real; it's only an actor, an he's in no real danger. This is called suspension of disbelief; you don't really think the danger is real, you've just allows yourself to feel this way for the sake of escaping from reality. This character has become real to you only for the sake of entertainment.
Everyone has their own escape, be it a movie or a book or some good music. Some people will create a facade of optimism and emotional stability and believe it's real to feel better. Deep in their mind they know they don't really feel better, but they have allowed themselves to believe it for the sake escaping from reality. This character has become real to them only for the sake of sanity.
I walked across the room from my computer and picked up my phone and a cigarette. Downstairs to the outside world to inhale some mentholated cancer, the only fire escape available in the house. It's cold outside, I like the cold but this is ridiculous. I could have stayed inside and kept myself away from this annoyance, but killing myself a little bit quicker was worth it. The smoke stings my throat and tinges my lungs a darker shade of black, I should stop, but everyone has their own escape. Every time I come out here it looks different, the trees are dancing to a different song and different people have other places to go. I'm just standing here, I have nowhere to go, I certainly have nothing to dance about. I'm just standing here, and they're over there, and no matter how far I outstretch my arms I can't touch them. I remember once when I went to get the mail from the mailbox. I was half asleep, and I didn't see the car coming. He slammed on his breaks three feet away and looked at me as if he had just saved my life. You have no idea Mr. 1998 Ford Escort driver, you just have no idea. In that three feet I could have easily reached out and touched him, but I chose not to because that would have made the situation even more awkward. I threw my cigarette into the pot of sand on the porch and went back inside. The house smelled like old wood, must and air freshener. "My head hurts, I need some asprin." I thought to myself. I poured out way too many and begrudgingly put them all back save for two and closed the bottle. "I wonder how it hurts to OD," I thought to myself. "I wonder if it would hurt me as badly as everyone says." I think about stuff like that a lot. I think about things people have said and wonder how it applies to me, if it's the same or if I'm weird. Everyone has their own reality.
There's no such thing as love. We simply find ourselves attached to someone because they''re better than we are, or worse than we are. The care we feel for them is a fear of losing the only person that we have claimed that we can look up to or down upon. We will either shower these people with affection or mistreat them, it all depends on how the person copes with their fear of being alone. I am a man of logic, not emotion. I have no use for emotions, emotions make people weak and vulnerable. Emotions make people do and say stupid things, mistakes are something I make enough of anyway. I see people out in the streets or on television holding hands and kissing, it's infuriating. I hate happy people, I hate people that are 'in love,' I hate everyone in general. Hate, hate, hate, it's the easiest and one of the most intense emotions to feel, the one emotion life has granted me the ability to understand. "You just have no idea about life yet," old people will tell me, "you're too young, just wait until you're my age." I'm not going to wait until I'm you're age, I have set aside nonsensical things such as 'caring" and replaced them with a much more productive thinking pattern called "apathy." This way I can concentrate on how people really work and not be biased by how I feel towards them. Everyone has their own balance between arrogance and integrity.
I head back upstairs and open my dresser drawer to retrieve my gun. I put it up to my chest and pull the trigger, there is no deafening bang, I see no blood on the wall or on the floor, but I know I am dying. In my last few seconds of life I slowly lower myself to the ground and lie there for a while. I awaken something like seven hours later, there is no blood and no bullet. This happens about once every other day, not very many people in my life know this happens. It probably isn't healthy, but every time I wake up I feel a little better than I did before. I collapse into my computer chair and close down my web camera software and delete a bunch of people from my Live Messenger. I check my email and I have a message from someone I don't know, they want to meet me. Whatever, I'm going to bed. I lie there awake in the dark with my eyes closed, tossing and turning, unable to turn my head off. I hate sleeping but it keeps me from thinking for a while, which is pretty nice. Thinking is both my best friend and my worst enemy; it keeps me one step above everyone else as well as make me wish everyone and myself were dead. This mechanism becomes the only thing real to me for the sake of coping.
Every time I go out, even to places I've already been, it looks like somewhere I've never been before. Perceptions always change, the stop lights I've seen a hundred times before are now different shades, I forget when it's my turn to go. It still amazes me when I drive down the road and the other drivers manage not to swerve into my lane, what an unconditional trust that we have developed. Peoples' faces morph into odd shapes the longer I look at them, people start looking more like the monsters that they are. I want to be the good knight that slays them, or rather the evil dictator that has them all executed. That isn't to say I'm not a monster myself, I'm most likely more of a monster than they are. Monsters are incapable of feeling, this is certainly a position that I fit into. It's odd that I'm so in touch with the emotions of other people, though. One of my favorite hobbies is manipulating people to my will, and one must truly understand how people work in order to do something of this nature. I guess it's that apathetic thinking pattern that I mentioned earlier that allows me to be in tune with the human affliction. Everyone has their niche.
Chapter 2.
There's a phone ringing, I think. I'm not sure where it is, I can't see anything, so I suppose I'll slam my hand into my alarm clock a few times. Well that didn't do anything, I guess it's my phone. There you are you little starfish, now let's see if I can't remember how to answer it. "Hey, I didn't wake you up did I?" , "No," I lied, it was only four in the morning, why would I be asleep? "Are you sure?" , "Yes I'm sure." I'm not sure why I feel that it's something to lie about but something is compelling me to prove to her that I was never asleep even though I was. "Anyway, what do you need?" , "Allen left me again." I could tell ever since I answered the phone that she had been crying. "That sucks. What do you need me to do?" By this time my eyes had adjusted enough to see my floor, it was messy. I would introduce this woman on the phone, but at the moment, I'm not exactly who she is. "Don't be a richard, I'm very upset right now." , "That doesn't answer my question." , "I don't get why I continue to call you for help," Me either, "all you ever do is stuff all over me." Oh ok, this must be Meagan. Meagan and I have lived near each other since we were children, somehow, I sometimes feel as if she's stalking me. She hops around from boyfriend to boyfriend, so sure that each one will be the one she will be with forever. Each time getting her heart broken. "Look Paul, would you just stop being an starfish for about ten minutes?" No, but I can stay quiet so it seems like I'm giving a damn. "Ok." , "Allen was over earlier and we got into a huge argument. We had been fighting for about four hours," What the hell? I don't even spend four hours taking a stuff. Well, actually no nevermind, I sometimes do. "and he left about 10 minutes ago. He said we were through, he said he wanted back everything he ever bought me." Sounds like just about every other relationship she has been in, it's probably her causing the arguments. Sometimes I wonder if she's such a bitch because it's in her nature or if she's just doing it to push people away. Hello mirror on the wall. She went on ad nauseum for a full ten minutes, as if she was timing it. I was. "Well uh, I don't know what to tell you." , "You say that every time, surely such an introverted person would know something." Yeah, she's right, I just don't feel like giving anyone advice right now. "Look Meagan, I think you just need to stay single for a while, don't rush right into another relationship. You need to figure stuff out." , "..." I'm not sure if she liked that or not. I'm hungry. "I guess you're right," You're damn right I'm right, "I just needed to tell someone about this. Though, I could have produced the same results talking to a rock." , "Rocks don't give you advice." , "Rocks also sit around all day and do nothing because they have no legs, what's your excuse?" Meagan is always jabbing at me and trying to make me feel bad for being inactive. She usually picks times like these where her interjection is out of place almost comedic, I guess she thinks she's taking me by surprise. "Rocks also don't don't call people at four in the morning just to insult them." , "Whatever, I'm going to bed, goodnight Paul." , "Yeah." Well that was an enormous waste of my loving time. Er, waste of my sleep. Whatever, I'm going back to bed.
I awaken, it's four in the afternoon and I don't feel like getting anything done. After I wake up for a while I reach into my dresser drawer and grab my gun. Up to my chest it goes, the silent bang follows, I'm free. I get all made up and give Meagan a call. "Hello?" , "Hey Meagan! I'm sorry about last night." , "Oh hey, it's ok, do you need something?" , "We should go out and cheer you up, let's get some food or go shopping or something." , "Haha, ok then, you can go on ahead and come over." , "See you in a few!" I hang up, put my shoes on, and grab my bag. Meagan lives only a block away, I usually walk to her house. Down the steps, across my ten foot yard and off I embark. People walking by turn their heads in almost a double-take, I get this a lot. Some call me a freak, others just smile, either way I'm not bothered. Meagan and I take her car out to the mall, we're both hungry so we grab food first. Our favorite little cafe, they serve coffee and food, I always order the lemon soaked grilled chicken and a mocha latte with orange juice. Meagan usually picks from the menu at random, she likes pretty much anything. "Allen-" , "No Allen, none of that, the purpose of this little outing is to make you forget all about that stuff for a while." Meagan simply smiled at me, my stomach moved a little bit, I'm assuming it's the fact I haven't eaten since midnight. "Embrace the single life Meagan, it can be pretty great." I assured her, shifting in my seat uncomfortable avoiding the stare of the middle aged gentleman at the table diagnolly behind Meagan. "I don't know, it gets so lonely." , "That's what friends are there for!" Meagan smiled at me again- damn I'm hungry. We ate, we left, I paid, we tried on clothes and shoes, we bought clothes and shoes, every outing like this draws her and I just about an inch closer. "Well I'm glad you dragged me out of the house today," Meagan said with a grunt, squeezing into her new pair of high heels. "I really needed it." , "Of course, I couldn't have you all down and mopey on me." I said, adjusting my shirt as another group of disgusted individuals passed by with evil glares. We arrived back at Meagan's apartment around eight o'clock, it was getting late so I headed home. We hugged goodbye and I embarked back to my home, shivering slightly in the February chill. Stop being so god damn nice and giddy, it's sickening. I closed my eyes momentarily and shook my head. You disgust me. The urge to throw myself out into the oncoming traffic was disturbed by the man standing stone still in front of me, staring incredulously. "Are you... Are you ok?" He said, clouds of steam billowing forth from his mouth. "Yeah, I'm fine I guess." His eyes widened, what was his loving problem? "You are really pretty." His face flushed instantly and he looked straight down at is own shoes. What the hell? "Um, who are you?" , "Nothing- Er, I mean no- or it's... I'm Sam" He stammered clumsily, his eyes now fixated on something beside my head. "Ok Sam, well, I need to head home now." , "Oh uh, ok there- I mean, I'm- it's getting dark. Would you- or, well yeah, you- like me to walk with you?" His face was so red I started picturing him as the Kool Aid man. "If you want..." This guy is loving weird. "Alright well. Ok then." We walked all of two-hundred feet back to my apartment. "This is nice." He was looking up at the apartment, the apartment that looked exactly like the ones surrounding it. "Thanks... well I'm going inside now." His head jerked violently back at me, he had a stupid look on his face. "Ok, um. Well, what was your name again?" I never said it to begin with you twit. "P- Angeline." Came out of my mouth like an explosion. "Ok then Angeline, I'll er- see you later or something I guess." He hurried off past me. People in this city are loving weird. I headed inside and upstairs and awoke in my room, eager to sleep yet again, my body and feet aching from my shoes and unnatural posture I held all day. I hit the bed, tossed and turned, cried a bit for some reason, and waited for the room to dematerialize into blackness.
