Eileen

by Ottessa Moshfegh

Those perfect, neat colonials I’d passed earlier that evening on my way through X-ville are the death masks of normal people. Nobody is really so orderly, so perfect. To have a house like that says more about what’s wrong with you than any decrepit dump. Those people with perfect houses are simply obsessed with death. A house that is so well maintained, furnished with good-looking furniture of high quality, decorated tastefully, everything in its place, becomes a living tomb. People truly engaged in life have messy houses.

Did she honestly think she had the power to atone for someone else’s sins, that she could exact justice with her wit, her superior thinking? People born of privilege are sometimes thus confused.