Dead Inside

by Chandler Morrison

There is no greater tragedy than beauty needlessly wasted.

Self-awareness really doesn’t mean shit, though. It is, in fact, little more than psychological masturbation, and has about the same net worth as a wad of semen in a handful of crumpled tissues. No cockroach ever desired not to be a cockroach, just because it knew it was a cockroach.

My entire physical being has been restored with glimmering life, all thanks to the delights of a girl filled with abyssal death. Her void fills my own.

We are who we are, just as anyone else is. How we got that way isn’t anyone’s business, least of all our own.

For once, I find myself wishing I knew why humans do these strange little things they do.

“How do you feel about drowning? I read somewhere that people who drown experience an incredible sense of peace and euphoria right before they die.” I raise an eyebrow. “How could they know that. Who is providing testimony for this research.” “Hmm. Good point.” “No drowning for me, euphoria or not. I can’t swim.” “If you were drowning, you wouldn’t have to swim. That’s . . . kind of the point.” I shrug. “Whatever.”

She smiles at me as she pushes open the door, and it’s a very dead smile; she’s been anxiously chewing pills ever since I picked her up, and her heady inebriation is painted all over her face, like the blank canvas of a frustrated artist. I even caught her drooling and nodding off in the passenger seat a few times on the way here. I’ve never been more attracted to her.

That’s all I can think about. The living are dangerous. They inflict pain. They’re so fueled by greed, a lust for useless material shit, a smoldering desire to fit in . . . and they’ll hurt and betray and destroy whomever they must in order to get anywhere close to all of it. None of them are any different.

Everyone’s a parasite, each a small part of a collective plague upon the planet.

“I don’t have fun. I have moments of satisfaction in between long bouts of plain existence. That’s it. I don’t even know what fun is.”

Sighing, she says, “I think what I said was that sometimes I wished I was dead. I think that’s probably true of anyone. Besides, I was emotional.” She sighs again. “Listen,” she says, “you’ll have your chance at death. You’ll have a whole eternity of chances. But you only get one chance at life, and it’s a very small window.”

I’m suddenly nervous, my body anxiously attempting to claw its way out of my skin.

I’m already gone, through the doors, thinking back to a similar scenario I’d been in with Helen, not long ago. And I’m thinking that I wish she were here. And that’s just fucking gross.

“Helen,” I say, “what the fuck has happened to you.” She looks deeply at me with an expression that’s far too affectionate and says, “You, darling. You happened to me.”