The Brain Eater

Here's a ditty I wrote about ten years ago. Had posted some a while back, but just found the ending so thought I'd put it up.

The Brain Eater

Marcy Green

He always enjoyed this part best.  The screaming was finished, and he could eat the brain in relative peace and quiet.  He enjoyed the rest too (but, not to the creep out point.  He wasn't one of those sickos you read about in the paper).  All that noise, though – he didn't like that so much.  'Oh, please, please!  I'll do anything you want!'  Shut up, shut up, shut up!  They wouldn't stop. 

He had considered gagging them, but, as much of a nuisance their chattering was, and though their agonized screams did make him feel a little guilty, he was able to get past that and enjoy what bits of conversation there was.  He didn't have any friends and he liked the companionship. Once he had them here – restrained, under his control – he considered them friends – artificially brought together, to be sure, but no more so, it seemed to him, than people who make such acquaintances everyday, like at a bus stop or in line at the grocery store.

Besides, since this was their last chance for contact with another person, he hoped it would make them more open, more real, more apt to an honest exchange, because, he figured, they needed that. And, it worked. He was closer to these people than he had been with anyone else and figured they must be closer to him than they ever had been with anyone else – a win-win, if ever there was one. So, he didn't gag them and, sometimes, he would stop the cutting to ask a random friendly question.

They were eager to talk, he figured, because it bought time, or maybe, he figured, if they established a bond he would let them go. In fact, often they even suggested this. They'd say, 'You know, we're friends now, don't you think? Why don't you let me go?' He knew it was a trick. He knew what they were and why there were here so he declined, always, and within a few minutes, when his captives saw their sleight of hand wouldn't work and they couldn't hold back for another second, invariably, they would start with the names. 'Crazy, insane, bastard,' et cetera. There was never much variation. Sometimes, they would use the F-word. That was embarrassing. To him, it was such an ugly word and a pretty rude thing to say. Plus, what it meant was so graphic, so unnecessary. Using language like that made it pretty clear they weren't going to be friends, eager to talk though they may be, and when they reached this point – this lack of civility – it made him hate them again, so he figured he might as well get back to work, get back to the cutting.

The talk continued, got more frenzied. The deal making continued. As things progressed, they promised anything, any imaginable favor in exchange for freedom. When it became clear this would not happen, they would promise the same favors – the exact same things – if he would just stop for a moment, just a couple minutes so they could get their strength back, catch their breath.

This made him squirm. Women saying such things. But, when a man would make such propositions... A couple times he considered them, but they were so, well, real. Such things. How could they even say those things?  It creeped him out to consider doing those things with them, or letting them, or any person, do that kind of stuff to him. So he wouldn't listen. Besides, the pleads and promises were the same every time, so once he was used to hearing them – after, say, the hundredth time – he just ignored it. And he had done the hundredth one such a long time ago the screaming now fell on deaf ears.

Toward the end, they all promised the same thing – 'I won't tell anyone.'  But, that didn't hold water. Of course they would tell. They'd have to see a doctor, right?  With that big-ass gash in the side of their head, and half their brain exposed? You have to see a doctor for that kind of thing. Besides, walking around like that somebody was bound to ask if they were okay. ‘Do you need help? Oh, no. I’m fine, thanks.’

What happened to you? Someone on the street would ask. They'd tell. No matter how many times they swore they wouldn’t. He couldn't let them go. They knew it. You say anything when you're getting the top of your head sawed off.

‘I swear! I swear! I swear!’

He just wanted it quiet. He just wanted them to shut up. ‘Shut your God damned stupid mouth’. He wanted quiet, he wanted to eat.

It would get quiet. The screaming would stop. The buzz of the saw would stop. Even if they kept talking, they usually shut up about the time the top of their skull came off. Those who talked after that point tended not to make much sense. Nobody said anything after the brain was removed.

He had become adept. In the beginning he needed a knife and fork. He would cut the tissue carefully with the knife, impale it with the fork, and eat. But, because his hands were occupied with utensils, the skull would roll around and things would get sloppy. Sometimes, as he raised the fork to his mouth, the flesh slipped off, fell onto the floor, splattered the carpet. What a mess –warm, fresh raw human brain soaking into the carpet. He would have to stop eating, wipe it up with a napkin if he had one, or a nearby tee-shirt, sock, or whatever was around. And, that pissed him off more than his victims constant talking, begging. Once brain fell on the floor he had to miss a few seconds of TV in order to clean it up.

For the most part, that was the reason he learned to eat without dropping any –he didn't want to miss any TV, not even a few seconds. Now, after so much practice, he managed quite well. He could hold the top of the skull inverted in his left hand like a bowl. The bloody hair between his fingers served as a grip of sorts, especially once it congealed, got sticky. The brain would swim around a little in encephalic fluid, but he was still able to scoop goo up with his right hand using just a spoon, and get it to his mouth without dropping it. That way he never had to stop to wipe a spill off the carpet, and never missed any of his favorite show, not even a few seconds.

In fact, he never had to take his eyes off the screen at all.

II

The elevator doors open and Bob steps out. He is wearing the same dull clothes, same calculated neutral expression, and walks with the same tacked-on ease. When nobody is looking his eyes flit about for approaching threats. He sees one now. It can't be avoided. So, just keep walking. You're doing fine.

"Good morning," she says.

This one is Margeaux. Stu-pid. Bob is smarter than her. Margeaux only speaks to him because she must. He knows it. If she just passed without speaking it would make her a bitch. The Office Bitch. So, she says something. Anything. And...that's the only reason. She's still a bitch but at least she doesn't act like one. She hates my guts. She'd just as soon not say a word to me. She wants to see me get fired. I know it. I know it. She thinks I don’t, but I do. (File for later use).

"Good morning." 

He sits at his desk. The same as yesterday. Everything where I left it. Perfect. I can't believe I'm back here. It's like I just left – I swear, it's like I was here just a minute ago. Just sixty seconds ago. I mean, literally…one minute. Now, I'm back. Great. Okay, big smile – 'Hey. How's it going?'  You know, he's not so bad. He hates his job, too. That's cool. He's an okay guy. Kind of a dick, but who cares. (Already filed, but probably won’t/not able to use). Everybody's kind of a dick. I wish he sat next to me. I could show him how he could have more resolve. I wouldn't mind. That's what that guy lacks. Resolve.

He starts the email server and gets the machine running. Then, he hears her. Oh, my god. Here she comes. What kind of perfume will she have today?  Don't we have policy against that? You're not supposed to be able to come to work smelling like you dunked yourself in a bathtub full of GD perfume. (GD stands for God – you know. I don't say that, though). Oh, fuck. There it is. That's it. She's wearing that flowery kind. I fucking hate that kind. I hate all of them, but especially that one – the flowery one. What's that for? To help you get rid of your anonymity so you stand out from the herd? Stu-pid. It's so stupid.

Now she'll take a slurp of her coffee and set the cup down. There it is. SLUURP! I have to listen to that because she doesn't know how to drink coffee quiet. Look, you do it just like this. He raises his cup to his mouth and sips coffee without making a sound. Is that so fucking difficult? Can you do that? ...Dumb bitch. She starts her computer and slips her feet out of her shoes. High heels, but not too high. Her feet are cute. Sexy. I always look at them for a few seconds. Maybe five. Sexy.

Oh, great. Here he comes. The 'boss'. Check this guy out.

"Morning Bob," he says.

"Morning," I say. "Busy today?"

"No, kind of light actually."

"Oh, good."

The boss nods as he ambles away. Dick. Thank God he's gone. Well, at least it's light today. I always like it better when it's slower. I like to be able to think. More time to look around, watch these people. Makes it more interesting.

Look at Margeaux. A couple desks down chatting with T-T-Tommy (he stutters...dumbass). Wearing the floofy shirt unbuttoned so everybody can see her cleavage (especially when she bends over like that), and a short skirt (well above the knee), with dark hose and platform shoes. She’s leaning over T-T-Tommy’s desk so her ass sticks out – (she wants people to check out her ass – it’s so obvious). She thinks T-T-Tommy likes her, likes having her tits in his face, but he thinks she's a manipulative bitch. He told me, sort of, one day in the break room. I agreed with him. I still agree with him.

He's lazy. His work isn't very good. No resolve. He'll never become anything. I'm much better than him and the boss likes me better (they want to fire him except if they do he'll claim it's because he stutters and sue the shit out of them –which would be cool). So...despite the fact he’s right about Margeaux, and I agree with him on that, he’s still a dumbass. Except for that stuff, I could like him. And...I do like him – because he doesn’t like Margeaux, and the boss wants to fire him (and he (T-T-Tommy) doesn’t know the boss wants to fire him, but I do.

Is that wrong? I’m sure you understand...know what I mean.

That damn perfume. It stinks. Don't you think? She smells like a prostitute. Okay, I admit it. I don't know what a prostitute smells like. I've never, you know, seen one. Well, maybe I've seen one but I never got close enough to smell one. Not that I know of.

------- That would be cool, though. To stand right next to a woman who would let you fuck her for money. I wonder if she would let me squeeze her boob. Stu-pid!  'Boob' is so lame. You're like a high school kid. It's 'tit'. You say 'tit'. Not 'boob'. Idiot!  You FUCKING STUPID IDIOT. Say the right words. (Sorry, sometimes I get mad at myself). Anyway, how much would she charge for that? Like, a couple bucks. Two? Four? That is so funny. 'Here's two bucks, ma'am.'  'Oh, thanks big boy (they call their johns [you know what a john is, right?] they call them big boy because men want to be big – it's a psychological trick). Now, give my tit a good squeeze. Go ahead.'  That would be so cool. I'd do it, too. I'd reach right over and put my hand on her boob and yoink it. Oh, man. Honk, honk.--------

I can almost feel it.

That stinking perfume. And that slurping. Can't she drink coffee without making noise?  You do it like this. See?  It's so easy.

Margeaux is finally finished sucking up to T-T-Tommy. Oh, good lord. No. She's coming over here? No way.

"Another day, another dollar."

"More like fifty cents."

"Yeah. At least it's not that busy today."

"Yeah, thank God."

"Really. See you."

Yeah, right. See you. Her name isn't 'Margeaux', it's 'Margot’. She spells it that way – the French way – because she thinks it makes her special. Stu-pid. She's hot, though – but, not because her name is Margot (spelled Margeaux). I wouldn't mind fucking her. I'd like to find out if she even wears panties under that short skirt – bet she doesn't – it would only take a second – one quick reach up there, feel around – I bet she'd like it – I bet she wants me to – secretly – at home – at night – Friday night...when everybody’s horny. Maybe, someday I will – reach up there.

Well, I got all the greetings out of the way. Thank God. Now, I can work. I'm glad it's not a busy day. I'll have time to think.

I work in an office surrounded by pests. Out of everybody here I'm the best. Not that anybody appreciates that fact. Speaking of dorks, check out that guy over there – he's a good example. I can work and tell you about him at the same time. (It's easy for me). This guy has a lot of energy but he's insecure, and it really affects his potential in the company. If he could just focus, he'd go a long way. Here's what I mean. His eyes. He's always looking around. He can look at two or three things in one second. I'm serious. Each time he looks at something he responds to what he thinks it might be thinking about him. If he looks at the water cooler he is relieved because it's an inanimate object and couldn't have an opinion. But, half a second later he'll catch a glimpse of someone passing by and three different kinds of fear will flash across his face. His face looks like it's controlled by puppet strings – jink up the brow, lower the left side of the mouth, cast the eyes to the floor – that kind of thing, except lightning fast. Now, he's suspicious yet befuddled – eyes narrowed, lips pursed – and now, a fraction of a second later, he's surprised and embarrassed – eyes wide, mouth shaped like an O.

If he catches you looking right at him he freezes like a deer in headlights, but only for an instant. The moment he realizes he is looking directly at someone who is looking directly back at him he zips his eyes away and finds some random object to look at. He's like a shoplifter desperate to look casual – the only thing missing is the fake, cool whistling. Then, he'll realize he's staring at, say, a pencil and feel self-conscious – like he's making the pencil uncomfortable by looking at it. Like it was a rule of etiquette that you can't look at pencils if you are not engaged in conversation with them. He'll get pissed at himself for being so rude, then find some other object to look at, proud of his quick sensitivity – only to realize that now he's staring at the clock or bulletin board and feels like shit for making those things feel bad. After this eye-hopping he'll look at you again and get red-faced because he knows you've been watching him the whole time – the 'whole' time being between two and four seconds – then the process starts over again when he realizes he is looking directly at someone who is looking directly back at him, and he starts the search for some inanimate object to look at, only to feel guilty for making that object feel bad. Et cetera.

He twitches like this all day long, from nine to five, five days a week. This guy can make an ass out of himself ten times in a second – ass, ass, ass, ass, ass, ass, buffoon, ass, ass, ass, ass – forty hours a week. Stu-pid.

At least he's good at it. He changes facial expression like a concert pianist plays a fast passage – effortlessly, hitting every ass note. He'll never go anywhere. How could he?  He spends half his time looking around to see if someone is watching, the other half of his time wondering what they think of him, and he spends the third half of his time feeling guilty for staring at random objects (in order to avoid looking directly at people). For the last ten years. He's been with this company, flashing his eyes around like that and feeling guilty – for ten years. I'd rather be dead.

Okay. See that woman? She's an alcoholic. She drinks so much on weekends that by Monday, in the morning, at work, without having had anything to drink that day, her breath smells like vodka. And, I don't mean she has bad breath, I mean it smells like vodka. On Monday morning, saying hello to her is like sticking your face in a bucket of vodka and taking a big whiff. It stops you in your tracks.

She drinks during the week too, but not as much – she saves the big guns for Saturday and Sunday. Anyway, she's in the first stage of liver failure. This means her liver can't burn all that booze and her body tries to get rid of it some other way. Right now, it's her lungs (later it'll be her skin). Her dying liver ships raw booze to her lungs in the hope it can be expelled there – and, it works – the proof is in her breath. Her breath smells like vodka, largely, because there's a certain percentage of vodka in it – shipped directly from the failing liver to the belabored lungs.

By Tuesday though, it isn't as bad because she doesn't drink that much on weeknights. On Monday night she's mainly interested in knocking back the daylong hangover with a bottle or two of red wine – strictly utilitarian. So, by Tuesday it's not her breath that's the problem – it's her mistakes. She can't concentrate. She’s jonesing for booze and can’t think – simple as that. She fights back with a resolute determination. She forces herself to concentrate, and as a result, strangely, she makes a lot of mistakes. Probably more than she would if she just cruised through her day in a stupor.

She'll put the wrong name on a file, copy the number wrong on a phone message, that kind of thing. Stupid stuff. Stuff that earns you a reputation. After all these years people expect it from her and treat her dismissively, as if they're better than her. She tries to offset this by being over friendly...clingy. Some people like the power this gives them and string her along – makes them feel strong. I can't do that – I’m strong enough, stronger than them, at least, the very least.

I treat her normal. She’s clingy with me, I just treat her like normal.

Most people keep her at arm's length. She notices. That knocks her back on her heels and the loss of equilibrium causes more mistakes. Then, come the apologies. Endless apologies. It's automatic, a knee-jerk reaction to almost any event. Even when she doesn't do anything wrong she's apologetic. Like – you'll pass her in the hall and she'll say, "Hi" (she's always the first to talk) and you answer, "Hey, how's it going?"  Then, a second later, she'll say, "Oh, sorry. I guess…I didn't."  But, by this time you're halfway up the hall and she's apologizing to the place where the floor meets the wall. Walking and apologizing and gesturing. When she realizes she's doing this she apologizes for it. "Oh…you're gone. Sorry. I'm so sorry." 

She has these episodes all day. They're not clumped up – like a few here, a couple there. They're strung together – one leading to another in a long smooth unbroken chain of gaffs and apologies. Mistake, apology, mistake, apology, gaff, I'm sorry, gaff, I'm sorry. Then, toward the end of the day, she's all flustered and that makes the next mistake unavoidable. At this point she's afraid of her own shadow and moves about with her hands held near her chest in a protective way like some little girl in a forest – in a fairy tale.

I've seen her like this. She'll be sitting at her desk, hands clutched near her chest, looking at her pens. She'll reach for one then snatch her hand back. I guess she's afraid to pick it up because she's sure that, somehow, she'll pick it up in a manner that's not correct. Problem is she needs the pen to write with so she's stuck in this loop: reach for the pen, snatch her hand back, wait a few seconds eyeing the pen like it's a snake, reach for the pen, snatch her hand back. She'll try to trick the pen by looking in another direction like she isn't interested – the only thing missing is the fake casual whistling – then, when the pen's guard is down, she'll grab for it, but won't be able to commit, and she stops, her fingers hovering and twitching.

Her eyes will be wild. She'll look like a bad actor in a bad movie who is about to address the press to inform them that monsters from space have attacked Earth. Her hand will hover there over the pens for several seconds, then she'll snatch it back where it will join the other hand clutched to her chest and you can just see the disappointment. She's really ashamed, breathing hard, glaring at the pens, hands twisting between her breasts.

After a few minutes of this her face will be all shiny and slick with sweat. It's pathetic – and after a while she'll sense how pathetic it is and with all her resolve she'll squeeze her eyes shut, take a deep breath, shoot her hand out, and grab a pen. When she opens her eyes and sees the pen in her hand she does this weird smile-grimace thing and clutches it in her fist like it was a stake and she was going to kill Dracula with it. Her expression is pure triumph, as if she just won a wrestling match – which she did, in a way, I guess.

She'll click the pen a couple times, wipe the sweat off her face, and take a deep breath. Then when her breathing has returned to normal, she'll hunker down, and eloquently, triumphantly put pen to paper. Then, she'll write a few words and start a different version of the same process. Write a couple words, scratch them out, apologize, write half a sentence, scratch it out, apologize. Write, apologize, write, apologize, agonize, I'm sorry, agonize, I'm sorry. She keeps this up until the paper is covered with scratch-outs so dense they're solid ink. In places it's so bad the paper has holes where the tip of the pen has been raked back and forth twenty or thirty times.

It looks like modern art, like something you would see in a small gallery for five hundred dollars entitled 'Frustration', or 'Life Sucks!, number 4’.  She'll throw the paper away and fling the pen back behind the desk. Then she realizes she's right back where she started – without a pen. Then, again, she'll reach for a pen.

By the end of the day she's exhausted and tends to stare at her computer a lot. It gets worse as the week progresses. By Friday she's a real mess. Her hair is frazzled, sometimes a shirttail will stick out. People are unable to look her in the eyes and tend to make their remarks short and to the point – one word if possible – and deliver that word without breaking stride.

I think the only solution is for her to start drinking during the day. You know – keep a bottle in the bottom drawer. A lot of people do it (you'd be surprised). It would calm her nerves and she could focus. I suppose it won't be long before she figures that out. I mean, she has to reach a point with this. There has to come a time when she can't function...right?  Until she decides to take that final step and become a full-blooded boozehound, she'll spend her day fucking up and saying she's sorry.

It's been like this for the last sixteen years. She's been with the company – fucking up and apologizing – for sixteen years. It can't last much longer. It's funny. If she didn't drink so much she wouldn't be such a balloon-head. And, if she wasn't such a balloon-head people wouldn't make fun of her, and she wouldn't feel so bad about herself...and, if that were the case she wouldn't drink so much. It's circular, I know, but it makes sense. I guess lots of stuff is like that.

I used to care, but I got tired of it. Oh, well. What are you gonna do?  I'd rather be dead (and she will be soon). 

III

Just a little while longer. I'm almost there. I go up this street, turn the corner, and then a little bit more and I'm home. My apartment. I'll go in, lock the door, and all the idiots and schmucks will be on the outside and I'll be on the inside. Left, right, left, right. Why does it take so much time? These groceries are heavy. Almost there.

Bob comes in and closes the door. All in one motion, he grabs the remote, turns the TV on, picks up the guide. He flips to the right page without thinking, scans, decides, puts the guide back in its place, changes the channel, turns it up, puts the remote back, pivots, and heads for the kitchen where he sets the groceries on the counter: three cantaloupes, some milk, three frozen dinners. He pops one of the dinners in the microwave, setting the controls without looking, leans back on the counter, closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. The day is finally over. He can be himself, drop the façade, relax – not give a shit. He stays like this until the timer goes off. He pulls the top off the dinner, grabs a fork, heads for the TV, and a night of no thought, no responsibility, nobody to answer to, nobody to talk to, nobody to be afraid of. He turns the light off, sits in front of the tube, and eats without taking his eyes off the screen.

TV is his only friend. That's been the case since he was a kid. Its picture and sound has always been the only thing he trusted or relied on. He and the audience always laughed at the funny parts and clapped when they were happy. If he was careful he could watch for a couple hours without waking his dad, who was, like every night, asleep a few feet away on the couch.

Mom was in the bedroom reading, so really, he was alone in the house. He could watch the shows and not feel stupid, and since no talking was necessary, he didn't have to search for a proper response to an inane question like 'How was school' or What do you want for dinner'. In fact, he never had to say anything.

He liked how he could watch with no lights on. With the light on, the past was illuminated. It was dragged out and dumped on the floor along with the dirty laundry in piles, old newspapers he couldn't stand reading, and the heavy stretched-tight garbage bag next to the door. With the lights off, staring at the screen, the past didn't exist. He would sit on the floor with the darkness around him – like a cocoon – and watch his shows. After a couple hours the pool of blue from the TV screen would expand and became a lagoon, warm and flickering – a safe tropical hiding place.

The words and pictures and jokes and music would enter through his eyes and ears as if they had physical substance. He could almost feel them. The show would turn into threads that would wind their way into his brain, entwine the folds of gray matter and stitch themselves into him. The shows fed him and provided a barrier against the things he wished he could forget – as long as he kept watching, the past was at arm's length. It was an agreement – with the TV, and the past – a contract.

Watching the boob tube had always kept him safe from something. Before, it was his family and the pain of growing up with such a collection of schmucks. Now, it was the pain of being who he was – now, that day...that is.

His favorite shows were about happy families. Mostly, he liked the half-hour sitcoms. The jokes were a little dumb but he still enjoyed them. He wanted to. He liked dramas too, but sometimes he had trouble following the plotlines and found himself during the course of hour-long shows thinking of other things – his life, his inadequacies – the stuff he tried to avoid hashing over – so dramas weren't his first choice. He liked shows with live studio audiences that were cued by flashing signs when to clap or laugh. This in turn cued him and he would chuckle, even if he didn't really get the joke or hadn't been paying attention.

It was good to watch pretty people in nice houses with wacky neighbors get into funny situations, then get out of them in a way that wasn't predictable, or too predictable. Their lives were so much better than his. His was the same thing over and over. Theirs was a different thing over and over.

But, over the years, even the half-hour shows had gotten more difficult to follow. When he was a kid the situations Lucy and Mr. Ed got themselves into (and out of) were simpler. Now, he felt like the characters were always talking about something else, something behind the words they were saying. The audience would laugh but Bob didn't always get the joke.

When he was a kid he sat facing that picture, watching in the dark, with his back turned on the silly drone of his family. Now as an adult he watched with his back turned on the numbing routine of what had crept up and become his life. Hour after hour, year after year, night after night. He sat in the dark and never took his eyes off the screen – except for bathroom breaks and snacks during commercials.

It was time for a feel-good snack. During a commercial for a car he would never be able to afford, he goes into the kitchen, cuts all three cantaloupe in half, scoops out the seeds, and returns. Holding a half-shell inverted in his left hand like a bowl, he dishes out the goo with a spoon in his right hand and raises it to his mouth without spilling a drop. And, for the next few minutes, while he is scooping up cantaloupe flesh and eating, he feels pretty good.

A couple times, without noticing or thinking, he flashes a healthy smile, juice running down his face. He wipes it away with his sleeve – without taking his mind or his eyes off the blue picture. Later, he puts the cored-out shell on the cardboard box which serves as a table, and gets another. He eats them all. He doesn't have a care in the world. He's his own boss. He's strong. He's something he never is otherwise. Happy.

Later, there is a stack of empty cantaloupe shells on the cardboard box. They are inverted – a stack of six half-shells that, to him, look something like the tops of leathery skulls squished, one inside the next, making a neat wobbly tower. He puts them in the bag he carried the groceries home in and places the bag next to the door so he won't forget to throw them out in the morning on his way to work.

Then, it's time for bed. He hates to see that white dot in the middle of the TV screen after the picture has died and the fun families and the beautiful lawyers are gone. On weekend nights he'll just leave the TV on, watching from the mattress on the floor with his head craned at odd angles until his eyes hurt. He'll turn it off in the middle of the night on his way back from the bathroom. But, that's just for the weekend.

Tonight is a weeknight and he has to get up early and go to work in the morning. So, he waits for the proper moment. He'll stand there, holding the remote with his thumb on the off button, sometimes for several minutes until his thumb goes numb and cold. He has to wait for the right moment. He can't just turn it off in the middle of a punch line, or an ad for an upcoming episode. He waits for the best moment. Usually, it'll be a commercial – for something he'll never be able to afford. Ultimately, he presses the button and the screen goes black, except for the white dot, and he is left alone in the world again. A pain skitters up on insect legs to fill the void and silence that follows. It's this time, the time between the warm blue TV families and the comedy and drama, and the bliss of sleep that is the worst. Right now, as he walks barefoot the three cold steps to his bed and gets in and covers up, he is in that bottom of the ocean blackness – an airless place where aloneness presses on him with crushing weight. It will stay that way until the shows start up again in his dreams and he'll be able to breathe again.

So his mind turns to cold, dark things. The joy of the shows and sawing open of cantaloupe skulls – eating the brains – has faded, the way it always does. Now, when he isn't distracted by laugh tracks, garish lighting, and loud punch lines, when he is not yet sleepy and can't avoid it, he thinks. Always of the same thing. There has never been a night when he didn't. He tries not to, but it never works. He thinks of how he never had a conversation with his parents, not even once. He thinks of how he never had a friend – not a single one. In his mind he examines all the various endless things, touching their every sharp corner and crease with sticky fingers – the same way he has a million times before – until the dull ache in his chest swells and grows, and until, on some nights, the tears roll down the side of his head and fall off the tips his ears and make cool wet patches on his pillow.

The memories were always exactly precisely, down to the last detail, the same – each time, every time, a million times before and this time too. Playgrounds with happy jeering kids, clothes that didn't really fit, girls that suppressed snickers, boys that made it clear they would beat him up if they had to, teachers that reprimanded, and all the times his mom or dad told him to shut the fuck up.

He figured he was no different than everyone else, though. At least he hoped not. Sure, the brain-eating thing was a little weird. But, it made him feel better, strong enough to face another night, and the morning that followed and the day that followed that.

And, how was it different, really, from someone working a dead-end job for forty years, or somebody drinking themselves into a stupor every night?  He figured it wasn't. He figured everybody had a way of coping. His way was just more internal, more imaginative.

Later as his thoughts would slow and cool, as he drifted off, he would smile – a fragile, sweet boyish gesture – and let sleep sweep away the day's grit, and muffle the chattering memories that vied for attention.  He would dream of when the world was a fresh, clean place – before it whispered about him behind his back. In dreams he could be a happy child. He could soar in sunshine, strut across a spotlighted stage, properly command an army. He could smile.

Before the veil of sleep and the reprieve it granted, he would use the last of his mind still under his control to mull over that one thing. He turned it over in his mind with the same sticky fingers, but no sharp corners bit his skin and no thin creases cut him. He would hold it up close and admire its perfect facets and how they caught the light. It never disappointed – he was always proud.

Because, even though he was a loser, there was one thing he was not, and, for sure, a lot of things he would never become or do. Not because he was above it, but because it was so offensive to him. What others accepted as normal he could not allow of himself. He saw people sink to that level in a flash, an instant, as a reflex and without regret or even consideration. He knew their thoughts. He had seen the look in the woman's face as she watched the old man at the bus stop – the bum that smelled like urine and ammonia – who sat at the end of the bench and blamed some unseen enemy for his circumstance. That woman hated his fucking guts and thought he should be shot and dumped in a hole out in the woods. She wondered why she should have to share a bus with someone whose life was over.

And, he could tell what the man in line at the grocery store was thinking as he scrutinized every move the woman made while she wrote a check for an impatient clerk. The man thought she was a stupid fucking bitch and wondered why any dumbass bitch would use a check to pay for groceries when plastic was so much faster. Just swipe the card through and, poof, you're done. Shit man, that dumbass bitch should be shot and buried out in the fucking woods.

The endless stream of stories about suicide bombers and fathers who killed their families then themselves bothered him too, but it was the trivial crimes he saw everyday that impressed him the most. The ones that go unnoticed. The way people treated each other in passing. They weren't as dramatic as a serial killer's trial where weeping relatives point and call 'it' a monster and hope he burns in hell. But, what they lacked in severity they made up for just by being there, everywhere, no matter where he looked, no matter when he looked. That offhand condemnation of another person, the dismissal as if they were less than human. He knew he could never think of another person in that manner. It just wasn't within him. He had been the subject of so many whispered asides, nods, and winks that he couldn't bring himself to deride another person. To him, it seemed like a crime against his own soul. He'd rather be dead.

And, it was this quality of himself that he examined before he went to sleep – this conviction, this one thing he had that he knew very few others could lay claim to. It was this jeweled object which he held in the pure illumination of his mind, turning it, enthralled as it refracted the cosmic light into the colors of his imagination, the colors of his soul.

It was this treasured sureness – that even though he was pretty much a loser, and he would never have a hundred dollar pair of shoes, and he would never own a new car, and he would never live in a nice neighborhood in an apartment that didn't have bugs, and he would never take a pretty girl to dinner, who would be interested in what he did for a living and find his spontaneous comments about current affairs witty and laugh a real laugh and turn away shyly and cover her mouth and be impressed by his knowledge of wine and pasta and music and movies and books and watch with dewy soft intelligent admiring eyes as he paid the bill and left a proper gratuity, and look forward to getting him home – even though he would never have or be any of those wonderful regular things that people took for granted – he knew he never treated people like shit or thought they were less than him, even if they deserved to be treated like shit and were less than him.

He knew he had grown up to be a schmuck because his parents were schmucks and didn't care about him and because the house they lived in was an embarrassment, like the car his dad drove and the job his mom had, and because he had no friends and never would. From the time he was very small he had learned to simultaneously want the companionship of the people around him, and hold them in disdain for the way they regarded him, even if, outwardly, they regarded him not at all – and he had learned he had no future.

But, he was happy enough with his life, and could trust his own mind and he knew the difference between right and wrong, and he lived by that – the jeweled thing he was holding up to the light – the absolute sureness that, despite it all, and no matter how tempting it was, he didn't treat people the wrong way and he wasn't one of those freaks you read about in the paper.