Alpha to Omega

I can’t decide when it started because I can’t even decide if it’s wrong. Maybe it’s completely justified. What if everyone is bad and I’m just a sitting duck shot in high-contrast and at high-angle? You can see it, I’m sure—at the train station, in the grocery store, at school. Maybe you have seen me, and that should scare me further into delusion—I’m spurred on by the fact that every time I turn around there are menacing glares and perverse imaginings behind illiterate blood-shot eyes, unfamiliar with the sense of reason and endowed with such crude economy, cleanliness, knowledge and culture that all that could possibly remain is violence and madness.

My own madness is perpetuated by its very possibility. I watch the news and I read books that tell me that monsters exist and that the things I fear aren’t irrational, they could happen. Exposition—where probability and possibility is established in a narrative—that’s where we are right now. I check the locks on my door several times a day. It’s why I look over my shoulder more than usual lately and why every time I do there is a greasy white trash degenerate with sex in his eyes and cigarettes on his breath.

I’ve been going out less and less. I don’t enjoy it anymore because I can’t seem to relate. I encounter the oddest people, and the one’s I don’t fear I can’t speak to—they’re distracting me; they all want things from me. One by one they invade my space as though they hadn’t heard that I need it and ask me questions. I was waiting in a department store for an interview the other day and a man walked past and stopped. He turned around and he tried to act casually, but I knew that he wanted something. And he invaded my space and began with gruelling small talk and various mental molestations. My palms began to sweat and I wanted to scream, so I left. The interviewer wasn’t much better—she kept asking me what my priorities were as though she expected me to change them for her. I left her too. On my way out a stoned teenager asked me for a cigarette while I was on the phone and paced around after I'd said no.

Today it happened again. My class took a break and I just wanted peace and sunshine, but was instead accosted by a peer who stood far too close to me so I could smell the generous application of cologne which will forever remain the smell of desperation, grandiose effort and scripted pleas for validation. I was given a brief education on his presumably impressive feats, hopes and dreams, at which point I rudely paused and made a suggestive phone call. My efforts were not fully appreciated and I was given a brief speech on signs and fate, which concluded with a recitation of everything I’d ever spoken aloud in class. Verbatim. So now I’m quite certain that his intentions are malicious and I should never find myself alone with him.

I believe in signs too. I, for instance, could not take the job offer at the department store because of the creepy guy and the bitchy interviewer. I know I would be miserable. I also can’t go back to that mall without a guardian because there is an abnormally high percentage of sketchy people roaming about. They gave me a terrible feeling and I’m certain they will hurt me if I let them. I was also able to discern long before my confrontation, that my classmate had some degree of interest in me due to his unabashed staring. So, my question then becomes, why aren’t people picking up my signs?