An Inhuman Condition

Guns can make very convincing arguments. Few people will say no to a gun, and when they speak, anyone who they’ve made eye contact with is actively listening. I tell myself I’d rather be a motivational shooter and save my throat a few hours work. This girl: this fucking girl is the driving force behind my current dilemma. Picture the nicest girl you can think of, the type of person middle class moms once were. Picture her with enough disorders to make Freud’s unconscious tremble in the grave. I can’t decide how I feel because everything about her says land mine. If I like her or hate her, I feel bad. So I’m confused, and I’m starting to wonder why I bother with some people, and really all people for that matter. Days spent in isolation seldom end with disgust. Is it sad that a picture definition of schizoid could be a motivational speaker? I think it is too. What can you do though? I have this cult-leader personality that, while absolutely fake, hangs people on my every word. So instead of drinking some bitter Kool-Aide, I get them to pay money for absolutely nothing. It’s not as if people who need motivational speakers actually follow through with anything. You can bring a horse a map, but you can’t make him navigate.

The reason these fools continue to line my pockets is that most people will return to their suburban caves and tell all of their friends about the new program they’re on. They don’t do it because it’s working or it has made them grow; they do it to impress the suburban waste living down the street. It’s simple; tell Jan and Steve next door you went to see the most amazing speaker on how to quit smoking. Tell them it has “changed your life.” You get respect from Jan and Steve, and when Steve wants to break the habit, I get another zealous follower. Then when you start lighting up in a few days because you needed me to tell you to quit and have no willpower of your own, I guarantee you will hide it from everyone. So I get your money, your friend’s money and not a single negative review. It’s the perfect scheme. Don’t get me wrong, a few people will actually change their lives, but they could have done it without my campy, bullshit slogans. I just made them feel like they were addressing the problem.

So, I am considered by some to be a “people-person,” but they don’t actually know anything about me. I find those a lot. The people who I see at least once a month that all we ever do is occupy the same space for several hours. The more people I know, the more I feel that I don’t know anyone. But maybe that’s all in my head. Sandy is one of those people. I met her through some friends about eight years ago. That was all before I dropped college and started the cult of motivation. Sandy was what I like to call an affection junkie. If you’re there, and you aren’t stone cold she’ll warm up to you. She didn’t sleep around or anything; she just loved to be held in a weird sort of way. I’d hate to say land mine again, but it’s exactly how I feel. I genuinely wanted her to be happy. If you ever want to feel absolutely worthless, try helping out a chronic case like hers. I always did what I could to cheer her up, and it never did anything but land mine.

Moving forward, we have the feel of three 9mm bullets inside a work of modern art. Designed for use in the Austrian army, this polymer framed cannon was the gun that made Glock who they are today. It’s funny in a weird Darwinian way how we’ve altered the world. We’ve changed the evolutionary order. Survival of the best shot; the man with the most bullets is fit to reproduce. Right now, I think I’m going to be that man.

The scum standing off with me might be a slightly better shot, but three bullets in my sculpture are worth one in his spout. It’s sad how I never considered glasses a dire need until now. My fading eyes are maladaptive to my survival, but these small metal cartridges could mean everything. If I’m repetitive it’s because I feel cheated by society. I realize that I should have been a stale burrito for some Lion sans cage by now. No, we’ve made artificial enhancements that make me better so I can bring everyone down a little more. It’s not just me either; it’s every pacemakered and heart-bypassed son of a bitch sucking from our collective bosom. As a duty to the world I smoke and stay celibate. I’m fucking dead no matter how hard they try to save me; I like it this way.

But land mine, I never found a way to cope with the pain of watching Sandy slowly fall apart. She was seeing this guy I absolutely hated: the kind of moron that you want to smack on the nose with a newspaper and retrain. I swear some men learn how to interact with women from domestic abuse movies on Lifetime: one of those drunken jerks. At times I think I blame the girls more for staying with them, and this was one of those times. I pulled a vanishing trick and made a clean break. Like any war though, the land mines never clear. Fragile Sandy is a big Bouncing Betty, and I can’t believe I smoke as little as I do. I think about the first run, the second run and the marriage of Forgiveness with Resentment who now finish each other’s sentences. I would date her again if I didn’t know how it would end. I want her to be stable; she wants me to accept instability. The last thing I need is more instability; I saw a shrink once, and it was too much. It was last year even. I thought about my life and discovered I was manic-depressive. Not really, but reading about a disorder has this sly way of making you have it. Maybe it’s this medicated culture that has turned us all into hypochondriacs. We need to look out for symptoms so we can be all that our insurance will afford to us. I can’t believe I bought into that shit. Listening to this woman listen to me was as annoying as it was scary. I could feel her diagnosis. Talking about my life out of context was a horrible thing to do and it made me even crazier. I was a first time actor with my community college psych book; I could play out any of the big ones for a scene. Give me anxiety; give me antisocial. Quiz me on the characteristics of people most likely to commit suicide. This is Psychology’s gift to the world: a bunch of self-taught disordered minions.

I would always call her Sandra when I was angry or upset; I learned it from my mother. “Sandra, I can’t be with you anymore. We want different things. Sandra, I know. Please, don’t do this.” Later like sunset it was always “Hey Sandy, I’m willing to work it out again. We can get through all this.” Right now behind this streaming narrative I’m shattering and rebuilding Sandy’s heart, Sandra’s heart, Sandy’s heart.

I don’t want to make scapegoats. My emotions are solely my fault, but I think this culture has helped my helplessness. I don’t think I know how to properly be everything a woman expects from a relationship. I don’t think I can perform to some distant pre-destined standards of manhood, but every time I see this girl I want it to work. I want it so bad that it fucking plagues me for not being able to latch on forever and just accept everything the way it is because movies always end with wonderful hugs and people who become happy forever. I want to embrace in front of an airport while the sappy music reprises us to a teary grave. I want to be somewhere else.

The present appears again. I haven’t heard a sound from this guy in a while. How a person gets this affectionate with a career criminal is a mystery to me. Either he’s trying to pull something, or I’m a better aim than I thought. Whatever it is, I still win because he can’t make this shadowed basement anything it isn’t; I have the high ground and strength in numbers. I’ll bet he knows that his one shot has to be the shot of his life. He’ll have a great story to tell all of the other mindless fucks carrying down the orders of some short-cocked power vulture. Criminals with no philosophy disgust me. They’re a pack of emotionless wolves, alpha male and all. His reality is slowly fading though. A man trained in basic thievery will normally have enough sense to count rounds. When a person counts rounds, they should always assume the clip is full. His error was when he complimented me on my Glock 19 and not my 17. In any normal situation this would be an insignificant difference, both are 9mm and have the beautiful Glock design. Right now though, it means 2 bullets he is most likely oblivious of. What can you expect from a Beretta man? Thinks he’s a fucking law dog or something. I wait for him to make the move. I let him believe this is my last shot too. It gives me time to think.

I obviously care. If I didn’t care, I wouldn’t be here. Therefore, I must care enough to try again, but damned if you do, don’t or whatever. I’d hate to say it again, but there aren’t too many ways to describe a land mine and I’m caught without a thesaurus. I’ll do it. It’s that simple; I will try again and maybe fail as always. At least this time I will know I’ve done everything I can. It’s not a frequent event to have to kill a man for the woman you love, if I love her that is.

I guess I should explain how this situation interrupted my daily life. After successfully staying away from Sandy for almost eight months, I bump into her downtown…

Wait, there he is. I heard that sneaky bastard’s pointed-toe shoes scuffle across the cold basement cement. He wants to surprise me. Score one for my ears not following my eyes into decay. I aim my shot. I’m ready to take one step right and end this jerk’s hesitation. I grasp the trigger… Shit. I can’t believe it. Just as I’m about to step out this guy takes his shot at the door frame that happens to be covering my vitals. It is scary having bullets fired this close to you. You jerk; you made me wait all of this time for a lumber assassination. Congratulations man, tonight this door frame sleeps with the fish. I take my step. I don’t see him. Coward can’t even face his death. I decide I can’t wait longer. Sandy and I are about to have an unstable reunion where I tell her we’re out of this mess. I start down the steps. Maybe I’m a little too loud, but I want him to know I’m coming. I want him to tremble in his little corner. How many guys can say “I was killed by a motivational speaker” in the after-life? The last two steps are the most exciting steps I have taken in my life. Steps leading to an orgy of epic proportions wouldn’t feel this good. My foot touches cement. My ears hear it, but my eyes don’t see it. My brain can’t even register since it’s so fast. Too much input it says. How?

Ouch. It finally processes. On top of the pain, what I can’t decipher is how he managed to shoot me with no bullets. I try to aim in his direction, but all I feel are wooden steps slamming into me: a tap compared to the entrance wound. I need to make this gun point at him. I feel his bullet making friends: too many friends for a Beretta. One bullet could be a miscount; two would be a gross mistake. A fourth of a clip is not even the same phylum as a mistake. Now the explanation appears. While I was thinking about my new relationship with Sandy and making all of the wonderful life-story chatter, this asshole was reloading; fucking land mines.