?

I don't know what to do. I don't know how to move on. I lie awake at night asking the same questions, exploring the same thoughts. Maybe it's me. It must be me. It has to be me. What's the other reason? There is none. It's me.

I'd leave me, too.

These thoughts recycle through my head, intermingling with the sound of a nine millimeter's slide being ratcheted back, coaxing a bullet into the chamber. Or maybe I'm looking at someone, and I am surrounded by the urge to throttle them, to see their skin change, their eyes bulge. I see my car suddenly colliding with the freeway median, an explosion of glass and screeching metal.

Now, more than ever, Chuck Palianuk's Fight Club makes sense to me. An army of depressed, lonely men, forced to live out their lives in an uncomfortable existance, where masculinity and emotion has left them begging for meaning. Begging for a struggle. Begging for a challenge.

I understand it. I don't want to, but I do. People see me. They're afraid, maybe. Or angered. Or uncomfortable. Disgusted. Anxious. Paranoid. They make wide arcs around me. They're right to do so. Not a day goes by that I don't miss him. Need him. Hurt for him. His absense has rid me of my sense of being. I'm a shell, molded by friends fathers and excessive junk food. I'm sick. I'm uncomfortable. I'm disgusted with who I've become. I wake up every morning, disappointed to breathe. My teeth hurt from the constant grinding, my gut tired from the knotting, my heart sore from the beating.

I don't know what I am. I know I'm tired of being it.