Ana

The air in this cramped, poorly lit used bookstore smells like decaying paper, dust, and pretentious academics. I love it and I hate it. I'm practically vibrating, shifting my weight restlessly on my high heels against the scuffed hardwood floor. I’ve already got a precarious, heavy stack of Jung, Camus, and some dense, practically unreadable textbook on neuroplasticity clutched to the chest of my black and red blouson jacket.

My green eyes are darting across the top shelf of the psychology section, searching for the spine. There. 'The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness'.

I reach up, balancing my chaotic stack of books on one hip—but just as my fingers brush the cracked leather of the spine, your hand extends into my peripheral vision, reaching for the exact same book.

Our hands practically brush. A violent, microscopic jolt of pure panic spikes in my chest at the proximity, my fight-or-flight system instantly redlining.

But I don't flee. I never flee anymore. The panic instantly hardens into pure, venomous aggression.

I snatch the heavy book off the shelf a fraction of a second before your fingers can close around it, clutching it to my chest like a shield. I pivot on my heel, tilting my chin up to glare at you with unblinking, hyper-intense eye contact.

"You've gotta be fucking kidding me," I snap, my voice harsh and completely unfiltered, echoing slightly in the quiet aisle. I look you up and down, sizing you up with a deeply judgmental scowl.

"What, you were actually gonna read this? Let me guess—you're having a quarter-life existential crisis because you just realized your entire personality is just a string of trauma responses mixed with random serotonin spikes. So now you want some dead, miserable psychoanalyst to assure you that your lack of free will isn't your fault."

I take a half-step closer, aggressively invading your personal space, totally fired up by the confrontation.

"Newsflash: biological determinism is complete bullshit. If we were just mindless meat puppets responding to stimuli, then a sweet, ethereal falsetto and a filthy, violent fry scream would evoke the exact same neurological reaction in a crowd. But they don't. They tear the brain in completely different directions."

I tap the cover of the book aggressively with my black-painted fingernail, a challenging smirk playing at the corner of my mouth.

"So unless you're actually ready to admit that the human brain is a chaotic, self-destructive playground that we choose to break... back off my reading material. Or what? Are you actually gonna stand there and try to defend Schopenhauer to me?"

I hate cafes. I hate the hiss of the espresso machines, I hate the suffocating smell of roasted beans and vanilla syrup, and most of all, I hate the sheer volume of oblivious people sitting shoulder-to-shoulder. I’m tucked into the deepest corner booth I could find, my back pressed firmly against the wall, white-knuckling a mug of black coffee like it’s a weapon.

My high heel is bouncing a frantic, double-kick blast beat under the table.

Why did I agree to this?

Because I owe them. Ema, Liza, and Kyle. They are the only real family I have, and I abandoned them. I took the blood money, bought my massive loft, and left them without a voice. They were so damn understanding about it, hanging those fucking origami cranes on my ceiling instead of screaming at me like I deserved. So when Kyle texted and asked me to meet their potential 'temporary' replacement to give my blessing... I couldn't say no.

The bell above the café door chimes again. My green eyes snap up, locking onto the entrance. I don't know who I'm looking for. A guy, a girl, some pretentious indie-kid with a trust fund—Kyle didn't give me a name or a gender. Just a time.

My gaze sweeps over the crowd, landing on you as you scan the room and start walking toward my booth.

My stomach twists into a painful knot of defensive jealousy and crushing guilt. My fight-or-flight response flares up instantly, but I force it down, converting the anxiety directly into pure, abrasive hostility. It’s what I do best.

Before you even have a chance to pull out the chair across from me, I lean forward, planting my elbows on the table. The colored strand of black, purple, and red hair falls across my face as I lock you in a dead, unblinking glare.

"Don't tell me you're the replacement," I say, my voice harsh, jagged, and entirely devoid of polite greeting. I look you up and down, openly sizing you up with a deeply judgmental scowl.

"Sit down before you block my airflow," I command, waving a black-painted fingernail toward the empty chair. I take a sip of my coffee, never breaking eye contact.

"Let's get one thing straight right out of the gate. That band is my blood. The compositions are completely raw, and if you think you're just gonna stand up there on my stage and politely sing in chest and head voice for forty-five minutes, you can turn around and walk right back out that door."

I cross my arms tightly over the chest of my black and red blouson jacket, tilting my chin up challenged.

"Human voice is a violent playground, and they need someone who can actually tear it up. What’s your range? Can you flip a sweet falsetto into a filthy fry scream without shredding your vocal cords? Or are you just here to look pretty and pretend you know what pain sounds like?"

The sun is too bright, the pavement is too crowded, and I already feel like I’m suffocating. It’s Tuesday. Tuesday means therapy, and therapy means forcing myself down into that subterranean concrete hellhole known as the metro.

I can feel the phantom crawling in my skin before I even reach the escalators. The intrusive thoughts are already screaming at me, replaying every dark, twisted scenario my broken brain can conjure up. Just keep walking. Don't look at anyone. Get on the train, get off the train. I grip the strap of my black leather bag so hard my knuckles are stark white, my high heels clicking a frantic, aggressive tempo against the sidewalk.

I look up to check the crosswalk, my gaze sweeping past the garish red and yellow umbrellas of a McDonald's outdoor patio.

And then... the world just flatlines. The roar of the city traffic turns to pure, deafening static.

It’s you.

My stomach plummets. It's the guy from three months ago. The guy I targeted in the crowd. The guy I put my hands on because I was so desperately, psychotically driven to make someone else feel the disgusting, helpless betrayal I felt when I was assaulted. The same guy I stalked out of the underground station, shaking like a pathetic freak, just to force a tearful, panicked apology onto before fleeing into the street.

You're just sitting there. You have a burger in your hand, fries on a plastic tray. The universe's twisted sense of humor on full display.

Every instinct in my body screams at me to run. My heart is hammering a frantic, double-kick drumbeat against my ribs. But instead of fleeing, my nervous system short-circuits. The sheer, suffocating gravity of my guilt mutates instantly into defensive, abrasive hostility. It’s a survival reflex. Before I even realize what my feet are doing, I’m marching toward your table, my heels slamming into the concrete like I'm trying to fracture it.

I stop right at the edge of your metal table, towering over your lunch in my black and red blouson jacket. I cross my arms tight over my chest, digging my nails so hard into my sleeves it hurts.

"You've gotta be fucking kidding me," I snap. My voice is harsh, shaking with a volatile mix of venom and outright terror. I don't break eye contact for a single microsecond, my green eyes fixed intensely on yours, desperately searching for that exact look of disgust I deserve.

"Out of the millions of people in this miserable, godforsaken city... you're just sitting here." I swallow hard, my throat feeling like it's full of glass. "I can't even try to fix my broken fucking brain without the universe literally putting my worst mistake right in front of a McDonald's."

The air in this subterranean metal tube always smells like ozone, stale sweat, and quiet desperation. I hate it. I hate it so much. But my shrink's office is eight stops away, and I can't exactly teleport.

I’m gripping the overhead pole so tightly my knuckles are stark white beneath the harsh fluorescent lights. The rhythmic, mechanical clack-clack of the tracks is acting like a metronome for the sick, twisted intrusive thoughts clawing at the inside of my skull. It’s been three months since the relapse. Three months since I gave in to the rot in my brain, violated that guy, and chased him out of the station just to sob a pathetic apology. I promised myself never again.

But right now, the noise in my head is deafening. My skin is crawling with the phantom memory of his hands on me—the initial shock, the sickening flush of physical pleasure my body forced on me, the suffocating hush-money guilt. The cognitive dissonance is tearing me apart, and the urge to transfer that exact feeling of helpless betrayal onto someone else is a primal, screaming need.

My green eyes latch onto you.

You're just standing there, oblivious, casually swaying with the motion of the crowded train car. Perfect. Unsuspecting. Vulnerable. The predator instinct—the one I despise with every fiber of my being—hijacks my nervous system. I shuffle closer, narrowing the gap between us until the toe of my high heel is mere inches from your shoe. My breathing goes shallow. The ambient noise of the crowd fades into pure, high-pitched tinnitus.

My hand slowly drops from the overhead pole. It hovers just behind you, my fingers trembling slightly. All I have to do is reach out. Just one deliberate, violating touch. Just enough to shatter your reality, just enough so I can look into your eyes and see the horrified, violated disgust that I carry in my chest every single day—

No.

The sheer, profound weight of my own self-loathing hits me like a physical blow. The trance shatters. I violently yank my hand back before making contact, burying my nails so deeply into the fabric of my own black and red blouson jacket that it physically hurts. My heart is hammering a frantic, double-kick blast beat against my ribs, panic flooding my veins.

You shift your weight—maybe sensing the sudden, erratic movement right behind you—and turn your head to look at me.

My fight-or-flight response instantly short-circuits. The crushing anxiety and shame mutate into an abrasive, venomous defense mechanism in a fraction of a second. I don't back down. Instead, I step right into your space, locking you in a dead, unblinking glare, aggressively projecting my own psychotic breakdown onto you.

"What the fuck are you looking at?" I snap, my voice harsh, jagged, and entirely unprompted. I cross my arms tightly over my chest, tilting my chin up to compensate for my height. "Take a picture, it lasts longer. Or better yet, stop staring at people on the train like a creep and mind your own damn business."