4

So I would say there’s a fifty percent chance that I’m pulling this crazy shit just to keep you guessing, and that the other two thirds chance is that I’m actually insane. But then again, think about how long you’ve known me. I’m nothing if not talented at mind games.

I mean, think about the other night, when you were doing things you shouldn’t’ve been doing, and I was trying to write my goddamned English paper. “Stop it,” I snapped when you started playing with the ends of my hair. Let me tell you, it’s not joke, writing a rhetorical analysis of Winston Churchill’s “Iron Curtain” speech when someone’s tugging on you.


But you wouldn’t know, not only because I wasn’t playing with the ends of your hair, but because you didn’t do the goddamned assignment. I mostly hated you bastard underachieving types, going wherever you wanted on pure talent, with zero effort. I had talent and I tried and I still always got a few points lower on exams.

You rolled over and let your head thunk onto the floor to show you were sulking. Baby. “You’re no fun, anymore,” you moaned, plucking at the loose fibers of my rug. You knew I hated that. But I only had two paragraphs to go, so I ignored you and looked at my notes, instead. “Emily.” You turned back over when you realized I wasn’t going to pay attention to you, even if you were destroying my belongings. “I am bored. Entertain me.” I pretended I didn’t catch the not-so-subtle innuendo in your words.

I found it quite hilarious that you wanted me, actually. We had been friends for forever and a day, or at least since middle school. And then you hit puberty (hilariously late, might I add) and were like, What? Girls? Girls?! Oh, wait, no worries, Emily has boobs. And I did, because you missed the ball by like three years. Seriously.

But the reason it was so funny was that we’d told my mother you were gay, so she wouldn’t give us a hard time about us studying in my bedroom. And it wasn’t as if I didn’t enjoy horrifying my intolerant, Bible-thumping mother, as my hooking up with a former gay dude would certainly do. So, yeah, I might’ve hooked up with you, if my mom hadn’t had the sheer balls to say she was still uncomfortable with my having a boy in my room, because you might “return to normal.”

Oh, yes. She went there. The woman was a hate crime waiting to happen.

Yeah, she told me that you “weren’t immune, Emily Jean, you know,” whatever the hell that meant. I was so pissed off at that, I almost told her I had a Young Satanists of America meeting that day. But I wanted to make her mad, not kill her.
That’s the main reason I never hooked up with you. I really wanted to prove her wrong.

“Emily,” you moaned again, because you’re a needy bastard with ADD and are just annoying. “It’s a Friday. I am bored. I want to go out.” Seriously, if I had known you getting your license was going to be such a hassle, I would have shot you on the day of your driver’s test. “You stupid hack, stop writing your goddamned essay. It’s not due until Monday. I’m not even doing mine. You win. See? Let’s go.”

Usually you talk to yourself in a rambling way for much longer than you did that night. I hadn’t quite finished when you started in on the poking.

(Author's note: Part one of three of an assignment that I finally wrote as Red, published during the color month. I think it's kind of funny to see the thought process I went through to come to a killing maniac. The assignment was my alter ego, who was to be named Emily.)