One by Julian Strachan

I know you think I'm crazy. Believe me, I get it. To be quite honest I believe it too. I've always been the different one, the rogue that always tried to subvert the group. I would plan out my day so I could enjoy the sight of ruining another beautiful one for everyone. In a way it put me in control. You never know when I'm going to strike. Until I do. Unless you're the “one.”

I had always conceived of the “one” as a male, able to defeat me through means of physicality. It turns out she was able to undo me through my mind. Never have I felt so afraid as I was when she penetrated my mind and turned me into a husk of what I had previously been.

My soul hollowed out as a result of the rape perpetuated by this girl. What a foil she was to me, I the perfect image of solitude and extraordinary ability, she, complete normality. Not tall nor short. Not lean nor husky. Not popular nor disliked. Brown hair, brown eyes, decent person, what is this? There is nothing different about her, how was she the “one.”

I guess it comes from being the opposite. I am the sky, the earth, the soul. I tether all around me to a common level of consciousness. You could say I was made in the image of god, but this girl, this “one” was my undoing. My desire to undermine the people destroyed me for she could not be undone. How could there be?

She was the image of baseline, there was nothing to fall from. She did not occupy the peak of any skill, any style, anything. My only skill in life, my only goal in life was subverted. How ironic, me the king of all subversion destroyed by my own hubris.

It was quick. Faster than I expected, actually I had never imagined anything ever happening, how could anything ever happen? But it was swiftness at its finest. I met her on a Friday night, or maybe Saturday, perhaps Thursday, time is of no concern for me. I was quietly subverting the people around me, spitefully it may seem, but more objectively than that. She caught me. It was my first time getting caught.

It was a shock. Her only inquisition was her cold stare. My heart fell, she had me by the neck yet she didn't kill me. I knew until she did that we were linked indefinitely by her thick noose that signaled my servitude. Life began to drain from me from that point on. It has been years, decades, centuries and even millennia since I have seen that plain, quotidian girl and yet I remain a framework. The mass of my entity destroyed.

I was a king and now a lonely fool. What did I do to deserve this. How did I lose on my field. I should rest on it, but my rest is too long. If it must be eons until I understand then I will remain steady in my quest for knowledge. This “one” fooled me, and destroyed me. Subversion it seems is really the tool of an imbecile, my crazy self.


Julian Strachan is currently a rising senior in High School. When not writing short, weird excerpts of writing, he enjoys writing about politics on his blog Thoughts on the World (http://jstrachan7.blogspot.com), and doing other teenager-esque things. He can be reached at his email: julian_strachan@georgeschool.org.