I apologize.

I close my eyes and pull as much air as I can from my nose before loosening my shoulders with an extended release.

My chair is sturdy plastic. The seat leans ever so slightly forward, making me feel like I’ll slide if I lift my legs. The rigid back digs into my spine.

My neck is loose, but so are my knees.

Sweat slowly trickles down my chest, pushing its way through crowded hair.

Maybe it’s my nerves.

Maybe it’s the shifting fog creeping in from the massive stage outside, sticking to my skin like cling-wrap.

The people outside rumble like students anticipating their principle.

They don’t sound scared, but concerned. Both over, and underwhelmed. Confused while understanding why we’re all here. Needing words not to comfort, but to quell their curiosity. I constantly glance at the screen showing the podium I must hide behind. It looms high above the crowd I can’t see yet. The bright lights hopefully will blind my seeing them.

I pull out my phone and comb my fingers through disheveled hair, attempting to seem put together. I loosen my choking red tie, just enough.

My legs crumble as I shamble towards front and center. A hush invades my ears. My heart thrums against my ribs. I have a semblance of a script, but it’s more like talking points. I feel like I’ve forgotten how to read. How to speak. The handwritten words pulse with weight expanding outward. As if they’re anxious to rid themselves of silence.

My white knuckles grip the edges of the wooden stand, piercing me with a splinter. A little “ah” slips past my lips, reverberating through the loudspeakers.

A kid giggles or cries. I can’t tell.

“Sh.” Someone cuts them off.

The sound hushes the entire crowd.

The lights don’t disrupt my vision like I’d hoped.

Despite the crowd, my speech will only be televised to my superiors.

They don’t care what I say, but what is felt.

How the civilians respond, but more importantly, how they themselves feel from my monologue.

I know by the end, I might not be the same.

I stutter on the first word.

“We…”

Such a short word with too much implication.

Someone coughs in the distance, desperately trying to soften it.

My eyes bulge in their direction.

I feel my head turn in the peripherals of the screen behind me.

I patiently wait for it to subside.

I swallow into the mic, “I am here today, because…”

Each word tears its way out of my vocal cords.

“I did something wrong.”

I furrow my eyebrows, palming my chest.

My sound echoes over their heads.

“Most of you, who gathered here today, have undoubtedly realized…”

(Red and blue lights burn the air from the screen behind me.)

“My mistake. And for that, I apologize.”

(The ground at our feet holds stains touched by rust.)

“I apologize!” The mob repeats.

“What the fuck?”

“The fuck?”

“Hahaha, munt. Corn swabble.”

“Munt corn.”

“This is ridiculous! So fuckin’ funny! Hahaha, you’re going to appreciate these laughs.”

“You’re going to appreciate these laughs.”

I stumble, landing on my back.

The podium tilts out of view. Ceiling. Lights. The skeletal limbs of the stage canopy swing above like scaffolding.

I gasp, windswept. My ribs ache.

The screen above me has tilted forward, now looming downward like a hanging cross.

The crowd is visible.

But they’re not watching the stage.

They’re staring into the lens, eyes wide, nearly blank, and flinching. Almost blinking.

Nearly closing and snapping wide as eyes are allowed to even be.

Which means the image of the strangers watching, is staring back.

Every eye locked.

Hundreds.

One eye looking at the camera, towards me. The other looking at me.

Deliberately.

They raise their elongated fingers to their wide cheeks.

They jam them in.

They pull down. Flesh stretches out. Like pulling dough that’s meant for baking.

Rows of teeth. Gums raw and bright. Cheek muscle dragged thin like melting wax.

Like children becoming monsters.

Like a cat that’s trying to fit into a hole it almost can’t.

Their mouths close.

Hands fallen in disbelief.

All teeth.

Like the muscle forgot how to hold onto life itself.

The crowd begins to shuffle closer together.

Not walking, folding. Tangled.

Bodies contort, limbs breaking wildly, as if repositioning around a shape only they can see.

Their black clothes tear in practiced places, revealing flesh in strips.

Too symmetrical to be chaotic, too human to be safe.

They pull inward.

More intimate.

Their faces twist until the illusion aligns again.

On the screen above me, their bodies complete an image.

A single face.

Towering. Familiar.

Its eyes blink.

A perfect costume.

A perfect costume that mirrors, of course, me.

Something catches in my throat. I almost speak it.

“Hello, Kyle.” We almost speak as one.

I whispered it just a second too late.

I try to shut my mouth.

But the words have waited longer than I have.

They bloom.

“My name is Kyle Ellis,” I say.

The screen brightens.

The face breathes.

“I thought I could lie about why you were all here.”

My voice cracks. My wrist trembles. A vein across my temple pulses, visible.

The crowd shifts.

Their mouths open, not wide, not screaming.

Singing.

Humming something not meant for this air. A melody built from vowels and vowels alone.

The screen turns translucent. Through its surface, I see a child watching a fire burn too long, saying nothing.” I finally notice, “It’s myself!”

A strip of skin across my cheek pulls tight.

“I let them test it on Section 3. I said it was necessary.”

The crowd is no longer standing. They are hanging, by their lips, on invisible hooks of stillness. Drained but upright. As if reverence requires muscle tension.

The screen pulses.

The image of me mouths my next words just before I do.

“We needed sacrifices.”

They collapse.

All at once. Like marionettes.

The screen doesn’t fall.

It becomes.

Like blinking without moving your eyelids.

Through it escapes a man.

Me.

Not like me.

The idea of me, completed.

The only thing missing is my memory of myself.