#

It happened again!

Every night! Every bloody night… I don’t know if I can take this any longer. I thought that the serum would help, that it would lessen the pain.

No!

Each morning is the same. The knife in my gut is there to wake me up at 7.00 AM like clockwork. I’ve tried everything by now: tee, milk, yoga, meditation… I almost started praying. I even quit on coffee!

No! Nothing works!

It never changes. I wake up with the same jerk in my bowels, the ever-present churning, gnashing, ripping, pulling, twisting feeling. Every morning is the bloody same!

Every dream is the same!

Every time it’s the same!

But… me.

I’m never the same, I can never be the same again. Not after what happened… not after Claudine, beautiful, fair-haired Claudine. My… Claudine!

That’s the only part I don’t regret about the dreams: I get to see your face again, sense you again. I get to be tarnished once more by that sweet waft of vanilla mixed in with a hint of amber.

Oh, Claudine! My beautiful, fair-haired Claudine.

Your skin was the finest silk, your eyes the deepest blue, your touch as gentle and warm as a summer breeze, and all I do is lose you every night… over and over again into eternity.

Why won’t it end?

Why has the world pitted against me so?

Why can’t I get absolution, even from myself?

No!

I don’t deserve it. I should’ve been better. I should’ve trained harder, been faster, smarter, stronger…

Claudine!

Each morning I wake with your name on my lips and your killer’s knife in my gut. You die each night… and I die each morning… always!

The sun is way up in the sky by now; I need to get up, if I could just find the strength.

‘Sir?’

‘Good morning, Alfred!’

‘Good morning, Sir! How are you feeling today?’

‘Dreadful.’

‘That’s great, Sir! I brought you the usual.’

‘Thank you, Alfred!’

‘Don’t mention it, Sir.’

I’m lucky to have him, I’d really be lost without him. Especially now… especially now that the world’s turned against me, decided to torture me, rip my soul from my body, and feast upon it without remorse or doubt.

Why God, why?!

Six months! Six months of this hell and all I can do is crawl through another day hoping that tomorrow will be slightly better. It seldom is… actually… who am I kidding, it never is. It’s shit, every day is shit and every day will be shit from now on. Forever!

At least I’ve got Alfred and his eggs Benedict.

Six months… and who knows how many more to come, and every day some asshole decides to turn up the gas some more.

After that night, at the docks… I thought I’d lose it for good. The pain; it just wouldn’t end. All I could do was pull myself further, inch by inch, it felt as if my soul were being torn apart, bit by bit. Every miserable second spent in the agonizing vision of Claudine’s last glimpse, that look in her eyes… the reproach… the blame… the betrayal… as she understood, and… left.

Oh, Claudine! My sweet, sweet Claudine!

I thought she’d accept me for who I am; I thought she’d see the way I see; feel the way I feel and want… want what I want. But no… not her! She said she’d hurt too much; she said she’d lived too long to be stuck in another man’s lie, no longer able to trust the person behind the mask.

‘All men wear masks,’ I said to her.

‘Yes, but yours is far too heavy,’ she said.

‘I’ll bear it for the both of us!’

‘No!’

And that was it. She left! She abandoned me to my mask, the mask that had sheltered me all these years, kept me sane, pushed me forward. Who would’ve thought it would be my downfall? Who would’ve thought the very thing that had saved me time and time again would crush you… us?

Claudine!

No more… no more of this!

I will no longer hide behind it, no longer allow myself to snicker and crawl underneath its protection like a frightened child, too scared to show the world who I really am. Too scared of its rejection.

And reject me it did.

I had not shown my true face in years and I understood then why: nobody wants you to be yourself. No! Everybody wants you to be themselves, to feed their egos, to show them how precious and unique they truly are. Show them you want nothing more than to be like them, so they can deny you in the end.

Everywhere I went it followed me as a vulture follows the smell of rotting flesh, forever nipping at my heels.

People stared at me, weighed me… judged me… cursed me… no matter what I did, I was no longer one of them. I was different now; I was maskless.

Why? Why would they do such a thing, when it was plain to see how much they hated their own fate? Cursing their own masks, pulling at them with every step, cheating on them whenever alone.

Man is a filthy, vain species, bent to its own vanity, slave to its own delusions.

I cursed them all and marched on, determined on my path, destitute of my power, outcast again… outcast, but finally at home within my skin.

They would stare at me and say, snickering, bitterly:

‘Why aren’t you wearing your mask, Sir?’

‘You can’t enter here without a mask, Sir!’

‘We can’t provide service to you without a mask, Sir!’

Sir! Sir…

On the other end of their words, I was a Sir, in front of their eyes I was a pariah.

When they grew tired of speaking to me, they resorted to signs:

Wear a mask

Always wear a mask on this property

Masks encouraged here

No matter where I went it would follow me, different, but always the same: Wear a mask!

Later they pushed me away…

Please maintain a physical distance of 2 meters at all times

They banned me from the streets, confined me to my home. All because I made a promise… My sweet, sweet Claudine.

I would never allow a mask to alter my future again. I will not allow a mask to chase my love away once more.

I am who I am, and I wish the world to see me as I am.

Time was on my side, and in my pursuit, I am victorious, at last. The heathens have lost their will now and with each second their masks fall down, more each day.

They are reluctant of their own ways, weary of their own murky natures, hungry to see and be seen again. Vanity!

Today I face them again and take solace in this minor victory, and even though their signs stare proudly still and unforgiving, they can no longer deny their nature.

They want to be free as I am…

‘Sorry, Sir. You need a mask to enter the store.’ What’s this? Why is this weirdly shaped woman at the entrance stopping me?

‘Not this again! Look around you, everyone’s free to be themselves now,’ I say.

‘If you mean to say that people aren’t obligated to wear masks anymore, that’s only in open spaces, Sir. You still need to wear one inside.’

‘No!’

‘Then you can’t enter the store,’ she concludes, smiling.

Again, reality rears its ugly head in its attempt to rob me of myself.

‘Sir, you need to wear a mask, if you wish to enter the store.’ she says again, stopping a young man.

‘No, lady! You need to, otherwise they’d go broke,’ he says back to her.

Masks… always the bloody masks. Now I understand! We wear them because people like him, ugly and decrepit on the inside, tear others down, so they no longer feel empty.

I remember now! I wore mine to put a stop to people like him.

‘Stop, you punk!’ I yell as my training kicks in and launch for his throat. I will wipe the lipsticked smirk off his face. If not for Claudine, then for the weirdly shaped woman.

‘Who do you think you are, asshole!’ the joker asks, surprised.

‘I’m Batman!’ And proud of it!