Bill

This contains violence, sexual abuse and alcoholism.

Bill wanted to be a Bill more than anything. Except his name wasn't actually Bill. He joined the Society of Bill's under false pretences. Bill was actually named Bhandanattaram by his mother when he was born. Bill desperately needed his name to be Bill. He believed that by being Bill, instead of being Bhandanattaram, he would somehow succeed at everything in life. He lived with this hope burning inside. His eyes shone with the fervour of it. The light didn't know him either. The light that was always in his eyes was never him, but he really had to change this about the world to be Bill. There was something wrong with the world. Why Bill? Out of all of the names in the world, he just knew it was only with Bill as a name that he could win everything. He could become a very wealthy man. He could be endowed by a great fortune filled and happy life. He could be truly happy as Bill. Bill was everything he ever needed. He didn't find anything much to do with his time however, to change that for himself. He sat and absorbed himself in the name, he echoed inside his mind with the letters of 

B..I..L..L..

It was his mantra. His source for waking up every day. His interrupted thoughts, whenever he was called upon to think outside of being Bill angered him. He was angry about the world not accepting him for being Bill. Bill is beyond being a perfectly prismatic rainbow, he mused. Bill is not me. Oh no! No. No. No! I am Bill. Bill is the joy of life and Bill is the wonder of the cosmos and eternity and everything that is unknown and unseen. Bill is the key to the future. Noone else can be Bill but me. 

When Bill went to the Society of Bill's meeting, he lovingly wrote the word Bill on a label. He stuck it on his left pectoral. He stuck it with a feeling of being sealed in to his destiny. Everything was beautiful and wondrous! A man named Bill approached him and he said, "Hi Bill."

"Hi Bill." He returned to the stranger.

"Where you work?" The stranger Bill asked.

"Oh, I work from home." Bill lied. As he didn't work from home really. He only sat perfectly still in his mouldy room with nothing else in it. Hoping to become the Bill that he knew he could be at any given moment. He had the room as he was given money by his family. They knew he didn't have much. He ruined all the chances at being Bill if he didn't focus utterly upon being Bill. So, he had no other choice. So, it really was work for him. And he was the expert at being Bill. 

"Do you have a wife?" stranger Bill asked.

"Oh yes. I have a wife, but I was married in Tibet as a tradition. We do not see each other now, but we are still married." Another lie. Bill had never been to Tibet in all of his life. He had never even been married. All the while he was sustaining himself with the internally spoken mantra of Bill... Bill... Bill which never stopped. Bill never ended.

"So did you grow up in Tibet?"

"Oh, no. I actually grew up in Nepal." Another lie. He had grown up in the slums of Sri Lanka and his family struck it rich when his father found a lump of gold. His father was not even a miner, he was digging to build a shack to replace their home which was falling apart.

"So when did you change your name to Bill?" Bill froze. Everything stopped around him too. Or he couldn't see it anymore. Because he was not Bill. No! NO! I am Bill, I am Bill! I am Bill!

"I've never changed my name." He actually told the truth, as he could not bring himself to change his name in Sri Lanka, because the documentation would show the name Bhandanattaram. And he was just Bill.

"Oh, so were you born here?"

"No, I was born in Canada." He lied again. But it was okay as he was Bill... Bill... Bill. He was actually born in the dirt of Mullaitivu. Or somewhere around there, as his mother was a drunk and she couldn't really recall any of her 8 sons births. The drunkenness of his mother was also shared by his father. So when they won the big gift of gold, they were instantly off to find the best exchange rate to have a drink to celebrate. 

"Oh, you don't sound Canadian, Bill."

"Well, I was born there as my parents travelled the world. They were very wealthy and have named all of my siblings the names that are reminiscent of the area of birth. But they returned to Tibet to look after me properly, as I was their first born and they had no compulsion for the servants to look after their first-born son!" Bill was Bill. Bill was immaculate. Bill was immaculate. Bill was slipping into words of Sri Lanka. No! He was never there in spirit form. His father was beating him again. No! Bill... Bill... Bill...

"Are you okay Bill? Do you need a drink?" Bill's eyes widened in terror. He swallowed hard. Heart beating erratically. He couldn't think. He was Bhandanattaram, born of alcoholic parents, his father cast out by his family in India. His mother ridiculed by Sri Lankan society for marrying an Indian drunkard.

"No. I think I will need the restroom for a moment." He stepped with leaden legs as he moved through the filth of rubbish piles. No, he wasn't bleeding. No, he wasn't bruised. No, his hand was not hanging limply from his wrist after it was twisted. No..he wasn't here anymore. He wasn't anywhere but here. He was Bill. He was and he was Bill.

He opened the door to the restroom. He stood in front of the urinal. There was another Bill doing his business. He said nothing. He was used to this by now. He had always been Bill. 

He walked out not noticing anything but the stench of the breath upon his face of his mother. Her fetid smell was sweet, never nice. Sweet but sickening. Overwhelmingly sickening. He wasn’t here. He wasn't there. Her breath went away and he felt her mouth on him where his pee came from. He wasn't there!

"Are you Bhandanattaram?" Another Bill asked. 

"NO! I am not! I am not! Please no!!" 

"Oh, sorry, I thought you dropped this." Another Bill handed him a licence. It had fallen out of his pocket! What could he do?

"I am Bill. This is my cousin, we look very similar. I had his licence because he is in hospital and I went to visit. Or he was. He is dead."

"Oh, I am so sorry. Sorry for your loss."