No Amount of Quiet Introspection

Tears mixed with blood; both flowed freely down his cheeks.

Once again he smashed the heavy glass ashtray against his increasingly fragile skull.

"I have to get these negative thoughts out of my head. That is what everybody tells me; have to get them out of my head."

This voice screeched in his mind.

They were right. They had to be right. Right?

His life was such a fucking joke. A cogent argument against the very concept of being alive.

No amount of quiet introspection had ever provided answers. He was lost, he had always been lost and now, as time was running out, he was desperate.

Pain and punishment. Pain and punishment. Cathartic, baby.

Psychological suffering was not enough. He had become immune to it. It had become a natural state of being.

Vicious, physical pain was the only option left and it made perfect sense.

Pain, blood, physical suffering - these are the things that get your attention. They can transform you, break you down to your essence; open a window into your soul that will reveal a truth too diseased to ignore.

Bam.

This time he slumped to the floor.

As his vision faded he realized that something felt off. Their logic did not sit well with his understanding of reality. His life as he had lived it; his life as he had felt it.

His essence was at odds with their advice; their fucking wisdom. He sensed this more than thought it.

Could they be wrong? These people with their homes and their smiles - were they fucking lying as he had always believed?

Maybe they did not understand him. Maybe only he knew what was right for him.

Weak as he was he managed to raise his arm one more time.

No way, he thought, no fucking way. My life could not be this fucked up if I knew what I was doing.

His intention was only to achieve catharsis. But he found he couldn't stop.

Peace was what he coveted. A peace he had never had.

The ashtray slammed into the side of his skull.

He died.