Planet Baffled

Posted by Isaiah Joshua Lawrence

The following story is based on true events, depicting the lifestyle of what it is like to grow up as an incel (involuntary celibate), enlightening you about the possible physical abuse, emotional trauma, and financial inclusions and/or exclusions. This convoluted story that I attempt to simplify with feelings, views, and beliefs is to spread awareness about the misconceptions of involuntary celibates.

What is an involuntary celibate? An involuntary celibate is a member of an online community who has a desire to have a romantic relationship or have sex, but no matter what they do, it is impossible. There are theories that the person can be not following romantic tips (which are looked at by even women advancing to newer tips), that they are not extroverted, or anything you can think of. They are considered mentally challenged by some people (and that is not to say that some incels do not experience mental issues), but the involuntary celibates can have normal working jobs and go around unidentified as the label involuntary celibate.

Incels are actually just living in a strange world and this story, which uses some real events that I experienced and heard about, will reveal what exactly makes them incels. Introverts can find girlfriends, just as those with mental and physical disabilities can. Mentally challenged people can find relationships and gave sex even more often than regular people, however mental cells do exist (which is being an incel caused by mental illness or a psychological disorder).

To be celibate means to abstain from marriage and sexual relations, usually for religious reasons. Not everybody in the world has the desire to be celibate. How is it possible that people not experiencing mental or physical disabilities are avoided by women?

Incels can be attractive or unattractive. The way that you look is a factor in forming relationships at times, but it is not always the deciding factor. There has to be a much deeper reason as to why someone is an incel.

An incel is short for an involuntary celibate, but a volcel is a voluntary celibate. Volcels have opportunities to have sexual activities, but abstains from them. A person could abstain from sex because of their faith. Maybe they fear the sexual activity, despise the thought of it, or any reason to basically voluntarily not have sex. A volcel is more respected in comparison to an incel because at least a volcel chooses not to have sex.

All involuntary celibates are not misogynists or are a threat to society, deserving to be in a terrorist group. Sometimes, the world is not always what it seems, but from my experience and others, I’ve picked up on some things that makes people involuntary celibates.

What is a femcel? A femcel is a female who cannot find a romantic relationship or sexual partner despite desiring one. The idea of what a femcel is differs from person to person. Some people think that a beautiful woman does not have the right to call themself a femcel, regardless if they are celibate or not. Some people are fine with females claiming to be femcels.

How is it even possible to be a femcel if most men want sex. All a femcel has to do is flirt with a guy and she can get a romantic partner or sex, right? It cannot be that easy in a strange world.

For this hopefully thought-provoking story in particular, I will cover heartrending scenes involving toxic masculinity, bullying (including cyberbullying), sexism in the media and entertainment industry, workplace discrimination, victim-blaming, etc. If your plans are to skim through this story to see how everything unfolds, then it is your decision.

It is not in my heart to write out the well-known words of profanity or racial slurs, but surely, it can register in your mind where profanity can be said by the characters. Anyone can be offended by anything, especially in a politically correct society, but from what I know is moral, I try my best to do.

To show the depths with ongoing scenes of trauma from childhood to adulthood can lead some people to have sympathy. The aim is to gain sympathy and if not that, to have victims of the stigma of not having a romantic relationship or having sexual intercourse ultimately defines who you are.

Some scenes may be graphic, but it is to deliver the emotional whereabouts for how serious the subject matter is. Often, involuntary celibates are mocked and misunderstood. There are people with good and bad intentions labeled as involuntary celibates, but there are people with good and bad intentions in life in general. If anything, nobody in the world is unwanted because Jesus loves them. Even though the world may be against you, you have to defy the odds. “If the world hate you, ye know that it hated me before it hated you”—John 15:18.

Be willing to lose everything in the world, no matter how meaningful your jobs are. Be willing to exclude yourself from family members, friends, and/or even strangers if necessary. The illusion is that something is wrong with the involuntary celibate. Maybe you’ve said the right things to form a relationship and still, time after time, even though you came out of your comfort zone, things do not work out.

To be an involuntary celibate brings forth skepticism in numerous people. Can you fathom being an involuntary celibate? How can you possibly be in your 30s, 40s, or 50s and over without having a relationship or sexual experience? Maybe someone would wonder if you practiced semen retention or are simply not trying to engage in sexual practices because of your faith. There are plenty of involuntary celibates that are not practicing a faith that would restrict them of living out their fleshly desires and obviously, there are some women getting more attention from romance scammers than men. There are plenty of promiscuous women and to know such a thing would make the average person think that there is no reason anyone should be an involuntary celibate. You may be in the friend zone or you may be so despised, you cannot be friended.

Keep Jesus first in your life. No matter what you go through, people will try to harm you rather it is from a form of jealousy, a form of hatred, or a form of unusual happiness (like killing for sport).

Chapter 1:

Depression In A Drive-In Theater

A blond boy with ocean blue eyes is only 11-years-old with long wavy hair, riding in the back seat of a 1970s era station wagon on the left side. He is wearing a black beanie hat, aviator-style silver prescription glasses, a blue winter coat with a black scarf over a brown and grey, horizontally striped Henley shirt, black, insulated, microfiber gloves, blue corduroy pants, and white running shoes.

His brown-eyed brother, Darius, is 2 years older than him, (wearing a black beanie hat, grey winter coat with a white scarf over a white, cotton, hooded sweatshirt, black, insulated, microfiber gloves, blue jeans, and black gym shoes). A couple of years ago, his clothes rightfully belonged to Darius, who is sitting on the right side of him. All of the clothes that Darius owns are store-bought while his younger brother owns hand-me-downs. Everything the younger brother owns are hand-me-downs, except for a pair of white, wool socks that his 76-year-old grandmother gave him last Christmas.

The car still manages to have a new car smell from faithfully cleaning the mats (by placing baking soda and vinegar around them, letting it sit overnight, and vacuuming it the following day), using washable car seat covers, and dusting off the dashboard with a quality microfiber towel. It has wheel arch extensions and is not trusted at an automatic car wash, possibly leaving visible scratches on the paint job, hard water stains, or damages from misaligning the car on the conveyer belt.

Carl, his dad in his mid-30s (wearing a black beanie hat, a wool, black pea coat with a black scarf over a green, hooded puffer vest, black, insulated, microfiber gloves, blue jeans, and tawny, mahogany dress shoes) is driving the station wagon across a dirt trail with 9 inches of snowfall, then across black ice. 1970s funk music is playing and he sees Angie, his mother, in the passenger’s seat (who also has black, insulated, microfiber gloves, is wearing a white beanie hat, red winter coat with a yellow scarf over a black puffer vest, which is over a silk, blue off-the-shoulder top, and below are white jogging pants, and black, leather sandals), holding a cigarette out of a half-opened side window. She extends her left hand back and Darius spits out cherry-flavored chewing gum into her palm.

Watching the yuckiness that could take an eternity to delete from his mind that hunts him, his mother throws the used gum into a half-full silver trash can with a steel bar construction and a powder-coated finish. He looks at Darius, who does not seem to wonder the slightest how a mother could deal with touching the germs of her children. Then, after she opens up the glove compartment to search for hand sanitizer, she pours some in her hands. She turns the car stereo off.

“It was getting to the best part,” his dad says, enduring the painstaking silence.

He turns back on the car stereo, but this time softly sings along with the lyrics.

It is 6:45 P.M. and Carl is already showing signs of being sleepy, having bags under his eyes and nearly dozing off on the road.

“Let me drive the car. Get in the passenger’s seat and I’ll drive the rest of the way,” Angie says.

“I got this. I know what I’m doing. My cousin served twenty years in the Marines Corps in infantry and when he made it back to this country from Afghanistan, he never would shut up. So I could not get any sleep. I know how to stay up. I have the fighting spirit.”

“Hand me the key,” she says with a frantic look.

Carl stops the car on the road, hands Angie the car key, exits the car to walk in the dust, dirt, grime, and snow, and exchange seats with his wife. They shut the side of the doors simultaneously. Angie drives the car and turns the car stereo off. She notices that a red sports car is tailgating her, so she honks her horn and speeds up. When the red sports car make a left turn at an intersection, she continues to drive ahead.

Darius is making silly faces as if his younger brother is still a baby. He switches his face from having a cross eyed appearance while grinning, to making a dramatic smiling face that could be everlasting. The younger sibling ignores the ongoing stares by looking out his side of the window, only for Darius to poke him, then pinch him. He looks back, only to laugh out of frustration. A silent laughter erupts from Darius, just for him to make silly faces at driver’s on the road as if it will not escalate to a childlike road rage.

When the younger brother pokes Darius to make a silly face (smiling long), Carl turns around and says, “Stop playing around.”

Darius laughs and his younger brother is embarrassed, reluctant to horseplay.

Angie makes a right turn into a drive-in movie theater. Snow is falling from the night sky. A movie trailer starts immediately on the big screen, then the same red sports car from earlier parks beside the station wagon. The driver of the sports car is wearing an orange hooded coat and is kissing on a female as if she is getting exceedingly more beautiful by the second. In the back seat of the sports car, there is a brunette, so beautiful to him, she may as well stretch his uvula and give him a how-to guide to watch an outdoor movie.

Angie digs in a black, leather bag and hands everybody in the car a bag of salted popcorn and says to her children, “Brush your teeth when we get back home. Don’t forget,” then pass her husband a bottle of the sriracha sauce.

“The internet says that back when sugar first came to England in the eleventh century, it became a luxury treat, reserved for the rich. Nearly everyone would try to afford sugar and purposefully blacken their teeth. Now, having white teeth is a good thing,” the younger brother says.

Darius with garlic breath says, “That sounds so stupid.”

The mother says, “I don’t care. I drove down here to watch a movie.”

She digs in her bag again, but this time handing her husband a white blanket, Darius a tan blanket, and Darius’ brother a light blue blanket. For herself, she pulls out a separate white blanket. Everyone cover themselves to stay warm.

Carl says, saying, “Sugarcane fieldworkers had to work relentlessly for their masters in Barbados in the 1640s and that wasn’t a good thing. Everything that you see the mass majority doing is not good. In the mid-nineteenth century, doctors tried the unsuccessful method of using a whirling chair to stop schizophrenia and other mental illnesses. Do you think the whirling chair works because everyone back then trusted the doctors? Back then, people thought cigarettes was the cure for asthma and now, we all know that cigarettes cause asthma.”

“Listen to your father,” she says.

Darius, whose breath smells like undercooked tapioca (which would have cyanide in it) says, “I didn’t know that. How does it cause asthma.”

The younger brother lowers his face they his parents give a lecture about why smoking is unhealthy when the movie starts. When the younger brother looks at the screen, he hears nothing but Darius yelling, “I can have yellow teeth if I want! It was cool back then!”

“Don’t raise your voice at me!”

The argument continues and even when the younger brother cannot hear the dialogue coming from the big screen, he sees Carl’s enraged face get in the way when Darius changes the subject to how he is the king of the universe and angry. All he can recall from the first 5 minutes of the movie are real-life arguments that got in the way of him from watching the visual imagery, even seeing Angie’s face move in the direction that he is looking. It gets to the point that Darius says that he can be a better actor on those in the big screen, not realizing that nobody drove miles away from their home with the hopes and dreams of seeing interrupt an outdoor movie.

Instead of looking at the action-packed movie, which was highly anticipated, stargazing in the cold car, or putting forth an effort to fall asleep, the younger brother looks out of his side window at the brunette in the sports car. The anonymous girl finally turns her head out of the darkness and she looks like she is his exact age. She has brown freckles on her cheeks. Out of nothing better to do, she stares at him with sympathy, seeing an argument take place around him and he stares at her with sympathy, seeing her parents busy making out. The boy removes his right hand from a hand-warmer and decides to eat his popcorn and she starts to eat hers.

High humidity from outside causes condensation to occur on the car windows. The younger brother can no longer see the girl’s face in the back seat of the sports car, so he wipes the condensation off with his hands, only to notice that she does the same thing in her car. Again, the windows fog up and if their family were actually watching the movie, they would probably enjoy it with their windshield wipers on. He wonders why the lenses on his aviator glasses are not fogging up.

The little girl uses her fingers to draw on her side of the fogged up car window. It is not until he hurriedly wipes the fog from his side of the window, he can see the drawing. It is a drawing of a sad face.

He writes, “Hey, tailgater.”

“I don’t talk to strangers,” she writes.

“Suit yourself,” he writes.

Horns to numerous cars honk while there are boisterous complaints about the ongoing argument, then there are arguments about other strangers arguing.

Carl yells, “It’s too cold to open the window. I’m gonna say this one time only. Mind your business.”

Before a stranger from a separate car walks over to tap on Carl’s car, Angie, who is in the driver’s seat, drives away. Nothing but the look of disappointment is wrapped on Darius’ younger brother’s face, but when he looks at Darius, he has a furious face, until he spots a spider crawling beside him.

“There’s a spider back here,” Darius says.

Angie laughs, saying, “Spiders are more afraid of you than you are of them. They’re smaller than you. Sit on it.”

“Do as your mother says. Crying about a spider. You babies love that superhero who loves spiders, swinging from vine to vine in the jungle. You know that superhero swinging from those vines. Real vines cannot support a human’s body weight. That may be why the feral child learned to braid rope out of grass fibers, swinging from branch to branch. It’s uncommon to expect superheroes. It’s unnatural. You want to see a real superhero, then get over your fear and sit on that spider.”

A laughing Darius says, “That’s the wrong movie.”

“I don’t watch these movies. I like me an action and thriller movie. You can’t go around being afraid of bugs your whole life. Microscopic germs are on you right now that look like spiders and you just can’t see them. Bugs will crawl on you in your grave,” Carl says.

With how often there are arguments during movies, Darius’ brother is not surprised that Carl would not know the name of a popular superhero. Thank goodness that Carl’s comment was not yelled out at the drive-in theater. The embarrassment is just a regular day.

A half an hour later, Carl and Angie exit the car at the gas station. Immediately, Gustave knows that he is about to hear a pointless rant.

The moment Carl and Angie are away, Darius says, “I would’ve whooped my dad’s…”

“What would that solve,” Gustave says.

“I ain’t scared of him. They kept talking while I was trying to watch a movie! That’s all I was trying to do! They don’t know how angry I can get!”

Darius gets impulsive, striking Gustave in the ribs multiple times, then in the kidney. While Gustave gasps for air, Darius heavily breathes, as if his voice is on heard on an intercom. Gloom and doom seems to engulf Gustave’s entire life.

“How are you gonna be anything in this world if you can’t fight,” Darius says, then says, “Sometimes, I have to accept losing. I have to deal with my emotions. If you weren’t my brother, I’d kill you. I think about killing everyone at times, I could kill you while you’re awake and asleep. There’s plenty of time to think about that after what I do. Who’s your celebrity crush? I’m trying to get closer to you because you’re my brother.”

“I don’t have one.”

“Sure you do. I know you. I’ve known you all my life and you like a celebrity. Oxy. You like Oxy.”

“No.”

“She looks like a boy. You and Oxy having ugly children. My children could whoop your children’s…”

An ambulance passes by with sirens on. When the sound of the doors unlock, suddenly, Darius gets quiet. Carl opens the passenger’s seat and sits in, then Angie opens the drivers seat to hand Carl a plastic bag. She closes the door to pump the gas while Carl hand Gustave and Darius the same bag of chips.

Carl says, “You all can share.”

Sharing is fine. It is an act of kindness. The problem with sharing is wondering if the person you share something with is sanitary. If someone shares their feelings, it is another story, but if someone shares food, then that is when sharing is an issue.

Sometimes, Darius kicks his fingers after eating in a bag of chips that is shared and if Gustave makes a face of disgust, Darius laughs, only to continue eating. Sometimes, Gustave does not wash his hands and even though there is currently no hand sanitizer around, he wonders what the mentally challenged Darius placed his hands? Did Darius lick the bottom of a shoe again? Did Darius touch on a toilet seat, only to think that the germs would come off by rubbing his hand on one of Carl’s pants, in his cluttered room? Did he use his fingernails to brush his teeth instead of a toothbrush and toothpaste again? It is as gross as when Darius refuses to properly do the dishes, only to pour water on them without using any dishwashing liquid. Thus, Darius eventually licks his hands, making Gustave no longer wanting to eat out of the bag of chips.

It could be worse. It could be that Carl wants Gustave to share a green drink with Darius every day, making Gustave to miss out on his nutrients, even though he imagines himself being a professional wrestler. Many children dream of being a professional wrestler. Wanting to kill a villainous wrestler as a child, then growing up not wanting to, is viewed as sane behavior, especially after the villain insults the underdog and constantly pummels the character. Some children do not express feelings of wanting to kill a televised wrestler. Even though he dreams of being a professional wrestler, he is unsure if he takes enough calories or is allowed to exercise like his on-screen heroes. Watching professional wrestling is an outlet to any pent-up anger that he has.

The following day, Angie drives Gustave and Darius over to her mother’s house on the south side of Chicago, which is the slums. A somewhat excited Gustave is wearing a yellow jersey, blue jeans, and white, rinky-dink gym shoes. Darius is wearing a blue, denim jacket, black jeans, and white gym shoes. While Angie talks to her mother, they stand around under the hot sun for about 5 minutes, until they get permission to go upstairs from Angie’s mother.

After waving goodbye to Angie, they head upstairs on the third floor. Tonight is the night that professional wrestling should be coming on and when grandma, who is seated on a bed, is channel surfing, she sees professional wrestling. Darius, who is seated in the corner laughs, eating a bowl full of grits.

“Your mother allows you to watch wrestling. I don’t watch wrestling. This stuff is real. Ooh! Look at that hit. That’s real,” she says, then turns the channel, making Gustave cry.

Darius and grandma laughs at him.

“You’re crying because you can’t watch wrestling,” grandma says, “You need to be reading the Bible.”

An hour later, Grandma rises up to use the washroom, but while Gustave and Darius are walking down the hall, grandma opens the door, topless, seated on the toilet. It is similar to how Carl uses the washroom with the door open sometimes, but why would Angie’s mother willingly open the door naked around minors? She acts surprised, using profanity, saying, “Don’t sneak up on me like that” and slams the door as Gustave and Darius run into her room in disgust.

Grandma’s son is named referred to as Dinky. Gustave is unsure if that is his real name, but everyone calls him Dinky. He plays video games and listens to the rap music that Dinky plays in his bedroom, only after getting permission to go into his room. Why would somebody be called dinky? It means small or insignificant.

When it is 10:00 P.M., Gustave and Darius are instructed to sleep in the same bed as grandma. Even though Gustave remains sound asleep, grandma wakes up to constantly say, “Stop moving.” Surely, Gustave is not moving. Could it be a the neighbors downstairs, an earthquake, her imagination, or Darius (who is only going to laugh about this memorable experience, claiming that he was not moving). Thus, grandma grabs a black, leather belt and whoops both, Gustave and Darius.

Chapter 2:

Here We Go Again

It is 8:00 A.M. on a Sunday and Angie is (wearing a black, backwards baseball cap, leather, green jacket, blue jeans, and red gym shoes) on an elevator with her children. Darius is wearing a blue sleeveless jacket over a short-sleeved white shirt, grey jorts, and gym shoes. Darius’ younger brother is now bald, wearing a blue, distressed denim jacket over an orange t-shirt, wrinkled, blue jeans, and black gym shoes.

Angie says, “Darius. Gustave. Who do you want to live with the most? Do you want to live with your dad or me?”

Gustave says, “Why can’t we choose both? That’s not fair.”

Darius says, “Dad is cool.”

Angie says, “You can only choose one.”

Worrying how he may be separated from his brother if he says that he’d rather stay with his mother, Gustave says, “Yeah. Dad is cool.”

A frown appears on Angie’s face, but she hides it, then walks off the elevator with them. She unlocks the doors with her black car key and heads to a black sports car. Simultaneously, Angie, Darius, and Gustave enters the car.

Before Angie drives the car to a movie theater, where they watch a thriller-mystery movie, she picks up a man with long, black braids that they never saw before, named Gene. Gene is wearing a beige, backwards baseball cap, a beige trucker jacket, green jeans, and beige gym shoes. The man steps in the passenger’s seat and gives Angie two long, official kisses, which is an appalling event for Gustave.

At the phase of slightly still believing in the cooties, Gustave cannot fathom why anyone besides his dad would want to plant their lips on his mom, but Darius currently presents a carefree attitude. What about seeking a relationship counselor for Angie to work things out with Carl? Knowing about his parents mean streak, he prefers not getting involved in their business, even though some of their business is in his face.

Monday

On the following morning at 5:10 A.M., Gustave wakes up from the bottom bunk bed in a fetal position and does not see Angie anywhere in the apartment. He searches the rooms, even searching in the closets and under the beds. After asking Carl where Angie is, he hears, “Your mother is in Tennessee. She can visit every now and then.” It occurs to him that Angie is not going to be frequently arriving. Gustave did not know that their words would have repercussions and somewhat feels responsible for her leaving.

He returns back to his bedroom and Darius, who did not wash up for 48 whole hours, is stretching, then decides to play electronic music. Darius dances and forcefully starts a conversation.

“I had a dream that my dad was trying to date my girlfriend. He was trying to. It make me think he’ll do that for real. What did you dream about.”

“I usually just dream about darkness. I don’t know how to have dreams.”

“I have an endless amount of dreams. It’s the reason I’m so creative and I could say why you’re inspired by me. I can help you have dreams. Imagine yourself having a girlfriend. Think about how kind and charming she is. Try dreaming about that. When , my dad was trying to date my girlfriend. Now, you’re making me angry because I think you’re trying to date her. My conclusion is that you’re the only one in the family with blond hair and blue eyes and it’s time that you find out who your real parents are! Dream about that.”

“I am not inspired by you and I am not trying to date your girlfriend. I’m not even attracted to her,” Gustave says, finding the mere thought of dating Luna to be ghastly.

Darius thunderously punches Gustave in the kidney and his glasses fly off his face, then when he gets back up, Darius punches him in the chest, only to perform professional wrestling submission moves that would be broadcasted on national television. Gustave is angrily crying in despair, but Darius removes Gustave’s glasses to wear them, saying that if he can dream about perfect vision, he does not need glasses.

“Why can’t you see clearly,” Darius says, yelling with his breath blowing in Gustave’s face, “Who do you like? Imagine that her butt is just an inflated balloon, then you’ll be able to see. Who do you like? That Ashley Pulse? Ah. You like Ashley Pulse. She’s ugly. See. I got jokes. I know you can see how ugly she is.”

“Who do you like,” Gustave says.

“I like goth women,” Darius says.

Gustave knows that Darius’ girlfriend, Luna is nowhere near being goth.

“What about Luna?”

“Luna is a tomboy. She likes what I like. I like goth women!”

“Has anyone ever called you a goth before? Do you know what emo is?”

“No. Why are you asking me questions. Now, you made me forget what I was about to say.”

“What do you like about goths?”

“Stop! I like goths,” Darius says, then uses profanity, saying, “I pray to be the one person to save the world. I want everyone’s problems. I want everyone’s anger in exchange for them having peace.”

Gustave gets dressed up for school without his glasses, slips on his brown backpack, then before exiting the apartment, Darius hands him his glasses. Gustave waits outside on top of a hill for a school bus. Several children his age are around, then Darius rides his bicycle pass them, shouting, “You ugly!” The children start laughing as his brother rides his bike toward a separate school. Children at the bus stop make fun of the way Gustave look from how he is nearly growing a unibrow and to how he is skinny. Some children even call him ugly, make fun of his glasses, and laugh that he does not wear the latest clothes.

Finally, the school bus arrives, but that is when a rotund boy with a black buzz cut pushes Gustave into the back seat of the bus and pummels him in the face and body and he gets laughed at by everyone. The bus drives off and the bully threatens him to not tell anybody about what happened, even though there is a camera on the bus.

During English class, Gustave is sitting at a round, wooden, brown table. A male student is sitting to the right side of him and his blond substitute teacher is sitting across of him, wearing a blue and white floral maxi dress.

She says, “If we were all sitting the way you’re sitting, we’d be kissing each other.”

Expressing his disgust, even though the substitute teacher is adorable, he lowers both of his hand from his chin, to where his elbows are not touching the surface of the table. He still believes in the cooties. It does not occur to him to question if a substitute teacher is supposed to say such a comment.

Eventually, Gustave exits the English class to head to the bathroom, then sees a male with a black, low fade say, “I can get Ben to stop picking on you on one condition.”

“What’s that,” Gustave says.”

Ben unzips and lowers his pants and tells Gustave to suck his phallus. Gustave stares at the horror because it is the first private area of a stranger that he saw before and he does not totally know what being straight, gay, or bisexual means. Ben laughs with a perverted smile like Gustave is a form of monetary gain.

Ben then moves toward the bathroom stall, telling him to come closer. Gustave walks away without performing a sexual act. He is at the age where he does not even know what sexual intercourse is and feels extremely uncomfortable around a boy asking such a thing.

Later, Gustave imagines that stratus clouds form in the sky. He is on the playground and sees a redheaded girl (with curly hair) by the name of Jesse kissing the same bully from earlier. They are both hanging from the durable monkey bars. An evil thought enters Gustave’s mind, then he picks up a deformed conglomerate, which is tan and 149 millimeters. He climbs to the top of the monkey bars, being right above the anonymous bully. Then, he brutally strikes the bully in the face, thus, the bloody bully loses his grip from the monkey bars and smacks his head and back against the grassy terrains. Most of the children look in complete shock, only for several of them desperate to speak about the devastation. Gustave drops the bloody rock that he used as a weapon, seeing that the bully is crying, only to be banned from watching television at home when his dad finds out.

The overall power and performance of Gustave’s survival skills are top notch. That is basically because he stops imagining the feel-good moment, which was a nauseating for the viewers that he imagined. Going through with actually murdering others feels pointless to him, knowing he could lose the possibility of having a good paying dream job, a house, and a woman with mutual feelings by his side in the future.

The moment a yellow school bus parks outside of his complex, down the street, Gustave is confused about how to get get back to his apartment. He wonders around, frightened that he may never see his family again or that he may be homeless. He wonders thinking that a serial killer or an alien may meet up with him. Maybe he may be a victim of human trafficking due to heading back and forth with a nervous look, but a brunette named Beverly (wearing a ponytail and light blue, denim overalls) approaches him.

“Do you know where you’re going,” Beverly says.”

“I’m lost. I’m trying to find my apartment.”

“I’ll help you find your place.”

Beverly walks with Gustave in front of the door to his apartment. He thanks Beverly and walks inside, heading back. Brave Beverly could’ve been lured into a trap where a grown up could’ve snatched her and put her into child trafficking, but she decided to help assist Gustave. Maybe she likes something about him.

While he feels like he is on punishment, he sees Carl outside kissing a brunette (with side-swept bangs, a brown, quilted bomber jacket over a long-sleeved, white, chiffon shirt, a black, cotton tiered skirt, and yellow, suede moccasins) named Vinnie, then sees him swinging her around in circles by her hands while the sprinklers are on. The laughing couple get dizzy and after he positions Vinnie on her two feet, he nearly slips. Carl seems happier with Vinnie than with Angie, until he notices him watching. The audacity of him watching at a happy moment gets him humiliated.

“What you lookin’ at! Get in the house and do them dishes. Smile. Just staring with a grumpy look, like one of those horror movie.”

Vinnie laughs at the comment. Carl gazes into her eyes as if though she has the Eve gene. He behaves like it’s a discreet relationship, even though they show public displays of affection at times. If there is another family reunion, the couple will not show public displays of affection. She is supposedly a Jehovah’s Witness and he was supposedly raise to live according to the Bible, to strictly preach to his children about the spirituality.

Meanwhile, Darius shows up and says, “You need to learn to fight.”

“Does everyone have to know?”

“If I say so. Your business is my business.”

“No it’s not.”

Darius makes disparaging remarks out of anger, “And what are you gonna do when you get an overweight wife and two crippled children speaking Korean? I think they’ll talk like this,” then makes a blasphemous remark, “I’ll knock Jesus out if I get to heaven and see you. He’ll be like, ‘Let’s all be friendly’ and I’m gonna be like, ‘Why’d you let me live like this on Earth,’ and knock Him out! If He’s so powerful, do something about it! I don’t see God. Where is He,” then says, “You’re gonna grow up and start dating a man. I already have a girlfriend. Why don’t you have one?”

“Leave me alone,” Gustave says.

Darius, who could be suffering from megalomania, kicks Gustave in the testicles (like his actions are inevitable), saying “God did not give us food. I did,” then resort to choking him on the floor, all while smiling. He positions his feet over Gustave scrawny arms, fogs up his glasses by intentionally blowing his reeking hot breath on the lenses, removes the glasses from his defenseless victim and tosses them on the floor, beside the living room couch.

A problematic Darius already has his body weight on top of his younger brother. The younger brother cries in agony and despite being pummeled, he avoids striking back. Punching back could just manage for Darius to never forget being a punched, resulting in murderous thoughts. The younger brother has the dreams of being successful at something in life, but really wants to be independent, never to experience his future with his family.

Darius says, “Defend yourself. Look at what they’re trying to do to your wife. Defend yourself,” then yells like he is the victim, “I tried to warn him that I get angry! He kept talking to me and I get angry! He needs to fight others! I can beat up anyone! I can stop the whole world! I can pick up the whole world, plus Mount Everest!”

Finding Fault in Darius’ action, Gustave thinks about murdering him by whacking him with a hammer if he falls asleep at night. He thinks about committing suicide, but wonders how he could deal with the pain, then is frightened about the afterlife, if he was to commit suicide. There is the thought that what if he was to get a girlfriend who is to die for and Darius tried to inappropriately touch her like a full-body circuit workout. Gustave would feel the need to murder his own brother, but will he be around to protect his girlfriend from being sexually harassed or physically harmed or will his girlfriend conceive a child with his own relative, his future boss, or a complete stranger? Will she be humiliated with shameful words? He thinks about just killing Darius repeatedly, but refuses to.

With a ferocious headache, Gustave has a long-suffering look etched on his face, thinking about how if Darius was to climb Mount Everest and reach the top, what it would look like if he falls into a tree, poking his eye out from the tip of a tree branch. Even if Darius was to close his eyes, his eye would be profusely bleeding and if he remains in the same spot, his blood can be tainted or he can get frostbite. Gustave wonders why some people in the world ever attempted to climb actual buildings when they could have climbed mountains, but the physical pain he feels causes him to not focus on other thoughts for long.

2 Hours Later

Carl says, “I’m going to the store. Do you want anything back? I shouldn’t give you anything, Gustave. You already had a bag of chips earlier. Eating potato chips is not healthy. Don’t open the front door. I don’t care if the President of the United States shows up. I have cameras around here watching you. I see everything you all do. You think I’m joking.”

A curious Gustave says, “Why do they sell them then?”

“Can’t you hear that I’m talking! Because they do! The companies selling potato chips do not care about your health they care about your money. You’re worried why there’s extra air in potato chip bags and they’re addicting you to the product. Eat too many potato chips and you run the risk of having a stroke. You run the risk of cancer, high blood pressure, and heart disease. Heart disease runs in the family. Your uncle Craig and aunt Denice died of heart problems. Look at the serving size on the back of the bag.”

Before looking on the serving size on the back of a bag of any food product, Gustave would have to be aware of how many calories that he has to eat daily. He is not in control of what he eats, but at least he is not the one cooking. Why does some of the most unhealthiest foods taste delicious? He can munch from the breadcrumbs of a slice of pizza and is told how an excessive amount of refined sugar and high-fructose corn syrup clogs up the arteries that sends oxygen to the heart, as well as how it can damage the liver.

The thought of high blood pressure or having obesity runs in his mind. He would rather have single-serve smoothies daily if that means he stays healthy, but he does not know exactly what proper foods he is supposed to eat. Getting angry repeatedly can raise someone’s high blood pressure and he already gets angry from getting bullied, feeling like he would not be a good protector if he was to get a future spouse one day, even if he agreed to start a childless family. The overweight people that he sees makes him wonder if they have eating disorders or commit the sin of greed, but is taught that not everyone overweight eats an excessive amount of food and body shapes and sizes change throughout life.

Angrily, Darius says, “I want some chips!”

A sighing Carl then yells, “Lower your voice! I’m your father! I’ll come over there and knock you out.”

“Do it then! I’m not afraid of nobody! Not even the world’s most strongest man can stop me,” Darius says.

“I can drop you off in the streets where I grew up and you’ll see how rough it really is. These kids out here will blow your brains out and not care anything of it. They’ll even go and kill your brother because you’re related. Anyone you love, they’ll kill because they know it hurts. You have it made here! Both of you! Spoiled. Just ungrateful! All I’m doing is teaching you about health! A real woman would not put up with your,” he uses profanity, then says, “If Luna was a real woman, she would want a man who washes up and isn’t getting into constant fights and arguments. How are you going to work in the future?”

“I don’t care about health,” Darius yells, “You’re just trying to break me and Luna up!”

Chapter 3:

You’re Not Like The Sunshine

The sun is one of out of 200 billion trillion stars and is the main source for space weather, but who knows exactly if space is real? While the United States government agency managing the country’s science and technology involving space and air can simply broadcast computer-generated imagery, have paid actors, and introduce the world to false public knowledge, majority of the planet would believe the information.

When the sun emits high-energy light, it produces gas and particles into space, called solar wind, having electronically charged particles from corona (the outermost layer of the sun’s atmosphere, made out of plasma). Space weather effects can be caused by eruptions of plasma and magnetic field structures from coronal mass ejections, and solar flares.

It is Wednesday at 5:00 A.M., there are dead trees around, and Gustave is watching a the first episode of a television series. The scene is showing the solar system, but his dad, Carl, paused the movie, saying, “This is a good movie! It’s too much!”

Sitting in a durable wing chair on the right side of the living room that has brown leather and brown and white cowhide material, Carl throws a dry towel at Gustave’s face, then laughs. Gustave, sitting in a wing chair on the left side, removes the towel and points to the movie screen. The moment Carl (who is wearing nothing but red underwear and his black body hair) starts the movie, his cell phone vibrates. Carl takes the cell phone off of silent mode and answers the device, speaking for approximately 30 minutes with Vinnie. The topics that Carl talks about with her range from what happened on the news today, yesterday, and the day before, to what their relatives are up to, to what foods they want to make when they meet up, and what attractions they want to see. Then, Carl calls his grandma for 5 minutes just to update her that he is watching a movie, even though he already talked to her 2 hours ago.

Finally, Gustave dad starts the movie. The movie plays until Darius enters the living room and speaks with a mouth that smells like half of a bottle of anti-alcohol mouthwash. He quite possibly used dental floss and brushed his yellow teeth, but his socks (with holes in the front and back) has the smell of elote cookies dipped in leftover sauerkraut and molded mayonnaise.

Darius says, “I’m hungry.”

“Give me five minutes. We’re watching a movie. Snack on a granola bar in the closet,” Carl says, just to pause the movie, dance for five seconds, saying, “Give me five minutes, Gustave. I’m gonna fix something to eat. You hungry? You can shave that hair of yours, while you looking all mad. And shave that unibrow that incoming unibrow. Theres so much to smile about. Open up your blinds while you’re at it and get some sunlight. And let there be light. What am I gonna make? We gotta eat somethin’. I’m gonna start teachin’ you all to cook, so that I don’t have to cook anymore.”

“A little,” Gustave says, thinking about how it would not be disappointing if Darius was to get euthanized.

Carl sarcastically mocks his voice, “A little.”

Carl actually mentioned that he would teach Gustave how to cook last year, but like 1-4 times a year, he would watch Carl cook foods like orange chicken, beans, quinoa, stir fry, lasagna, and more. Hardly ever does Gustave ever get hands on experience in cooking and when he starts to cook himself after watching, Carl will take over, cooking. If he was to cook a dishes with many ingredients, Carl would worry too much if Gustave prepared the meal properly, having him banned from cooking most meals that can be eaten dinner.

At this point in life, Gustave does not care if he eats breakfast at midnight, only to think about how he want to eat nutritional meals, as well as perform more exercises than pushups and sit-ups. He wants muscular endurance (including strength and conditioning), anaerobic endurance, aerobic endurance, hand-eye coordination, speed, agility, and more. He wants to know the best fighting styles and how to counter any and every maneuver that opponents have, in order to protect himself and his future sweetheart. Learning every useful fighting and self-defense style, as well as detecting which martial artists are not teaching their students properly would be beneficial.

Somehow, he would like to learn how to be the most skilled fighter without rigorous training and feels like seeing the results of training with zero cheat meals. Part of him wants to know how to be the most skilled fighter in the world without anybody knowing that he is unconquerable. He wants to have an effective defensive and offensive moveset and would exercise 1-3 times per day, if he was independent.

He would not want a martial arts instructor to know what he is capable of, but would just like to know how to defeat anybody and everybody. Therefore, if he has to defend himself, the villain may not expect his style of physical combat. He even wants to own guns one day, but knows that Carl would question him like he is planning to go on a mass shooting, misuse it by shooting himself, or simply waste his money (if he can eventually afford guns).

To have a muscular body could capture the visual adoration of others, but he still eats the same foods that his dad eats. He wants to be able to cook and one day, he will learn all that he has to in order to please the woman of his dreams.

A depressed Gustave heads to the bathroom, to actually shave his unibrow. He thinks about how unibrows used to be popular in ancient Greece, only to think about if he was to get a job, he would be able to get out of his abusive environment.

By the time Gustave exits the bathroom, he hears the sirens to an ambulance passing by. The neighbor next door is playing his music loud and it disturbs Carl to the point of complaining. This, Carl takes time to call Vinnie to complain about the loud music, then calls the police.

Carl says, “All he had to do was put on some earphones, then he can blow his eardrums out. Gustave! The food is ready. Darius helped cook this time.”

“I put my secret sauce into this one,” Darius, who can clog up a toilet with his humor says with laughter.

“Thank you,” Gustave says.

He grabs a plate with three egg rolls and beef and broccoli stir-fry, just for Vinnie to call. Automatically, Darius taps Gustave on the shoulder to head to the bedroom. As Gustave is walking away, Carl says, “We’ll finish the movie tomorrow. I should have you two eating in the dinner table.”

Smelling like dehydrated vegetables and 1/2 cup of spoiled milk, Darius blows off a dusty VHS tape, inserts it in a VCR, which is below the cathode-ray tube, and watches a video play while he sits on the top bunkbed. On screen, a 16-year-old male (wearing a grey tank top, blue and white, polyester workout pants, and black running shoes) is participating in the sport of track and field, profusely sweating. Then, when the male runs to a nearby water fountain, gasping for air, an elderly woman in front of him wraps her entire mouth over the running faucet. She laughs and runs away as he looks in disgust.

Diabolically and hysterically, Darius laughs at the scene, presses the rewind button, then laughs again. So impressed by the movie that he probably watched over twenty times, he hops off the bed, walks away from his poster of a half-naked female pop star on a white, plaster wall, pass his brown, mahogany dresser, opens the double closet doors to open them, ignores the improperly hung clothes, grabs a disposable camera from the top shelf, hops back on the top bunkbed, then takes a picture. Gustave sits on his bed with a sad look, then his older brother positions his body to downward to where he can stare at Gustave from the top of the bunkbed. The older brother smiles, revealing his crooked teeth and takes a picture of the younger brother, who is awfully camera shy, attempting to hide his face.

Darius says, “That’s your girlfriend,” pointing at the television screen.

Gustave says, “Your girlfriend looks like a boy.”

Darius yells, “Shut up! I’ll knock you out right now!”

Carl enters the room concerned, even though the bedroom door was closed, saying, “What’a all this noise?”

Darius says, “He said that my girlfriend looks like a boy! I can date a man or a woman if I want to!”

Before Gustave can say much, Carl walks into the center of the room to where he is not facing Darius and says, “Shut up Gustave! We don’t use that type of language in this house,” then Darius silently laughs.

Even though Gustave stays in an apartment, it is spoken about like it is a house. The irony is that his older brother can verbally abuse him, just as much as physically abuse him, and get away with it. If he goes against his brother, he gets punished. It is a dilemma either and the manipulation is only seeming to get worse.

Later, Gustave is outside, trying his best to forget about his family drama while walking with a his friend (Wade, with one eye on the left side 2 1/2 times larger than the other with red spider veins), who seems to like bodybuilding just as much as him. An outdoor race course is around a football field and he is jogging on the school premises. Students are back laughing at him and a blond male says, “Look at that loser over there. Beverly must’ve transferred to Venetian’s State Academy to get away from him.” The moment that Gustave finds the courage to pace himself toward the blond guy and say, “Were you talking to me,” the response is, “Brush your teeth.”

Everyone around Gustave laugh. He walks away and the laughter gets louder. After P.E. class is over, Gustave is walking down the hallway and sees a light-skinned female with black pixie haircut, saying flirtatiously across the hall, “Hey, Gustave!” “Hey,” he says, then the female mocks his monotone voice. The moment Gustave turns the corner, the female says greets another student, flirtatiously.

A school bus driver drops him off in front of his apartment complex. He walks off the school bus and sees strangers wearing gangster clothing, using profanity, and smoking on the porch. Frightened by the unusualness (because he is yet to hear gangster rap or learn about the lifestyle of gangsters), he returns to the school bus.

It takes for Carl to walk outside just for Gustave to somewhat feel comfortable walking to his apartment, but the gangsters are nowhere to be found. He walks into the apartment and sees a mad look on his dad’s face.

“Why were you scared to come up,” he says.

“There were four people downstairs smoking and using profanity.”

Carl says, “Stay away from people like that,” then gossips about the event with friends and family members over the phone.

The topic covers how scared Gustave was, how cigarettes can destroy a human beings lungs (especially a minor’s lungs), and how he wants gangsters and gangster-looking people to no longer be around the suburbs. The moment Carl hears loud rap music playing from someone’s car passing by outside, he starts to dance and bob his head up and down, intentionally exaggerating how cool the gangsters must feel.

The moment he decides to enter the bedroom that he shares with Darius, Darius (who is seated on the bottom bunk) positions his hand out when and where he is sitting down. Thus, Darius squeezes his younger brother’s buttocks, chuckling.

“You’re making me horny when you act like that,” Darius says.

Thursday

It is 5:10 P.M. Gustave is wearing a grey t-shirt and blue jeans and Darius brings up the time he found last year’s Christmas presents hidden before they were presented to him. Last year, Darius searched for the presents in every room, only to find three video games above the tawny, mahogany counter, played the video games, then placed them back on the counter.

Gustave is watching television and a martial arts instructor, who has anger management problems demonstrates how to avoid being attacked by someone wielding a gun. “The moment the martial arts instructor says, “He can be anyone,” Darius shuts the bedroom door, then inserts a VHS tape into the VCR, then Darius says, “Press the rewind button. Stop.” After Gustave follows the command, Darius turns on a video game, telling Gustave, “Record now. Action. Cut.” Another wanted scene by Darius after another occurs and Gustave is pressing the record button on the VCR, even when his right arm gets tired and index finger gets numb, so he switches hands.

Four hours later, Gustave enters the living room and sees a pornographic magazine with a naked male on the cover. He opens it while sitting on the couch, surprised, seeing gay males, posing. Jack, a male friend of Carl arrives and is surprised.

Jack says, “Put down that magazine. You are not supposed to be looking at those types of magazines. You should look at women.”

Gustave closes the magazine, puts it on the couch, then leaves. He was not sure how to react seeing muscular men naked, but it makes him think about bodybuilders posing half naked. He would like to have the stamina to gain muscle mass and be intimidating. He would like to head to a friendly gym and have everyone copy his proper form in exercising, just to be terrified to copy while he is watching.

Gustave has not seen naked females before. He does not know how babies are actually born yet. Seeing a magazine of fully naked men should not define his life, just as when he played with a doll for less than 2 minutes a couple of months ago should not.

There are things that grown ups lie to children about. They lie about Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, and how children are born. While he endures parental control, how is it possible that he talks to certain people 95% of the time. He talks to Carl 40% of the time, Darius 40% of the time, his grandma 5% of the time, and cousins 5% of the time, if not his friend Wade from middle school 5% of the time?

Chapter 4:

High School From Hades

On the first day of high school on a windy Monday, Gustave is wearing the same clothes from middle school and the upper section of his running shoes are half of the way separate from the shoe soles. He is walking down the hallway and meets up with Wade, then gets slapped in the back of the head by a smaller and scrawnier student (Marcus, who is 5’ 4”), spending time around three buddies. Other students in the hallway laugh.

Gustave tries to ignore the slap. How does he expect to ever be athletic and respected in the future if he allows people to put their hands on him?

One male with braids say, “You just finna let young blood slap you?”

Gustave walks away without retaliating and there is continuous laughter.

In Art class, instead of the class going over a syllabus, they are drawing portraits of who they are seated next to. Ms. Kennings, the teacher is walking by to give everyone instructions on how to draw, including the one that Gustave is drawing. He has to erase the female’s nose and add more depth to the nose, as well as make the eyes symmetrical. After following Ms. Kennings’ instructions, the piece does not seem to need any more fixing and the female student sitting next to him is impressed.

She smiles and says, “Do we get to keep the portraits of ourselves when everyone is done? It’d be a nightmare if Gustave draws a masterpiece of me, then sells it for a millions dollars.”

“It’s not gonna sell for no more than twenty bucks. It will be worth more than Gystave’s shoes. The one thing that your good at drawing, I can do better. Look at the eyes on my drawing,” a male named James Killjoy says (who is wearing a chambray shirt, the color of peach), showing a picture of a photorealistic male student with cartoonish effects of him fantasizing about Ms. Kennings, with heart-shaped eyes.

“Next time, draw exactly what I want. Do not draw me. Draw your classmate. He is the customer. Tomorrow is when we can explore our creativity,” Ms. Kennings says.

Students are preoccupied laughing at Gustave because he is not wearing his pants slightly above his knees. The ridicule him because his socks are showing when his is seated and it is popular to look like you are a from the slums or represent the hip hop culture. Wearing pants below his waist makes him feel like he should just wear his pants below his ankles, so he hardly tries it. It is irritating him, just as much as thinking about how many males are said to not like fashion like females, but make a big deal out of what other males wear.

What is the purpose of trying to be accepted by society? He does not try to care anymore. The utter humiliation gets worse, just when he thought it would not at the moment.

A loud voice can be heard yelling from outside the classroom. The voice sounds like it could be no one, other than his older brother, Darius, using profanity and kicking the lockers. The students rise out of their seats in excitement as Gustave rises up in embarrassment. Again, he hears laughter and the laughter gets worse when Darius spots him in Art class.

“Hey! Brother,” Darius says.

“That’s your brother. Your brother’s cool,” James says with sarcasm, “Gustave can’t afford these shoes.”

When Gustave tries to smile and speak softly, someone with reading glasses interrupts, “It is his brother. I live across the street from him.”

Gustave looks at the art teacher and even she tries to prevent herself from laughing, saying, “That’s your brother? It’s a pleasure to have you in class.”

“What about me,” James says.

A male named Morris (with a red bandana, a silver necklace attached to a silver pendant, an oversized, red jersey, blue jeans hanging below his waist, and red shoes) says to James, “Marcus has chicken fingers. There’s no way he’s gonna pull that chick I saw.”

James says, “Bro. He pulled her. She be on everyone’s time, hittin’ it up with me last year. We were in the same class…”

What is supposed to be an exuberant art class is just a memory that Gustave would rather forget. Gustave thinks that James and Morris are talking about Marcus having a relationship with someone, but is not aware of much slang terminology. He is not aware of what exactly sexual intercourse is, probably because nobody ever brought up what it was, but simply acted inappropriately. A sexual education class would had probably came in handy, but even if he was to take a sexual education class, he would need to know what sex looks like. The good news is that Gustave does not watch porn, yet, but he is aware of HIV/AIDS and STDs. Such diseases are perceived by him to be spending too much time socializing with the wrong female, but he is not exactly sure how people can obtain them.

4:00 P.M.

Carl calls Gustave into the living room. Carl is seated on a couch.

“Sit down,” Carl says.

Gustave sits down on the couch.

Carl curious asks, “Do you masturbate? I don’t notice any sperm in your laundry and you don’t show signs of romantic attraction.”

A curious Gustave asks, “What is masturbation?”

The moment turns uncomfortable when Carl says, “You rub your hand against your penis repeatedly.”

“No. Who does that?”

“A lot of people. Are you attracted to women?”

“Yes.”

“That’s all. You’re free to go,” Carl says as Gustave rises up to walk to the bedroom that he shares with his older brother, then Carl sarcastically says, “Get out of here!”

Without ever watching porn a day in his life, when it is 10:00 P.M., and his brother is sleeping on top of the bunkbed, at the bottom, he lowers his pajamas underneath the grey blanket. He touches on his skin and after gripping his phallus and groping it repeatedly, the sensation turns addicting, but he refuses to say anything. The feeling makes him unwanting to stop masturbating, then he ejaculates in disbelief that he never knew what masturbating was. Semen covers the inside of his bedsheet and he waits a while before masturbating again before falling asleep.

Tuesday, the following day, Gustave is in a rush to enter the bathroom, and spends much longer than usual. He masturbates while leaving the shower running, then gets dressed up. He is transported to school from the yellow school bus, but the moment he heads to Art class, James mentions something that hunts him. Gustave is minding his own business, grabbing paint supplies, then James says, “The closest you’ll get to having a girlfriend is watching porn,” laughing. Gustave says, “What is porn,” then numerous students laugh, believing that he is simply denying to watching porn, when he never watched it.

Later, in his Typewriting class, he uses a search engine to see what porn is, which makes him horny, seeing the various images. Then, he watches videos of porn that he leaves on silent while Mr. Batch, the teacher rants in front of the classroom. Thus, he inserts in earphones to find out how the somewhat natural performance of sexual intercourse is. He cannot help but look at female classmates and imagine having sexual intercourse with them, then uses his mind to select which female he finds the most attractive. Like a rapacious boy, every once in a while, he glances at a goth female named Nicki (who has a self-expressive style of curly hair, black eyeliner, green eyes, black choker, a green, fishnet crop top over a black shirt of a metal band, black fingernails, leather pants, and black, leather boots), imagining having a moment with her, on a canopy bed, like in the provocative scenes he is watching in the back of the classroom.

He then wonders what type of person would want a demeaning job as being a porn star (performing high-intensity activities, low-insensity activities, and activities in between) with the expectations of having to always have a high sex drive, but learns after this day. His future of research will lead him to understand that some women claim showing off their body to be a form of women empowerment, that some females are drugged against their will to perform recorded sexual acts for monetary gain, placed into human trafficking, and/or are underage.

Nicki, who could be the epitome of beauty, (does not have 15-year-old corpses as skin) has pale skin and an overall appearance that gives him mysterious vibes, capable of burning fat while she is sleeping. Is the mysteriousness good vibes for him to get from Nicki, (who has the aroma of cinnamon cookies and can taste like a strawberry slushy) being uncertain if she is capable of sympathy? She already has a curvaceous body and if he somehow was to get into a relationship with a Nicki lookalike, his family would have a panic attack, but he strongly does not think he would date a family member of the person he has a crush on.

Some of his own family members may feel like she is a dominatrix or a devil worshipper, then because of the ongoing yelling, repeated Jesus talks, and only God knows what else, he has to either end the relationship or risk living with her (if she does not live with someone else). Even if he had a wing woman (a friend who who attends social events with him for a potential romantic interest) around, his family would find a way of getting involved, likely ending the friendship. He would possibly be humiliated or instructed by Carl on how easy it is (when it is not so simple), to being instructed by Darius (who is not the right romantic matchmaker).

Many people may claim that Christians should not be judgemental. Some people may reference “Judge not, that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again. And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam is in thine own eye? Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother’s eye. Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you”—Matthew 7:1-6. Other people may reference the quote, “Judge not, and ye shall not be judged: condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned: forgive, and ye shall be forgiven:”—Luke 6:37. There is a Bible quote “Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment” John 7:24 and ““Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them”—Matthew 7:20.

Would Nicki even be comfortable if he used her washroom or should he be expected to have his own house and provide for his future wife? His disagreeing family could go as far as believing that goths, punks, emos, and scenes are the same thing, that they are all suicidal, or mentally unstable. It feels like everything that he desires in a woman, the competitive world is either against or wants it for themself. It could be that Darius would switch from fantasizing about goth women to thinking they smell like 3,000 decaying bodies and exist to damn him to hell. Finding love is supposedly complicated, risking the odds of being a victim of love bombing or any other form of betrayal, but he has to worry about what others think.

Just thinking about the endless scenarios of others judging who he could date kills the romantic vibes. He imagines possibly being rich one day and spoiling a genuine and loyal goth woman who has social etiquette, like being clear and concise when communicating (avoiding to use slang and profanity), saying “please” and “thank you,” avoiding electronics in the presence of others, and being on time for appointments. To spoil a beautiful goth woman that loves him in a penthouse or mansion could be meaningful, but to simply live independently and hug her is what he would desire.

What if hypothetically, his girlfriend or wife possibly still has male friends, saying, “He’s just a friend” or “I’m not giving up my friend”? What he wonders is if it is possible that some women can have male friends without cheating or ending their relationship. Then, he is aware that he would probably have to elope with his future spouse.

To be manly enough to confidently talk to Nicki’s parents if he has to and talk to her friends, would make a huge difference. How can one human being seem to be more important than him and his dreams, even if all she was to do was caress his shoulders? She is not more important, but thanks to not knowing officially what he is going to do with his life, to finding it hard to smile, and being ridiculed, momentarily, his life does not feel valuable. He just knows that he has a crush on Nicki, but the odds of her reciprocating his feelings are slim.

What is the point of dating? Besides, he is not even dressed in goth attire. It is quite possible that he could bond with Nicki, but what if it is impossible? What if he just walks up and talk to multiple women regardless if he is attracted to them, just to see if any of them would agree to dating? What if he does not want a child with a woman who he does not get along with? Anything can occur. He actually does not want children though, but somehow would like the lifestyle of intimacy.

With her striking features, she glances his way, then Mr. Batch walks to the back of the classroom, leaving several classmates exit out of websites that has nothing to do with the typewriting software they are using. One male was hungry enough to order a pepperoni pizza online, only to minimize the screen and type at a maximum speed. Mr. Batch looks at Gustave’s screen, sees him typing on the typewriting software, then heads to the front of the classroom.

Gustave thinks about if there is a way to print out pictures of the beddable women that he see completely naked, wondering if he could be a film director for similar scenes. He wonders if the primary reason he never knew about sex prior to high school is because he is under parental control at home, students kept a secret away from him, or he had erectile dysfunction.

A couple of minutes before the Typewriting class is over, the teacher says, “I need to talk to you after class,” pointing at Gustave.

He wonders what Mr. Batch says, “While I was teaching class, I noticed something you were doing earlier. Can you explain this,” showing print out copies of the pornographic websites that he was on.

As if the computer he was using is covered in dust and cobwebs, he says, “I can’t. I was trying to…”

Ever since finding out about masturbation, Gustave felt invincible when he practiced the act, but now, he feels shamed. A displeased expression is etched on Gustave’s face as if he received several college degrees, but is unsure about what the difference between 12:00 A.M. and 12:00 P.M. is. He feels like he was tying his shoes the wrong way ever since he learned to and that some of the Spanish-speaking women with beautiful faces (capable of creating origami shapes with solely their tongues) may not approach him if they find out he watched pornographic content. Some of the high-value Asian and white women may not approach him. Polite and respectful women in general may not approach him and his hands feel unclean even though he did not touch his genitals during the class session.

As if Gustave would attempt to watch porn if he was to have a 9-5 job, Mr. Batch says, “I’m going to be making a phone call home.”

Any 60-second dreams he had of being a serial seducer are gone. At this moment, he starts to wonder what type of playlist Nicki listens to, but is more concerned with how his dad will react to him watching inappropriate content in high school. He is not like the Freemasons Giacomo Casanova (who was an Italian adventurer and writer) or William Shakespeare (an English playwright, poet, and actor). The teenager is not like Genghis Khan with at least umpteen wives and 500 concubines or King Henry VIII, who had six wives. He is not like Solomon in the Holy Bible, who had 700 wives and 300 concubines. He is not even a fictional character that he can write larger-than-life attributes about.

The 14-year-old freshman does not even have sexual escapades, let alone a girlfriend experience. He is not a celebrity, who can automatically gain the interest of regular women, as well as gorgeous women. He is a loner and most women are attracted to males that are confident, social, and has a sustainable lifestyle. The bright side of all of this is that he does not have to to go to church anymore, being forced to stand up when the choir sings on stage, as his mother’s mother dances. He does not have to bear seeing cliques in church, even if it’s not a sin. He does not want to see cliques in high school, but is okay with some loners who could make friends, therefore no longer being loners. Also, he is okay with seeing some goths, punks, and emos, but is mostly a loner.

Hours later, Gustave slowly closes the front door, locks it, trying to not make much noise while heading into his room, then Darius starts singing. Gustave hears his dad (who is shirtless, in white underwear) walking with a belt. He gets lashed at repeatedly with the belt, running away in pain and Darius is trying to hold in his laughter. It is degrading to look at women and he does not want to be around them temporarily.

After the excruciating pain and receiving several welts on his body, Gustave heads to the room that he shares with his brother. Darius is silently laughing and turns his face away from Carl to hide it. He then looks at Carl, capable of switching to a concerned look.

Carl then walks by and says, “I better not find out you’re watching porn again! Your cousins are coming over today. Fix your face up!”

Approximately 37 minutes later, Gustave’s aunt enters the apartment along with her three children. A knock occurs on the bedroom door and Darius sighs. He looks at Gustave with rage, then forms a fake smile, but only when he opens the door, the cousins do not realize the smile is fake.

“Hey,” Darius says.

“Hey Darius! Hey Gustave,” hugging Darius.

Gustave waves his hand like he does not want to be around the apartment, then says, “Hey!”

The aunt says, “You’re not getting away from me. How have you been. You’re in high school now. Family is growing up,” hugging Gustave.

“I’m fine. Same old. I’m just drawing,” Gustave says.

Carl says, “He ain’t doin’ nothin’ up in that room. He need to be focused on those school books. He need to be focused on that Bible. I tell Gustave to stay away from those girls because I ain’t taking care of any babies! I ain’t no grandpa!”

Why on Earth would Gustave want Carl to take care of his children? Of course, at such a young age, he may have thoughts about just wanting to know what sex feels like. He also would not want his girlfriend to meet his family, which could easily limit his chances of finding a girlfriend, thanks to many girlfriends preferring to meet their partner’s family.

The aunt laughs and says, “What about you Darius?”

Erick, who is 7-years-old says, “I can color. I can’t draw, but if you give me a coloring book, I’m all over it.”

“Sit down. You be coloring all over the walls at at the house,” Gustave aunt says.

A concerned Carl says, “Nia! No he doesn’t! You didn’t tell me about that! When this happen? Erick! Do you be coloring on your mom’s walls? Don’t do that.”

Aunt Nia walks out of the bedroom to talk with Carl and Erick says, “Turn on the video game. I wanna play wrestling.”

Tina, who is a 7-year-old female says, “When you gonna get your own place? Do you have a girlfriend?”

A 6-year-old male named Heath starts digging in his butt, pulls out human excrement, and aims it toward Gustave, as if though his fingernails are smeared with caramel. Gustave moves backwards, then Heath aims the human excrement at who moves to the side, kicking Heath to the grey carpet with partial strength. Heath cries and when Nia walks around to look, nobody says anything. They act like Heath was spinning around in circles until he got dizzy and smacked his head against the leg of the bunkbed.

“Wash your hands,” Erick says, then Heath stops crying, heads to the bathroom, and washes his hands.

Darius whispers to Gustave, “Every time they come over. Every time. I hate them coming over.”

When it is bedtime and Gustave’s aunt and cousins left, he wakes up, puts on his glasses, sees Darius rise up to turn the television on, and turn the volume down. Darius inserts a pornographic VHS tape into the VCR and watches it in silence. Two people having dark skin complexion are in the screen. A muscular man is having sexual intercourse with a big-boned woman and they are both comfortable?

Darius says, “Turn around and close your eyes,” slowly reaching into his pants to grab his own phallus while on the floor.

Gustave looks at Darius, saying, “Gross.”

Darius angrily says, “Turn around.”

Gustave is disgusted, wondering what type of a woman would ever want to have sexual intercourse with his brother, then does not have to wonder anymore. He remembers that his brother has a girlfriend named Luna, who is around 5’ 4”, with a complexion similar to a chocolate brownie. He takes his glasses off, covers his ears with a pillow, and tries to sleep.

It is Wednesday and while Gustave is walking in the hallway, he sees Nicki (visible with the same hairstyle from the Typewriting class, black eyeliner, green eyes, lipstick the color of ashes and a black, velvet sweetheart blouse) walk by, just to have Nathan, a male goth walk by with a coffin-shaped guitar case, lower the guitar case, and vehemently kiss her against the lockers. The longer Gustave looks at the couple, the more he thinks about two vampires kissing, somewhat jealous that he is not bitten (by a female version). Circling in his mind are the peculiar thoughts, “At what point did they feel comfortable sharing their lips together” and “How do they not worry about what other people will say and do?”

A woman named Jasmine walks by (who lives in front of white picket fenses, is wearing a yellow, floral print spaghetti strap and blue bell bottom jeans, and black gym shoes) with another woman named Emily (wearing a brown, leather cowboy hat, white tank top, cow print pants, and brown cowboy boots) and they smile at his direction.

Jasmine says, “Hey.”

Emily, who smells like non-perishable prunes, waves, giving him a flirtatious look.

Jasmine says, “My friend likes you.”

Gustave wonders about what to say, then Darius arrives, but he does not arrive alone. Darius and Luna arrive. No longer does he have to wonder about communicating to Jasmine back in her vernacular, let alone having the confidence to approach Emily, if he really wanted to. Emily is just a pretty face and it is not like he knows her entire personality. It is not like he knows what she will think and say at times due to spending years together. It is also is not like his older brother did not arrive at an unusual moment. What could’ve been the beginning of a romance story, may have been stopped by his older brother. Maybe he is simply overthinking because females would not prefer having a significant other obsessed with them like they are a sort of celebrity or goddess. Was it will or fate?

“Brother,” Darius shouts, then says to Emily and Jasmine, (who are smiling) “Hey.

Darius kisses Luna, then chokes Gustave from behind his back. Jasmine and Emily walk away, trying to hold in their laughter. He lets go of Gustave.

“I was protecting you. Those women don’t care about you. They just want sex.”

When Jasmine and Emily walked away, Gustave knows that his older brother interfered with what could’ve been a romantic moment in his life. How romantic could the experience be with Jasmine if she would laugh at his misery anyway? He looks straight ahead and notices that Ms. Kennings was watching the entire event take place.

“You two, get to class,” Ms. Kennings says.

Darius says, “I do what I want,” then walks into a random classroom to throw a desk, and runs down the hallway.

“He’s doing it again. Bye Gustave,” Luna says.

“Bye,” Gustave says with a monotone voice.

Wade passes by, then before he can speak, the bell rings.

“Hey,” Wade says.

“Hey,” Gustave says.

Wade paces himself down the hallway.

“Back to class,” Ms. Kennings says.

P.E.

Everyone is typically wearing the school colors in the gym, having a light blue shirt with a yellow logo, dark blue gym shorts with the name of the school mascot. If Gustave was not at the school, everyone else would be walking slow around the race course.

While Gustave is jogging around an indoor race course, (which surrounds a basketball court) a male named Demetrius (who has muscular features around his entire body) walks up to him on the race court with two of his buddies. Ken, Demetrius’ buddy (who has long black dreadlocks) pretends to strike him, but only hits the air and Sam, his other buddy (who has a black bald fade haircut, brushing it with a black pin brush).

A conceited Demetrius laughs saying, “I’ll rock you. Yeah. You!”

Others in the surrounding area cannot resist to look and do absolutely nothing. Laughter fills the gym, especially when Gustave jogs around the race course a second time. Demetrius rushes up and slaps Gustave in the back of the head. Gustave looks backwards and the group is laughing. Ken claps Demetrius’ hand and Sam, who is racially motivated, mocks Gustave, making the sound effects as if Gustave is from Africa. Then, the second time that Gustave jogs around the race course after not retaliating, Ken slaps him. Thus, Sam says, “Don’t ever come to Chicago!”

After physical education, Gustave is back in his regular clothes, which are the same ones that he wore yesterday. He is heading to English class and three-fourths of the way through the class, four students are making jokes about others, especially him. The jokes are so prepared, they could be used at either a comedy movie audition while improving or an onstage act at a comedy club, but only the students are intentionally humiliating him. They make fun of the same four shirts that he has, how bald his head is, how dark his skin is, and so much more.

The humiliation gets so bad, after trying to laugh along from the consistent verbal attacks that would not stop, he rises up, exits the class, and slams the door shut. Some students gossip as if though he is about to wield a handgun and fully-automatic to school. Thus, he has to explain to the proper authorities that he did not threaten to bomb the school.

At least two students from his English class lie on a written statement about him saying he is going to bomb the school. They use the word bomb, but the description of shooting up a school is not bombing a school and both of their stories were different.

Gustave is not aware of the name of any guns. It is just a regular day at school and lunch, where he frequently sits by students who are not actually his friends, but will occasionally have small talk. Yet, when another student laughs mocks him in the cafeteria, nobody at his lunch table defends him.

One smiling student walks up and says, “Demetrius said he wants to fight you. Can you fight?” Other students burst out in laughter and the best answer that Gustave can think of (like he strengthens his bones, muscles, and connective tissues, as well as know how to use head movement, play with the illusion of distance, and strike properly) is, “Yes.” Why would Gustave say that he cannot fight,” but he in fact never telegraphed a punch, let alone punched anybody before.

Two students already committed themselves to lying on him an hour ago, to where one student claimed that he mentioned being in a secret society. Gustave has no idea what exactly are secret societies in the world, but he heard of the highly classified Area 51 (being portrayed in movies, cartoons, and television shows), which is rumored to have UFOs hidden in.

When Gustave gets off the school bus and walks back to his apartment, his dad already is talking in the cell phone. Carl enters the kitchen, which smells like cooked focaccia bread. Even though the smell is pleasing, he does not want to mention that it is. He may hear how is bedroom should smell like the kitchen or that he should smell just as pleasing himself. He may hear that when he is exercising himself, he should not smell like ammonia.

He says, “Next time some bully comes up, I’m telling my son to knock him out! Knock him out,” ending the phone call to say, “What do you want?”

“I was going to tell you about what happened at school today.”

“I know.”

“My side of the story…”

Practically singing while talking, Carl says, “I don’t want to hear it. What were you gonna do? I didn’t raise you all to be getting into fights.”

The following day, during P.E. class, Marcus runs up and pulls down Gustave gym shorts on the indoor basketball court. Marcus runs away. Everyone laughs. Ken, Demetrius, and Sam are laughing, including the females. He positions his gym shorts back up, then the moment he walks to Marcus, ready to fight, a muscular male named Jonathan says, “That’s my cousin. He didn’t mean it.”

Trying to avoid trouble makes him think about how school or life in general is like prison, but how would he know if never been to prison. He would not be able to consume the foods that he wants, would be told what to do and when to do it by guards, inmates would try to harm him, and the surroundings would smell putrid. He does not want to fight anyone, thinking that bullies would harm anyone regardless of who the person is. How could they care about freedom then? Why do they care about the internet if somebody on Earth invented it, when they’re willing to harm and/or kill anybody? Why do they like bragging when eventually everyone has to go asleep, wake up, possibly eat, possibly work, and repeat that until they die.

Gustave is simply playing basketball alone, then a chubby woman named Melissa (with glasses and brown freckles) walks over to play. Melissa is the only female that he remembers from kindergarten, as even back then, she would not say more than, “Hi” to him. She does not talk to him, but basically knows about him being bullied.

Melissa throws the basketball through the hoop. The moment she attempts to throw the ball again, Gustave uses his speed to take the ball from her hand, shooting it through the hoop.

Melissa shouts, “You’re just like your brother!”

Dropping the basketball, Gustave walks away from the female without saying a word.

Only 25 minutes later, then Marcus throws a basketball at the back of Gustave’s head. Gustave turns around and sees Marcus sitting on the top of the bleachers. Marcus walks away with Jonathan.

English Class

The next week, on a Wednesday, after so much bullying occurred, Gustave is in English class and notices that five students are busy making jokes about others, then focus their attention on him. A woman named Raven (sitting at a table across from him, who he thinks is just as appealing as the clothes she wears) has a black shag haircut, light brown eyes, a silk, beige balloon sleeve shirt, black, leather pants, and black, leather, knee-high boots.

The humiliation is so unnoticeable, Raven laughs. Even Gustave laughs at times, hoping that him laughing at himself can hide the emotional pain. Him laughing simply is not effective, especially by lacking jokes and comebacks that can make everyone laugh.

After hearing the competitive jokes that students make during the class session, Gustave knows that comedy is not what he is good at. Comedy is now even a genre of movies that he does not favor after being ridiculed. There may be some jokes that can make him laugh, but overall, he does not appreciate the art of comedy.

There is a woman named Sarah, who would could ask him out on a date and he would feel a necessity to say, “Yes.” She looks too irresistible, like a specks of sunshine and poppy seeds around her smile, somehow embodying the emo style. How he would have to know everything about her if he was to date her, makes him wonder if she’d notice how much he is attracted.

She lives in a gated community and smells like hot chocolate wafting into his bedroom exuding confidence. It is not actually that he is afraid to socialize with emo women, but that somebody will interfere and ruin any effort he puts into developing a relationship (especially if it could naturally grow into a symbiotic relationship). What is the point, if a white male, who is allowed to have long hair, allowed to listen to rock bands and skateboard (possibly being self-involved with on-stage singing and/or playing an instrument) can just immediately bond with her?

Marcus flirts with Sarah, “Hey, Sarah. What do you say you kick it with me?”

Sarah says, “I like somebody else.”

“Who you like,” Marcus says.”

She points at Gustave, like a female who resist missing her future boyfriend, leading to the erroneous behavior of Marcus, “Ain’t nobody thinking about that ugly…”

Everyone except Gustave laughs. All Gustave can think about is why are bullies alive on Earth and what if he was capable of shooting up the school. He does not think that he would feel sorry about his actions, especially after experiencing heartache. He has been mocked and has been rejected multiple times and it is not going to be his last time. To his knowledge, trying to approach Sarah could be a set up for her to say she’s not attracted or it could just be that he has to wonder what his family and bullies try to do. The pressure makes him want to kill everyone, but he does not even know if he would personally like Sarah.

He does not own enough money for a gun, but can only think about how he is a horror buff, feeling like he can relate to the emotions of serial killers. To an extent, he would like to learn how to build his own home with secret rooms, foreign weapons, and traps around the area to punish his victims. The anger that he has kept inside of himself is feeding his wicked imaginations.

A male named Malcom who is wearing all black attire, but a baggy clothing says behind him, “People think that I’m goth because I’m wearing all black.”

What Gustave really wants to say back is “Nobody thinks that you’re goth. You are an anti-goth who has all of momma’s money to buy you everything you ask for, but you choose to wear hip hop clothing. You cannot bear to listen to rock music, would steer away from a goth even if they told you the roof is on fire, and dress like you’re on the latest rap commercial featuring a male younger five years younger than you.”

Instead, Gustave refuses to say anything. The awkwardness makes him want to get away from Malcom, but everyone has assigned seats. It would be better if Gustave was actually sitting next to a goth, having an in-person introduction into their worldview.

A few weeks later, Gustave has to see Ms. Putnick, who is a blond woman with short, curly hair. She has an extroverted personality, but even though Gustave answers many questions with one or two words with a monotone voice, he notices that it bothers her. The only time he usually does not speak in one or two words is when he talks about bodybuilding, fashion, or family drama.

“What’s going on? What do you want to talk about,” Ms Putnick says.

“Winston Mayfield’s mother died yesterday. He’s a bodybuilder. I don’t know if you heard of him.”

“I don’t care,” the social worker says and laughs, “I don’t like bodybuilding or wrestling and I’m wearing a wrestling shirt.”

Ms. Putnick is indeed wearing a grey hooded sweatshirt with the blue letters “WRESTLING” on it. She smiles, showing her perfect teeth and Gustave cannot help but to laugh. She plays a mainstream song with lyrics telling him to smile, then says, “I scheduled someone to meet up with with you next week. You said that you’d be okay with it.”

“It depends on who it is.”

“I think you two would get along.”

“Earlier, my brother was fighting someone in the hallway, then started running down the halls”

She interrupts, gaslighting him, “Why does everything have to be about your brother? I never see him running down the halls. You are not your brother. You have your own life.”

Moments after his time talking with Ms. Putnick, he notices that Wade (who is wearing a black, hooded, long-sleeve shirt, blue jeans, and red gym shoes) is holding Emily’s hand. Wade and Emily walk by and after Wade gropes her buttocks, he digs in his pocket to eat some roasted sunflower seeds.

Emily greets Gustave like he is a neckbeard, as if though she was not interested in him a while ago, “Hey, Gustave.”

Wade texts Gustave on his cell phone, “I smashed this chick in the washroom an hour ago,” then Darius runs down the hallway, yelling.

What is Gustave supposed to think? Gustave is not a sexologist, but does not want to overreact. If he overreacts, his older brother may notice and showcase his unpredictable actions, his dad may hear about the event somehow, or he leaves an everlasting impression that he cannot manage his emotions. He was not raised on how to exactly talk to females or fight against bullies.

Even if he was to have a relationship with a female teacher, telling other students for bragging rights would get him into so much trouble, he really would not have privacy. He imagines bringing a book bag full of guns and ammunition to school and somehow opening fire on each student that he sees, except for Nicki, Emily, Jasmine, Raven, and Wade. He then thinks about what if he shot shot up the school while Wade is absent and if a dispatcher is on the phone, the dispatcher would be forced to listen to the action. The dispatcher would not only hear the screaming and gunfire, but crying and moaning from the multiple rapes (specifically Nicki, who would have her undeniable gothiness rubbing against his skin and so forth), as if though the dispatcher paid to hear a phone sex operator.

What if Gustave was to have an allergic reaction from a woman’s body fluid? What if he is allergic to spermicide or lubricants? What if he is allergic to an ingredient in a brand of deodorant, soap, shampoo, cologne, deodorant, or conditioner? What if he is even allergic to a woman’s pheromones, if so pheromones actually exist in humans?

At the age of 7, he could rub and hug cats and not show symptoms of having an allergy. Now, if he touches a cat, he will develop a runny nose, experience repetitive sneezing for 3 days, then his nose will get stuffy and his sneezing will stop. Having allergies would expose him if he was to desire staying up late at night.

To have a manly persona, from like monster trucks, bodybuilding, and wrestling makes fits his personality. He would love to wear trench coats and dark tinted sunglasses or mostly dark clothing in general. He would love to listen to metal bands and watch horror movies (including the ones that Carl complains that he should avoid). He would love to watch some movies with profanity, but some action-packed movies with profanity that he watched, he had to watch with his dad, only to not finish watching them. But what if he appears so manly, only to be reduced to not even a fraction of a man by being allergic to cats (an animal that many women love)? Maybe having a weakness is what would make him human, just as if a seemingly invincible superhero (was to have a nickel allergy), having allergic reactions from the metal nickel, which can be found in items like earrings, bracelets, watches and fitness trackers, belt buckles, coins, cell phones, laptops, and tablets, hip and knee replacements, as well as some health foods (like oatmeal, whole grains, nuts, beans, legumes, and bread).

He simply cannot be allergic to condoms, as when he was 7-years-old, one of Carl’s friends in Joliet (who had approximately 9 cats, allowed Carl, Gustave, and Darius to live at his house for a couple of years) would allow Gustave and Darius to play with condoms after begging. The only reason he discovered condoms so young is because he was participating in a game called hide and seek around the house.

Jasmine walks by and looks out the window, seeing a male named Corey (with black sunglasses), playing loud rap music with profanity from a white sports car. Jasmine says goodbye to Emily. Jasmine then slips on her book bag, then rushes outside, screaming to enter the car. She waves back at Emily.

When next week arrives, he enters Ms. Putnick’s office and simply does not want to visit her. They greet each other, then they sit down. Another freshman arrives with an outgoing personality.

“Ms. Putnick! Hey. You’re looking sharp today. Did you lose twenty pounds since the last time I’ve seen you?”

“I have been doing a lot of groceries. Stop it. I’m going to have to tell my husband on you!”

They laugh. At this moment, Gustave feels uncomfortable. He does not feel like he belongs in the same room as them, then it gets worse.

“This is Andy. Andy. This is Gustave.”

Andy extends his hand out for a handshake and Gustave shakes it. They both verbally greet each other as well. Then they sit down and seemingly, the entire session involves Andy talking about how he has two jobs and a girlfriend. After Andy’s flawless performance of making Ms. Putnick happy, she looks at a withdrawn Gustave.

“You see how Andy was talking?”

Gustave says, “Yes.”

The social worker says, “That’s how I want you to talk. That’s why I brought him in here today.”

On a school bus back to the apartment complex, Darius grabs the attention of Gustave by poking on him in the front seat of the yellow school bus, then saying, “Roxanne wants to be your girlfriend. I’m trying to help you get a girlfriend. If you accept her, then you may love her.”

Roxanne, a chubby 15-year-old female with a black ponytail, (who looks somewhat decent to Gustave, wearing a blue yellow blouse, blue jeans, and red gym shoes) spends the majority of her time around special educated students, because she is in special education classes. In fact, she may wound up agreeing with anything that anybody says or disagree if she somehow has mood swings.

Roxanne is distant friends with the amoral Darius, making Gustave further not want to date her, so he says “No” like her father could be a drill sergeant, who despises him. If dating could possibly lead to having children with the partner, why would he? He knows having children with someone who is mentally challenged has a greater risk of his children being mentally challenged.

Darius turns around to tell Roxanne about the rejection as if it is still 500 hours in military time, saying “Sorry…”

Every once in a while, Darius brings up that he tried to help Gustave get a girlfriend and brag about how he has a girlfriend and that Gustave does not. It is embarrassing and disheartening.

After school, when Gustave and Darius get off the school bus, a woman with black braids named Brittany, says, “Hey, Darius. Hey, Gustave.”

Brittany is in a special education class and only knows Gustave because of how often his brother brings him up. Brittany attempts to throw a basketball into a hoop, but it bounces off the rim and misses.

“You want to play basketball,” she says.

Darius, who knows that his dad (who hardly leaves the apartment) is out grocery shopping, says, “Game on.”

Brittany talks to Gustave, “You playing too?”

Gustave removes his book bag, then participates. A quarter of a way through the game, Darius played basketball with his book bag and jacket on. Darius claims to be the winner of the game, then Brittany invites them up to her apartment. Gustave is thinking about not showing up, but when else would he go to someone else’s place without being watched by his dad?

Thus, they head to Brittany’s apartment and inside, they quickly find out that her mother is nowhere to be found. Like she is a sex therapist, she plays with a female doll, then eventually kisses Darius on a bed repeatedly. She whispers in his ear, then they head to the dark closet to close the door. Gustave is disgusted, fully aware that Darius and Brittany are not performing pelvic floor exercises in the closet. What happens worse is that when they exit the closet, after smelling the intimacy (coming returning unscathed), Brittany has the audacity to ask a reserved Gustave if he wants to go in the closet with just her. She recently shared her mouth with Darius’, which smells like spoiled cabbage and 40-year-old unwashed toenail clippers, with a dose of ethnic cleansing.

Gustave looks at her like kissing females is a common mistake, then says, “No.”

Darius is still in a relationship with Luna, but seems to want to know more than what Brittany’s playlist is like and if she is ticklish. Gustave just wants to exit the apartment, but before he can exit the bedroom door, the front door knob twists. He doubts that a female would attempt to rape him even though some females may think he is cute. Brittany’s mother enters the apartment, enters her room, and greets everyone. After greeting the polite mother back, Gustave and Darius stay inside for about 20 minutes, then leave.

What is a proud moment for Darius turns into a hectic day later. After being over Brittany’s apartment, Gustave is waiting for a red light signal at a street to turn green, but Darius runs across the street, passing up speeding cars, laughing. Gustave waits for the light signal to turn red.

Back at the apartment, when Darius gets mad that he is told to wash up at home more often by Carl, Darius yells in return. They complain from 7:00 P.M. to 4:00 P.M. and it is just a regular event. Gustave had to sleep during the argument.

Chapter 5:

Betrayal At Its Finest

On a Saturday morning, Darren, a train conductor walks down an aisle, checking for each passenger’s ticket, on an electric locomotive. As soon as Darren gets near the down-to-earth Gustave, he is looking downward at the cell phone that Gustave is texting on. Gustave looks upward and noticed that Darren is standing over him, then a nearby Carl is laughing in a seated position.

Carl says, “He thought you was going to show him your digital ticket.”

Darius laughs.

An elderly man (wearing a navy blue beret) who has his back slumped down against a backrest has his right hand against his right cheek, but his middle finger is extended. The man is not looking at Gustave, but he was recently staring his direction. How could a grown man have such a behavior like a child and not even know the person they disrespect?

When he tries to tell Carl that the elderly man has his middle finger up, Carl speaks too loud, “Huh. I can’t hear you?”

Gustave says, “He has his middle finger up.”

“What are you talking about?”

“He has his middle finger up,” Gustave says again.

By the time Gustave lets Carl know, the elderly man lowers his finger.

Making matters worse, Darius opens his mouth, “I don’t see nothing. It could’ve been an optical illusion. Maybe he’s not aware of what he was doing.”

“No Darius,” Carl says as the elderly man gets off at the next stop, then Carl says, “Some people have mental illnesses. They’re all over the place downtown. I saw this one black guy who got on a train last week and he sat right across from me. He just kept licking his lips and rubbing against his crotch. I told him that he’s sick, then left the train.”

After approximately five stops, they exit the train, that numerous passengers exit. They walk down a stairway. Carl greets two Jehovah’s Witnesses (with pamphlets) that are standing inside of the train station and because Carl greeted them, Gustave and Darius feel the need to greet them. They continue walking and they exit the local train station.

While walking down the street, Carl sees a big-boned lady named Tammy (with black, shaggy hair that touches her shoulders, buck teeth, a green, faux jacket over a blue spaghetti strap, green jeans, and blue gym shoes) shout across the street.

Tammy smiles, waving while saying, “How’s it going? I smell me some dinner!”

“Next time, I’ll fix you a plate. It’s just my orange chicken that I made over my mom’s house. She survived chemotherapy a couple of days ago.”

“Oh. Thats…”

About 30 minutes later, Gustave is standing around with Darius, watching Carl maintain an enthusiastic conversation.

After Carl finally says, “You two can walk to the back,” they walk to the apartment, but Gustave overhears a laughing Carl say, “I have to keep a watch on both of them, in case they get out of line. I ain’t violin’ tonight!”

“I know that’s right,” the lady supposedly who met Carl at the local library a month ago says.

Trying to pretend like his metaphorical hurdles in life are simply imaginary, Gustave is walking back to the apartment with Darius, the male to help destabilize the community. It does not take forever for his older brother to say, “I’ll race you back,” then start running back to to apartment and at this point, Gustave despises running. Cardio is not an issue for Gustave, but he does not care for competitiveness.

The feeling of rushing simply feels like unpreparedness and he despises it. He does not care for the reminder that his older brother runs around in public settings a lot. He does not care for walking behind someone like a parent, guardian, or anyone in general, just for a stranger to get in the way, then he is somehow further behind the person. Also, he does not care for trying to walk or run to be in presence of another person, just for them to continue walking fast, then his legs may start hurting or he has to constantly catch his breath.

Outside on the balcony, there is the sight of several people swimming in the swimming pool with party music playing. Food and beverages are out on multiple wooden tables and there is the familiar smell of barbecue. It rains, causing the party to come to an abrupt end.

“We beat the rain home. You wouldn’t be able to beat the rain if it wasn’t for me. I predicted that the rain would come,” Darius says, saying, “Tomorrow is going to be the same type of weather and only I have the power to stop the tornado.”

“There is no tornado,” Gustave says.

“But you’re wrong. There could be a tornado in Japan. Like it can be eight o’clock here, it’s can be one o’clock in another country. It can be 15 hours ahead. It can be 5 days and 45 seconds ahead in another world. In a parallel universe, it can be another time. I can rewind time because I’m a genius.”

“Okay,” Gustave tries to agree just so that Darius can stop talking, but he doesn’t.

A soaked and wet Carl makes his way back, then shuts the front door. Carl lowers a bag of groceries to the white tiled floor in the kitchen. His cell phone rings, but before answering it, he tells Darius that it is time to take his medication.

It is a relief. Gustave has at least 30 seconds to not hear Darius up close. Darius walks into the kitchen to take his medicine, but Gustave does not care what medication Darius takes or if it is a placebo pill, as long as it is effective. The medicine is not effective, but seems to turn him into more of a zombie, forgetting about nearly everything. The things Darius does not forget are what makes him angry (and nearly everything makes him angry), if he wants some money, and if he is hungry.

At 7:00 P.M., after Carl exits the apartment, Gustave is watching professional wrestling on television, then Darius turns off the television and runs away with the remote control. Darius laughs as Gustave chases him around the apartment.

“You’ll never be as big as Ricky Vanderseed. You can get as big as you want from lifting weights and I’ll still be able to,” Darius uses profanity, then says, “If Jay York ever was beating on you while you was wrestling, I’d beat…”

Using profanity, Darius rants about how he would harm a professional wrestler, but Darius does not workout. The best chance Darius has of beating a professional wrestler is by using a foreign object, but Gustave is forced to hear the ongoing rant, to the topic of how Darius would fight Jay York if Jay York talked about him. The discouragement is already factor as to why he should not invest time in entertaining others as a professional wrestler. Also, he is still skinny and does not consume enough calories per day to be a heavyweight.

When Gustave takes the remote control, he gets kicked in the right eye, only for Darius to put him in a leg submission. As painful as the moment is, he hopes that one day Darius would pass away. About 20 minutes pass in order for him to be able to see clearly out of his right eye, but all he is focused on is what events he missed on professional wrestling, rushing back to the room. The batteries are out of the remote control and Darius laughs while jumping up and down on the top bunkbed.

Darius makes a callous comment while stripping naked, “And the world heavyweight champion of the world is Gustave! The audience is cheering for the greatest wrestler in the world! Uh-oh! Here comes his older brother! Wham! The new greatest wrestler of all-time is Darius!”

Darius blows his breath into Gustave’s face. Being interested into fitness and not being able to actually attend a gym and/or martial arts school because of how strict his dad is, let alone that he cannot afford a membership, makes him concerned. He is aware that being athletic does not make somebody invincible; he is aware that soldiers can fight a war and return home to be shot by a gang member; he is aware that a bodybuilder can fall a victim to with food poisoning; he is aware that martial artists can be raped in prison. Still, Gustave wants to be the able to defend himself and not have to worry about having to punch his older brother, but he never punched him back before.

The constant pain of being attacked makes him wonder if he gets a girlfriend, will Darius attack him in front of his girlfriend and Will Gustave question his own survivability? Will Darius attack his girlfriend? Will he make fun of her because he already makes comments about his celebrity crush, Ashley Pulse (a Hollywood movie mogul, songstress, and sex symbol), saying that she “looks like a boy,” when Ashley just has a goth style and saying, “Why are you into her” for the thousandth time? What if his girlfriend just so happens to have a physical disability, then he would question if Darius or anybody else would try to take advantage of her.

Really, he is not romantically interested in a celebrity. He would have to make numerous attempts at explaining why he finds Ashley attractive. She is somebody that does not know him. Darius would forget why Gustave is attracted to Ashley moments later and change the subject to anything that will get him angry anyway. What Darius would remember is anything that gets him angry, showing favoritism for a cartoon character called The Intangible Hawk, who loves to get angry.

Gustave says, feeling like Darius is experiencing a Dunning-Kruger Effect, “Never.”

Darius says, “I don’t care how long you lift weights. Older brother is smarter and stronger. I’ll always be able to beat you. I’ll kick your,” he uses profanity, then says, “because I know that I’m going to get angry about something you’ve not done yet. That’s how angry I get.”

Carl arrives back, then Darius tosses the batteries at Gustave, turning silent. From that moment, while Gustave watches professional wrestling, he can only think about how much despises Darius. Thus, he remembers how his social worker got fed up that he usually talks about Darius acting certain ways, only to feel misunderstood.

Sunday at 8:08 P.M., Darius says, “I want to see my mom.”

“There’s nothing I can do about that,” Gustave says.

“If my dad didn’t cheat, maybe mom would still be around.”

“I don’t know the whole story.”

“I wanna go outside. Ask your dad can we go outside,” Darius says.

“You ask him.”

“No. You,” Darius says, “Do you want to go outside.”

“You brought it up.”

Gustave walks into Carl’s bedroom and knocks on the door. Carl, who is on his cell phone makes a disturbed face as if he was asleep. A half-full bag of potato chips is on his bed.

“What,” Carl says.

“Can me and my brother go outside?”

“Where outside? For what? You can’t just be walking anywhere outside. That’s how kidnappings happen. You two can ride ya’ll bikes, but do not go pass McWay Street like your brother two years ago. I’m coming with you all,” he says before telling Vinnie about the information.

Gustave is riding his blue bicycle, then sees Darius performing a trick where he balances the back end of the bicycle on one wheel and land on both wheels. When Gustave attempts the same move, he falls off the bicycle, recurving a bruise.

Laughter erupts from Darius, then Carl says, “That’s it. We’re going inside.”

The following day, Wade approaches Gustave after school, sitting by a brown, wooden bench. He never saw Wade in his town before, even though they attend the same school.

Wade says, “You wanna hang out?”

“I can’t. My dad is going to get mad if I don’t get upstairs.”

“Call your dad and tell him you just want to spend time with your friend.”

“My dad don’t care about that.”

“Call him.”

Gustave calls Carl, “Hey. I was wondering if it’s okay that…”

“Okay that what?”

“If I spend time with a friend.”

“No. I still have to clean up the place. It’s messy around there. I don’t know these people.”

After the phone call ends, Wade says, “Let me borrow your phone. I left mine at home.”

After handing Wade the device, he says, “Let’s go to the store,” then calls someone, “Hey. I’ll be over in about an hour. I’m with a friend right now.”

The strange behavior gets is noticeable, but only Wade rushes away after Gustave buys him a couple of items that he wanted (with money that he saved up and he does not get allowance). Wade eats slices of mangoes and pineapples from a plastic cup with a plastic spoon, then Wade runs away with Gustave’s cell phone while he is not looking.

A livid Gustave chases Wade down to where there are train tracks, then a freight train passes, making him hope that Wade runs into a cul-de-sac. Wade already passed the train tracks and Gustave catches his breath, wondering what he is going to tell his father.

When Gustave tells his father about the event, leaving out the fact that he spent time with his friend, his father gets the police involved. Thus, Wade is at the police station being interrogated, then it is Gustave’s turn to be interrogated. The result is that because Wade stole over $900 in property, he is expected to be sentenced time in prison. Wade stole his $500 device. What Gustave did not know is that after stealing from him, Wade stole from another friend, running away with an MP3 player other belongings.

The unforgiving look on Gustave’s face makes Wade not care about what he did. It takes until Monday on a bus ride to school, for a student to approach Gustav, to know that Wade is in grave danger. Stealing property from a friend is a form of betrayal and one student threatens to pummel Wade for what he did. Thus, in lunch, a student (wears a black bald fade haircut on a head that has flat bone structure at the rear end, a red, backwards baseball cap, black varsity jacket, blue jeans, and red gym shoes) approaches Wade (who is eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich at a circular, wooden table. Five other students circle the table, then Wade gets panics, getting pain inflicted on him by a group, which could’ve be a form of therapy for Gustave.

A few minutes later, Gustave is scheduled to meet up with Ms. Putnick. The moment Gustave enters the room depressed, the social worker wears an excited look, probably because it is the last day of high school. It is a month until graduation and not only is he thinking about Wade, but his driver’s education teacher, Ray.

Marcus, who is also in his driver’s education class was laughing at how scrawny he is and showing a picture of his new car. A little-known fact is that on the last day of high school, Gustave will need only one more day out of the behind-the-wheel-training to drive on the road, so that he can finally get his license. On the last day of high school, he would have already taken 30 grueling hours of classroom instruction, but Ray will refuse to be considerate enough to use an extra day (to give Gustave a final day of behind-the-wheel training), so that Gustave can get his license.

“Hi! Thirty more days until school is over. Tell me something good,” Ms. Putnick says.

“Hi.” He says, sitting down, “I like the way you changed your hair.”

“Ooh. Good. You like what I’ve done. My husband cannot get enough of it…”

An awkward silence eventually comes, then he says, “Yesterday, Wade stole…”

“I already heard the story. The staff told me all about it.”

Gustave views his social worker as an old-timer, even though she appears to be in her 20s or 30s. Never did he ask her age because he was told to never ask a woman their age. The rule of not asking a woman their age does not seem to apply to his curiosity, but he refuses to ask every female how old they are. If they ask him how old he is, then he would ask them.

A couple of weeks after Wade gets pummeled, Raven from Gustave’s English class (who is wearing an immaculate light blue, chiffon flutter sleeve top, blue jeans, and white gym shoes) is sitting at a desk while everyone except for Gustave rises up, ready to leave. She is across from him and he approaches her, making the mistake of being attracted to her.

All of the classmates leave, “Hey, Raven.”

“Hey,” she says with a voice of gentle melody.

“I find you attractive…”

It is probably the first time he actually admits to a woman that they are attractive, implying that he would like to date her, without being direct. The first woman that he confesses his feelings to just so happens to be alone and the teacher left the room. The issue is that he does not really know her and she was basically laughing disingenuously at jokes about him. Throughout classroom sessions, he aggressively fantasized about her, giving him the idea that she may like him and he has no clue what she thinks about hypergamy.

“I’m not looking for anybody yet,” she says.

Only by the following day, an indelible event occurs. Gustave is walking in the hallway and notices Raven kissing a male of a dark skinned complexion beside the blue lockers. When he makes direct eye contact with her, she smiles, noticing that he does not appear bothered by her current activity, being already depressed over being bullied. He continues at the same pace, walking away, then when it is time to walk to the yellow school bus to go home, before he travels to the bus, Raven is standing beside Marcus and Wade.

Marcus is busy talking about how Gustave has on popular, new shoes, but they are really the same shoes he wore ever since the first day of high school. In fact, he wore his high school shoes 2 years prior to high school, now, flustered that Raven is nearby. He really is used to not washing up because of how often his brother does not, but recently started washing up before attending school. Seeing Raven laugh at what Marcus makes him think that she does not respect him, especially after seeing her infatuated with another student earlier.

Two black females walk nearby. One female has black braids and the other is a brunette with a ponytail.

Marcus says, “Ladies. You know, mixed exactly isn’t the style anymore.”

The female with the black braids says, “Black as,” referencing the word where sinners go in the afterlife, then says, “ain’t either. I’ma tell you that now!”

Wade laughs, saying, “Ooohh!”

Without trying to wrap his head around why Raven would be around Wade, he walks away to head on the yellow school bus. That does not stop him from thinking about why the two females that he never met before disrespect the black community. It is not like he is not just as dark-skinned as Marcus and Wade, so he is not attracted to them.

From strangers, he heard the viewpoint that black people cannot be racist multiple times. He even heard that black people are indeed racist and can say that they despise other races and commit hate crimes, without being called racist. It occurs to him that the woman with the braids was wearing prescription glasses, meaning that she cannot see clearly, so “Why would she discriminate?” He does see whiteness when he looks at his fingernails and palms of his hands, but did hear about how black is the original race, to white is the original race, to how Jesus could’ve had dark skin while he was on Earth. Maybe Jesus was black. Some people consider Him to be a Jew or the most Jewish of Jews and Jews can be viewed as blacks. To think that Jesus and voice the viewpoint could just cause somebody to claim that he was probably looking like an Arab or something.

“His head and his hairs were white like wool, as white as snow; and his eyes were as a flame of fire; And his feet like unto fine brass, as if they burned in a furnace; and his voice as the sound of many waters. And he had in his right hand seven stars: and out of his mouth went a sharp twoedged sword: and his countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength”—Revelation 1:14-16. What other race do you know that has wool hair in the Middle East? The media at times may tease that Jesus is black, simultaneously to having the narrative that He was white (being portrayed in movies, television shows, music videos, artwork, and more). “Then Peter opened his mouth, and said, Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons: But in every nation he that feareth him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with him”—Acts 10:34-35.

Before being politically correct and enduring cancel culture was prevalent today, everyone had to just accept how others feel, voice their beliefs and/or opinions, or keep their distance (unless the issue is about extremists wanting segregation, zero gays around, or anything). Some people obviously get emotionally fueled and others act without thinking, when there is a conflict. Maybe they are the ones to start the conflict, wanting a reason to inflict pain on somebody else, which is partly why he tries to stay out of escalating arguments that can easily be avoided.

Chapter 6:

Can’t Look At Anyone or Anything

By the time Gustave is 18, Darius (who has a black mohawk) gets into an argument with Carl. Another day of family conflicts is the usual and if Gustave was to wear a mohawk, he would be possibly kicked out of the apartment. A delusional Darius could feel like he can deadlift a megalodon and dodge speeding bullets without being a trained and qualified specialist in the art of self-defense or mixed martial arts.

Like he is is disowned from the family, Darius says, “You telling me that I’m musty is rude! I was just trying to play my video game, then you walk into the room trying to tell me to wash up!”

“Get out of my house,” Carl says after Darius tackles Carl, then Carl positions his weight on Darius, yelling.

They are fighting again and Gustave just wants to leave. Darius leaves the apartment, slamming the front door. Darius is outside without wearing a winter coat, even though it is snowing outside.

“It is freezing cold outside and he didn’t think to take a coat with him, walking out looking like a homeless person! Whatever! All I told him was to wash up, brush his teeth, and do the dishes! I shouldn’t have to tell him that, but he wants to catch an attitude! You think I said anything wrong?”

“No,” a depressed Gustave says, then Carl mocks Gustave, saying, “No.”

Stepping into his bedroom and realizing that he does not have to share it oddly feels like the best moment of his life. It may be a horrible thing to think, but no longer being tortured and manipulated by someone who is supposed to share the same blood is refreshing.

Two weeks pass and the bunkbed that he rests on is thrown out and he now rests on a twin bed. The posters on the wall are not of pop stars reminding him of the Darius’s playlist. There are posters of anime characters, because if he wanted to choose posters of rockstars, Carl would not allow it.

Before getting dressed to head outside, Gustave exits his bedroom, only to hear his dad say to him, “I’ve been having sex with Vinnie.”

“Okay,” Gustave says, confused as to why his dad brought up the topic.

What Gustave does know is that his dad is unequally yoked because he is not a professing Jehovah’s Witness. Why is it that Gustave is not allowed to date whoever he wants. Even his brother is allowed to date whoever he wants, practically having sex with multiple females in mental facilities.

Shopping for clothes is not fun. Over the weekend, Carl takes Gustave downtown and he does not know what stores Carl is taking him to, but can guess that one of them may be a grocery store. Gustave is wearing a black, faux leather jacket, which he probably only wore ten times and it is already tearing from the sleeves, reminding him of how a snake sheds its skin. There is a store called Guy Ups, full men’s clothing for hipsters. Gustave looks down various aisles of shirts, then picks a shirt up from a rack that has a rockstar’s face on it, only to see Carl’s no-nonsense look. Gustave put the shirt back, then Carl picks up a shirt.

“What about this shirt? What do you think about this?”

Gustave looks at the orange shirt and says, “Sure.”

“Where is the fitting room? We’ll just keep looking around.”

The moment Gustave picks up blue leather pants with colorful designs on it, giving 90s rockstar vibes, Carl yells, “You said you didn’t like clothes that give off too much attention! This will give you a lot of attention,” then Carl calls Vinnie, saying, “We’re at Guy Ups and Gustave is looking at some hideous pants. It has skulls on them.”

A 18-year-old male named Craig walks by with a shopping cart with two females his age, then smiles. The moment Carl turns around to leave the area, Craig gets in front of him, moves his entire face forward slightly enough that surveillance cameras would barely notice it, and frowns in a fashion that would intimidate regular people. Gustave stares at Craig walking in between the two women, thinking that maybe the teenager was rude because he is was not independent.

Carl returns back to the aisle and has his phone on video chat. Vinnie laughs at the pants and says, “Oh, my.”

“Exactly! You can’t be out here looking like everybody else! It looks stupid! I remember you said that you wanted a tattoo! That’ll give you attention!”

Students would make fun of Gustave’s clothing and some of the people he used to go to school with, he sees, but is not friends with. In a separate department, called Gal Ups, Emily and Jasmine are cashiers. He finds Emily and Jasmine by walking too far in the wrong direction. It is no surprise if Emily is no longer dating Wade and no surprise if she is still dating Wade, but Gustave would rather not see her face.

“Gustave! How have you been,” Emily, who smells like sweet aromatherapy says.

“Hey! You look so much different without glasses. I see you! Lookin’ sharp and making a wrong turn in the store. Stop by every once in a while and say hi to me,” Jasmine says.

“Hi,” Gustave says.

“And me,” Emily says.

“Hi,” he says.

Carl shows up and just when he was intensely nervous, the embarrassment starts.

Carl says, “Hi. I’m Gustave’s father.”

“You two look just alike,” Emily says.

“I guess I don’t need to get a DNA test,” Carl laughs, saying.

Jasmine laughs, saying, “Not at all.”

Emily says, “We went to the same high school as Gustave.”

For Gustave, having a nostalgia for high school is impossible. It cannot be a coincidence that he is seeing Emily and Jasmine. At least he is not seeing Emily’s ex, Wade, but he is indeed paranoid that he may see someone else from his past. He feels so paranoid that maybe he should be criminally responsible, but he can’t be suffering from psychosis, losing touch with reality. He does not hear disembodied voices. Maybe he does not have autism or even selective mutism, but awkwardness has a way of finding him, similar to unwanted criticism.

“Really? My son is going to Octavia’s College University to be a film director.”

The moment Carl mentions that Gustave is going to be attending Octavia’s College, Gustave has a series of flashbacks from West Massivedom College. He is soon to be transferring from West Massivedom College to Octavia’s College University, but in one scene, there is a female chancellor (in her 50s with grey hair, wearing a black business suit). Across from the chancellor is him sitting beside his dad.

The chancellor says, “When you attend West Massivedom College, we will not tolerate your behavior if you’re running around the schools like your brother. We didn’t tolerate his behavior and we won’t tolerate yours.”

Gustave, who did not once run down the college hallways is already being wrongfully judged. If he is judged just for being related to his older brother, who got expelled from West Massivedom a year prior to him attending it, then what is to stop his dad from yelling and running around?

“He expressed an interest in joining the military,” Carl says.

The disgruntled chancellor says, “You want to join the military? You don’t want to join the military. People are dying out in the military. You think you have it rough at home or school. Join the military, especially in these times.”

Gustave was contemplating on joining the military, but actually does not believe that the government cares about others. He does not agree with the justice system either. He just wants to find a way to make money, rather it is to sacrifice his life, but would prefer not to have to risk dying from the war.

A chancellor is discouraging him to join the military like he is incapable of succeeding at it if he was to pursue it. Like he is incapable of transporting a wounded soldier to a destination without breaking a leg, he has a grown and possibly overgrown naysayer. Her ex boyfriend must have committed suicide during basic training, had a freak accident, fell victim of friendly fire, or married somebody else in order to talk negatively about him going to the the military. Who knows, but he is uncertain if he can adapt to the military now.

The scene switches to Gustave sitting in Psychology class. He sees a female teacher run in place in front of the class. The class laughs. He did absolutely nothing to tell the teacher about how his older brother runs at multiple locations, has outbursts, gets into fights, etc. Somehow, he had a suspicion that the English teacher is aware about his brother, just as others are.

Another scene arrives. This time, he is in the school cafeteria sitting at a table across from a goth woman named Jennifer (who is wearing a black, mid-length, floppy hairstyle, black eyeliner, black lipstick, black t-shirt of a rock band, black, fishnet arm sleeves), then Luna arrives. The duration of his conversation with the goth woman is probably 60 seconds, first greeting her, asking her how she was, and where she is from, just as she asked greets him, asks him how he is, and where he is from?

Luna, who gained an estimated 50 pounds since high school (is wearing a grey hoodie that has the name of her high school and gym shorts with her high school colors) arrives at the table with her chubby female friend named Candace, slumps down in a black, wooden chair, and says, “Hey, Gustave. How are you?”

“Hey. I’m fine,” Gustave says, hiding how upset he is that Luna actually is in the same college.

The goth woman looks at Luna and Candace, then waves. The interference in his life seems to be everlasting. What else can he expect in life?

“When’s your next class. I have an hour until I head to Math class.”

“Art class is in about thirty minutes,” Gustave says.

“How’s Darius,” Luna asks.

“He still talks about you, every day. His anger is still a factor.”

“Yeah. He’s always angry.”

Candace says, “Last year, Darius was running down the hall and jumped off the second floor. He got expelled.”

Luna makes an unflattering comment that even a high school dropout should know never to say, “Don’t remind me. I feel like I chose the wrong person to date back in high school. I should’ve dated you.”

Out of hope, Candace looks at Gustave as if it is a possibility that he may want to date Luna. There is no way that Gustave wants to date Luna. He is not even attracted to her and if by an act of the devil that he was to be sexually aroused by her, he would regret it. Any attempt that Luna may use to seduce him would be ignored. If Luna would date his brother, (in which she did) then something is horribly wrong.

Even if Luna was to have an overwhelming amount of beauty and an unparalleled personality, dating her would cause issues with Darius. No matter how much animosity he may have toward Darius, he would not want to date Luna, let alone have sex with her. If aliens (which are demons) were to ever descend and abduct her, they would return her to Earth. If a human trafficker was to ever take her, the human trafficker would return her, but a hitman would just do his job. Her appearance alone belongs in a federal penitentiary after she used her mouth to utter such words about wanting to date him. If she was to kiss the ground that Gustave walked on, there would probably be an earthquake of a magnitude of 10.0. The thought of dating Luna (who is what a burnt raisin choked on by a Martian looks like to Gustave) being repulsive is an understatement.

“What? You dated my brother. I’d never go out with you,” Gustave says, as Candace’s eyes widen.

The goth woman’s face does not change as Gustave leaves the scene, forgetting to wave goodbye when it probably would not make much of a difference. What could’ve been a moment of getting to know a beautiful goth woman with a decent first impression is a disaster. Near the corridors, he walks.

Gustave has a flashback of when he is at West Massivedom and a muscular, black male is talking to him.

The muscular male has a deep voice, saying, “I used to be much bigger than what I look like now. I got into a car accident years ago, woke up in a coma and I loss all of my muscle mass. I was in a coma for like four months. You don’t believe me?”

Gustave says, “I didn’t say that. It doesn’t matter what I believe.”

The muscular male says, “I used to be on the streets every day and angry. Ask anybody about the hood I grew up on. I would harm people for no reason at all. These youngins out here don’t care if you’re walking with your girlfriend, mother, or father. They’re ready to kill you. You don’t believe me?”

Gustave says, “I believe that you have the power to control how you react to situations.”

A brunette named Marcy (who has a feathered hairstyle, a red jacket, blue jeans, and black gym shoes) passes by and says, “Man, you ain’t gone through,” using profanity.

When Gustave exits the flashbacks, Emily says, “Congratulations.”

“Thank you,” Gustave says.

Carl continues the conversation, saying, “How long have you been working here.”

More loving than a midwife, Emily says, “For about six months. I have a 5-month-old son, so I have to do what I can, while planning to get my degree in Criminal Justice at Realville University. He’s worth losing the sleep over, kicking my tummy.”

The conversation seems to continue forever, making Gustave wonder if Carl is becoming friends with even Emily to know some gossip about his life. Carl likes to talk with many people, including the talkative neighbors, librarians, and cashiers at other stores.

It is discouraging enough that Gustave took a driver’s education class in the past, consisting of 30 hours of classroom instruction and behind-the-wheel training, only needing one more day to get a license. Why could not Ray, the teacher be more organized or simply use the time after the last day of high school to sit in the passenger’s seat while he drives? Thus, on graduation, it was nearly impossible for him to authentically smile.

He could still attempt to study the Illinois rules of the road, but does not want to. He thinks about studying the how to drive, only to wonder about how his dad constantly says he will not be successful at anything in life. Sometimes, his dad says that he can accomplish anything. What happens if he studies the rules of the road, passes a test, then asteroids fall from the sky and the world is ending?

The universe would not just allow him to succeed? He believes that it is possible that he can succeed in life. He has to succeed in order to comfort his future girlfriend.

Finally, the conversation ends, leading Gustave to say, “Bye.”

Carl says, “Take care.”

Jasmine says, “Bye” and Emily says, “Stop by and see me every once in a while. Take care. Oh. I love those shoes. What type of shoes are those.”

Carl poses with his blue finger shoes, saying, “Thank you. These are finger shoes. I can workout with them. I can travel with them.”

Jasmine says, “I’m gonna pick me up some of those.”

They are still chatting. The conversation may never end. Seeing Emily and Jasmine make him think about horrible high school memories. One of his memories specifically involves asking his father if it is okay to join the wrestling team after school, receiving a “Yes,” then when he joins, the next day, he is told by his dad, “I never said that you can join the wrestling team.” The message made him feel delusional, but really, his dad was either delusional or gaslighting him.

Carl notices a sign that says “Gal Ups Is Hiring,” then directs Gustave’s attention to the sign, taking a picture of the information. Could this day get any worse? Of course it can. Gustave could be currently working at the same store as Emily, during the same work shift. One of the last things he needs is for Emily to be using him for sex or trying to have a baby with him, knowing that she dated Wade.

An hour later, Carl is on the train, sitting four seats away from Gustave and Gustave is preoccupied with thinking about past drama that is so emotionally painful, it is laughable. The laughter can stop him from crying and he silently feels like talking to himself because there is nobody else to talk to about everything he wants. He is not mentally challenged, but gets treated like he is.

Carl says, “Why are you talking to yourself?”

Gustave says, “I was not talking to myself.”

Sometimes, Gustave does talk to himself to feel like his thoughts are being processed in a productive way, but not because he believes that an imaginary friend is listening. He does not believe in his situations of self-talk, that he is talking to a villain either. He used to rehearse poems that he wrote aloud for about ten minutes, but could not rehearsing be talking to yourself? Is not acting talking to yourself or a form of misunderstanding?

Nodding his head horizontally, Carl says, “I’m gonna record you, so you can see how you look.”

After the train ride, Carl is in his cell phone talking to Vinnie on the way back to the apartment, saying, “My mother told me yesterday that one of her packages were stolen. You can’t trust the workers either. People out here looking for expensive gifts around Christmas. I’m shipping everything to the post office. God is gonna get them.”

A week later, on Gustave’s birthday, he receives a desktop computer from Carl and a smartphone from Vinnie as a gift. He thanks the couple in the living room, wondering how they could afford the gifts, if he spent a couple of birthdays and Christmases without a gift, just as much get asked for spare change (when he lacks a job). His life feels complete because he feels like he has an opportunity to get rich and famous from the internet, find multiple jobs, interact with anyone, and more. Not only does he love his desktop computer that is placed in his bedroom, he loves his smart phone, which has web browsing software applications, picture texts, and a multitude of apps.

His grandma says, “I’ve never see you this happy before,” then imitates the recent facial expression that Gustave made. The imitation feels like mockery, but Gustave is too excited to care, until Carl says, “He don’t deserve it. I had to work for my money growing up.”

Carl then groans in the back of Gustave’s ear while pointing at him.

“You’re not gettin’ any sleep tonight, are you,” grandma says with laughter, “You’re not gettin’ any sleep!”

“I have to sleep,” Gustave says, then Aunt Nia says, “He’s not gonna sleep. He’s gonna be up all night on that phone.”

“He’s just like Darius,” Carl says, “Standing around all day and being hungry. You hungry?”

Gustave says in a monotone voice, frustrated that he is compared to his older brother, “Yes,” then Carl says, “Fix you a plate then. Smile! It’s your birthday! I’m not cooking tonight! Cut your lemon cake. Nia made it for you.”

Everyone except for Gustave laughs. Even Eric, Tina, and Heath are laughing. He grabs a white paper plate, a plastic fork, and adds 4 scoops of beef and noodle casserole, honey barbecue chicken wings, and 4 slices of sausage pizza.

“You want me to slice the cake?”

It’s your birthday,” Carl says, then Gustave grabs a knife, leading Carl to say, “Wait. Let’s take a picture.”

His grandma says, “Ah, man! We can’t forget to take a picture,” then Nia says, “I’ll take the picture.”

After taking pictures of the food and everyone celebrating Gustave’s birthday, Nia poses for the camera, being in several pictures with other relatives. The uncomfortableness gets worse, when grandma places candles on the cake, lights them with a lighter, and everyone sings a cliche song.

Seconds before blowing the cake out, Carl says, “Did you brush your teeth?”

“Yes. I washed my hands too.”

He blows out the candle, then everyone rushes to get a plate full of food.

Later, Gustave is watching a nu metal music video on his smartphone, then watches several more music videos of the same genre, all while in his bedroom. His earphones are on and he is attached to the overall imagery of the clothing and aesthetics that he sees. Thus, he gains curious about if there are fully naked emo women recorded on the internet.

Thanks to his curiosity, it is his excuse to type “Naked emo women” in the search engine, seeing countless website options. He watches a video of an eye-catching emo woman who has red bangs and pink dye on the tips of her hair, black, thick eyeglasses, a white button-up shirt with a skinny tie, black stockings, and leather black combat boots.

The visual imagery makes him feel like he is living vicariously through the man undressing the female, then the porn star confidently has sexual intercourse with her. He looks at another porn video, but this time, is more attracted to a naked goth woman (with hair that looks like well-seasoned curly fries and silver, horseshoe piercings on her ears, as well as a green neck tattoo of a sword) who is fulfilling her carnal desires with a male on a leather, red love seat. Then, he looks at a punk rocker (with a pink mohawk) have sex, only to look up multiple videos of naked goth women, wondering if they’d ever use sexual innuendos toward him.

He imagines physically dominating the women in the overwhelming scenes and imagines slipping on condoms that were under imaginary floorboards), then proceeds to masturbate without moaning. Frightened that Carl may hear him if he masturbates too hard repeatedly, because the white, plaster walls are thin, he rubs himself slowly, then speeds up the process (avoiding to smack his hand on on his crotch).

Many types of women enters his mind. The 15-year-old imagines what it would feel like to have sexual relations with an Italian woman would be like, what it would feel like to have sexual relations with an Asian woman, and what it would feel like to have sexual relations with a Spanish-speaking Mexican. He wonders how it would feel like to simply kiss an Indian woman, only to look up a video of a male having sex with a gorgeous woman dressed as a nun, then looks at a video of a homeless woman having sex.

It occurs to him, how good of a sensation would it feel to have sex with a skinny woman (or underfed woman), athletic woman, and big-boned woman? How good of a sensation would it feel to have sex with a deaf woman until she develops asthma, a blind woman until she develops hearing loss, and a one-armed woman until her other arm becomes numb? How good would it even feel to have sex with a deceased woman? “How would it feel to have sex with an octogenarian woman,” he thinks, only to wonder about the different bust, waist, and hip sizes of women. He then thinks about how it would be to have sex with a schizophrenic woman even if he used minor movements, then remembers how his older brother has a mental disorder, only to come to the conclusion that most women would not act like him (not wanting a schizophrenic partner anyway).

The same way that somebody can be communicating with another, speaking clearly, only to abruptly forget what the conversation was about, Gustave wonders how a visually impaired person would handle such a situation. The person may experience vision loss, but their other senses would increase. If visually impaired people even read the lips of others, it could be worse than reading subtitles during movies, because there are consequences for not paying attention.

A small message pops up on the center of the screen after he exits out of the pornographic website, reading, “I’m watching you,” then Gustave presses a button that says, “Ok.”

Who could be watching Gustave? God is watching Gustave, but he doubts that God would communicate to him via a message on a computer screen in such a way. He wonders if his computer is hacked or if looking at hot goth women is so evil that it caused a hacker to complain. He wonders if not wanting a child with anyone except a woman who could be goth is wicked, then does not hear his dad on his cell phone like he usually is.

Rising up from a chair at the glass table that was sitting at make him wonder if his computer caught a virus. He exits his bedroom, only to see Carl laughing by the couch, (like a voyeur) nodding his head horizontally. He laughs so long, that Gustave cannot help but to uncomfortably laugh, feeling like his privacy is invaded. Why would anybody care about him being watched? Gustave does not pay the bills around the apartment.

Carl says like Gustave watched an entire hierarchy of secret societies, disguised as naked goths, “Why are you watching porn?”

“Because I can. I wanted to see how the women look.”

Carl calls Vinnie, then tells her about what happened, “I told you Gustave was going to be up to something. Gustave was watching porn.”

“That’s degrading,” Vinnie says, despising the rebellious look of goths.

“You shouldn’t watching porn. I’m going to tell grandma what you were watching,” Carl says.

“Why does she have to know. What if someone watched your internet browsing history,” Gustave says.

“You just worry about not looking at porn. Get out of here,” Carl says angrily.

An irate Gustave heads to his room and shuts the bedroom door. He wonders how Carl got access to watch what websites he was on remotely. Surely, he did not allow tech support from a local store to remotely control his computer, so Carl must have spyware.

The way Carl is acting definitely is not Christian, saying over the phone loud enough, “I don’t want him having punk rock babies! It’s stupid! All of that dark clothing! Devil worshipping… Read a Bible! I’d rather him get with a Catholic woman! Rock music! I don’t like that…”

Really, Gustave would rather not date anyone that he would not consider marrying and if he was to date somebody, maybe he would want to marry the person in the future that he wants to spend eternity with, even though he does not understand the concept of Jesus Christ yet. It is not an inability to understand the concept of Jesus. Why would God allow so much evil on Earth if He is good? He believes that there is a higher power, but why cannot he date somebody who is in another religion? What if the woman he falls in love with is Muslim or Buddhist? Being just a pious person is not an exception for most, if not all of his family members. If his future girlfriend just so happens to be a Christian, it would probably be because his father set him up to date a Christian woman, but even if he was Christian, nobody would help him actually get a girlfriend without any consequences. He would have to wait a long time just to consummate their marriage, but getting married does not guarantee performing sexual activities.

He wonders if he lives to be a Christian, gets married, then what happens if his wife was to gradually change her beliefs. What if he finally becomes a follower of Christ, then he is harshly judged even more for his beliefs by people calling themselves believers, that are really Pharisees? What if he exposes wickedness in the world, if so he was to find Jesus, then he makes countless mistakes. Being sinless seems impossible, so for the moment, he lives in the flesh.

The following day, Carl is complaining on the cell phone to to the supervisor of a store because he ordered a landscape picture from a store and the employee did not notify him that he could get a 50% discount if he has a special membership with the store.

After the conversation, Carl calls another company to complain. This time, Carl is complaining about how the staff members at the mental facility where Darius stays at should not give him any medication that he is not aware of because he is the parent and legal guardian. The complaint turns into loud profanity, which wakes Gustave from his sleep, like usual. The merest text message notification that Gustave gets from the heart-healthy Daisy make him happy (even if he is woken up by it), allowing him to smile.

Exiting his bedroom, he hears Carl continue to complain, so he washes up. After washing up, he hears nothing, except for the television on. It sounds like a news station and when he enters the living room, Carl says with profanity, “These people are so… Waiting in a long line just to get the newest cell phone,” then says after the next news topic comes up, “Who has time for online dating. It’s… I wouldn’t do it. That’s why she got murdered, thinking that she found someone. She found someone wielding a gun. Ain’t no way. White people.”

As if white people are the only ones partaking in online dating, Carl continues yapping. Gustave is just wondering about what if Daisy was to get killed by a group of gang members (with barbaric practices) and he found out via watching the news while sitting with his dad, then his dad makes a disparaging remark about women exiting the house wearing dark clothing. The thought angers him, then Carl looks and complains.

“What are you frowning about,” Carl says.

“Nothing,” Gustave says, knowing that talking to Carl will not alleviate any sadness.

“Exactly! Because you’re going through nothing. You need to be paying some bills around here or something. Around here frowning. Always frowning. You gonna get enough of listening to that rock music. That’s what it is. What are they saying in that music? You can’t hear what they’re saying and when you do, it’s not praising Jesus! Eat healthy. Travel the world. Talk to people. You don’t have to wear all black. You’re going to be attending Octavia’s College, so you can’t walk in there with the same energy, focused on the past. Someone of your caliber should know better than to listen to that unholy music!”

“Rock music is…”

Carl’s cell phone rings, then he answers it to tell Vinnie that he will call her back soon, taking his anger out on Gustave, “I’m talking! I’m not trying to hear about that demonic music! Your mom would not allow you to listen to that… You need to read the Bible with all of that time you have with your door closed.”

Carl talks to Vinnie over 2 minutes via his cell phone and Gustave has to wonder if Carl is going to yell at him for either leaving the scene because he is not yet done talking or yell at him for staying around (being gaslighted that he looks weird). Carl ends the call to talk to Gustave for over 30 minutes about basically how Gustave is not a Christian and is going to hell. When Gustave steps away to head back to the bedroom, Carl stares. Anger is on Carl’s face.

“Eventually, you’ll be thirty in your bedroom doing nothing with your life, then forty. Get a job. Even people dressing up in all black have to get regular jobs and be friendly. You can’t be working in a slaughterhouse! Thats disturbing! Vinnie would never talk to you again if she I tell her about that. Slaughtering animals! Why would you want to work there? Give me one good reason why you’d want to?”

“I hardly talk to her anyway.”

“Why don’t you?”

“Everything I tell her, she tells you anyway. I say hi,” he says like a doctor recently gave him a shot that went all the way through his vein, puncturing both sides.

“You can say hi in a friendly way. Not in a depressed voice. If I walk at a job all down in the dumps, everyone looks at me and think, that guy’s crazy. Let’s stay away from him. Someone will speak to the manager and you’re fire. If multiple people are saying the same thing about you, you’re the problem. I used to walk around with an angry face, then one time I looked in the mirror and noticed it. You’re acting like your brother. Last week, he comes calling me telling me that a dude pulled down his pants and got to sucking his penis, then calls it rape. I asked him if he was threatened or forced. He’s like no! That’s how absurd it sounds. I read part of his book that he wrote. He keeps calling it a book, but was writing it for seven years and it’s still unpublished. It has so many grammatical errors in it, I couldn’t finish it. You need to be more like your cousin Lil Ben. He’s not lil anymore. He’s traveling to China and teaching English to Chinese students. Answer the question.”

“What question?”

“Why do you want to work in a slaughterhouse?”

Gustave cannot give a good reason as to why he would want to work in a slaughterhouse, but he also would not want to be a cashier miscounting money or a waiter forgetting the slightest details in sensual meals.

“I want to gain money. Odd jobs work for different people…”

Carl interrupts, saying, “A serial killer would want to work in a slaughterhouse. Jesus would not want you doing that after He died on the cross…”

Carl continues talking without reading from the Bible or quoting one passage from the Bible. He talks for over 4 hours, but the talking is not like elaborate sermons. Such talks make Gustave think about rather dying from secondhand smoke. He thinks about how the Puritans treated witches burned at the stake and falsely accused others of being witches during the Salem witch trials (between February 1692 and May 1693). It makes him think about how there are stories of people killing relatives, friends, and strangers because the killer claims that Jesus told them to do it. It reminds him of the religious cults, as well as how many people can use the Bible against women’s rights advocates by simply misinterpreting the words.

If every Christian is like Carl, Gustave does not want to be a Christian. Why be forced to hear about God and if he rejected Jesus, who is God, then he can be kicked out of the apartment. He’ll be gossiped about. Momentarily, he would rather serve the devil, but by serving the devil, he would go to hell if he dies in his sins. If he claimed to have magical powers after practicing theistic Satanism, in which could be time-consuming, some of those that are not Christian may think he has powers, but if he claimed to be getting attacked by demons, he would be labeled as mentally challenged. The thoughts make him just want to not practice anything, only to think about why would he practice absolutely no belief if he would go to hell for denying Christianity. He believes in Jesus though.

At the moment, Gustave only remembers the verse “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life—John 3:16. He heard of the verse “Let the woman learn in silence with all subjection. But I suffer not a woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man, but to be in silence. For Adam was first formed, then Eve. And Adam was not deceived, but the woman being deceived was in the transgression. Notwithstanding she shall be saved in childbearing, if they continue in faith and charity and holiness with sobriety—1 Timothy 2:11-15. Believing that there are errors in the Bible, another verse that he heard before is “Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience as also saith the law. And if they will learn any thing, let them ask their husbands at home: for it is a shame for women to speak in the church—1 Corinthians 14:34-35. What he does not realize at the moment is that there is also a verse that says “Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it;”—Ephesians 5:25.

Women have the right to expose evil, just as much as men because what type of a person would be aware that someone is making choices that can lead them to hell, but do not bring it up? It is just that women are supposed to serve their husbands and the husbands serve God. Under the parents are the children. Why risk going against a message that says that women should not teach in the church? It does not mean that women should not share the Gospel or expose evil. “And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them”—Ephesians 5:11.

“Vinnie said that I allow you to talk too much and I agree with her.”

“I barely even say much.”

“Vinnie never argued back with her parents. They’d smack the,” the brainwashing Carl uses profanity, then says, “…if she ever was to disrespect their home. Her father was in the military. He wasn’t having it. You think you have it hard. You have it made, boy. Get your stuff together. She didn’t have time to be in the room all day because she had to clean up around the house, have Bible studies, work, and go to school. Some people your age have children. What are you going through? Nothing!”

“It’s not my fault that other people have children.”

“Listen when I’m talking.”

“Okay,” Gustave says.

“You need to serve Jehovah. Don’t let anyone ever waste your time,” an infuriated Carl says.

“Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God—1 Corinthians 6:9-11. At this moment, Gustave is aware that a self-righteous Carl spoke to the Jehovah’s Witness, Vinnie about religion. Why would Gustave embrace being a Jehovah’s Witness if he was taught that he is supposed to attend church, read the Bible, and praise Jesus, prior to meeting Vinnie, even though Carl no longer goes to church? The last time he remembers going to a church was when he was 8-years-old.

Carl is unemployed, but complains that Gustave lacks a job, too! Carl, the unemployed dad who makes matters more emotional for Gustave by bringing up Jehovah. There are over probably 45,000 Christian denominations worldwide and depending on the type of beliefs a practicing Christian would have, he thinks that he would have no freedom. There are probably 4,000-10,000 distinct religions in the world and he is forced to hear about one religion every day and would be punished or possibly kicked out of the house if he researched other religions. He fears that researching other religions would wound up in his dad trying to kill him, but surely plans to look up various religions after the long talk.

Carl is confused about which doctrine to believe. Gustave is aware that Jehovah’s Witnesses do not accept Jesus dying on the cross and feels like Carl is simply intentionally wasting Gustave time. He is just unsure why his own father would stoop to such a level.

The moment that Gustave enters his bedroom, Darius calls him.

Knowing that the talk most likely will lead to an argument, he picks up the cell phone and answers it, “Hello.”

Darius says, “Hello.”

“How are you?”

“I’m good. I just figured that I’ll call you because you’re my brother and I wanted to know what you’ve been up to. I’m not sure what to talk about,” Darius says, only to play loud pop music in the background, “How’s life?”

“It’s fine. You?”

“Terrific. My friend, Marissa is pregnant with her little brother. It was an accident because they both got sexually attracted. It could’ve happened to anyone.”

“No it couldn’t.”

“It was an accident. You can’t just control not wanting sex if someone is constantly flirting. Tell me about your life.

“I’m about to head to college…”

Darius laughs, interrupting, “College. That reminds me of putting a scene in college to the book that I’m writing. I’m going to create the perfect book and I’m adding the main character with your characteristics in it. It’s about a depressed man who finds out how cope at life.”

“I don’t want to be in your book.”

“It’s not you that’s in my book. The main character’s name will be Tray. Your girlfriend’s name will be Marissa and will have a baby with her boss. I’ll make sure to say that you inspired me on the acknowledgment page. It’s going to be horror, romance, comedy, drama, and every genre in one. It’s going to have everything. Remember that Dr. King quote. I have a dream! It’s spine-chilling. That’s the impact that I want for each word coming out of my characters. Remember your favorite wrestler when he takes the microphone, breathes into the air with charisma and says his line? I want that level of feeling to be added to the character.”

“That’s fine.”

“That’s the problem with you. You need to be more excited.”

“You called me though,” Gustave says.

“I called you to find out how you are for my book! What type of music do you listen to?”

“I listen to rock music,” Gustave says.

Darius interrupts, saying, “I like pop better. The character is going to listen to pop. I don’t like how my dad would tell me brush my teeth, even though I should. He makes me so angry. He don’t know how angry. You make me angry too!”

“What type of interview is this?”

“It’s not an interview. See. Now, I forgot what I was talking about. You and my dad always playing those tricks to make me forget. You, him, and the whole world. You’re not my brother anymore. I’m tired of you! My dad is trying to tell me what to do. I’ll sock him in the face. You yell at me and I’ll knock you out.”

“Stop calling.”

Gustave ends the phone call, just for Darius to call back, angrier, saying, “Why’d you hang up! I was just trying to talk to my brother.”

He ends the phone call again, then blocks his cell phone number. Gustave rubs his hands with hand sanitizer that is on his glass entertainment system and slips on his contact lenses. A knock is heard on his bedroom door. When Gustave opens the door, he sees Carl.

Carl says, “What I was trying to say earlier is that you need to be more talkative. Explore the world. Next time Vinnie comes over, don’t say hi. How are you. Say Good morning Vinnie. I like that shirt that you’re wearing. It compliments your shoes. She’ll notice the difference. Was that your brother that you was talking to over the phone.”

“Yes.”

“You were baptized as a child for a reason. You should talk to him more to build your communication skills. He’s someone that you should talk to. Forgive him though. Those are demons he is dealing with. Only Jesus can change him.”

“He’s always arguing.”

As if Darius gave him an invite-only exhibition ticket to see a lifetime worth of artwork, Carl says, “He’s your brother! Talk to him! He’s coming over tomorrow to help me cook up some orange chicken. You’re going to love it at Octavia’s College. There’s a lot of creative students there.”

If Darius is going through demons, why cannot Carl, who talks so much about Jesus times, send Darius to get an exorcism? Oh! That is right. Darius has to want to first accept Jesus and want the demons cast out of him. Every fact does not need an evidence-based solution, but somehow, God is the solution. It surely does not look like Darius will be ascending to sing in heaven or whatever souls do up there.

If it is true that he will love it at Octavia’s College, then that would be depressing when college is over. Instructors will grade him on his behavior and work and that is something that he does not enjoy about school. School is more of a cesspool from his perspective.

High school involves not being allowed to exit the classroom until the bell rings and not being allowed to answer a question in class unless his hand is raised. High school, which is supposed to be a safe environment for students, involves seeing a strand of hair in the school lunch, despite the lunch aide wearing a hairnet and sometimes, students do not see a strand of hair. Such times even involve cafeteria fights as if it is a prison for amateurs.

There is the stress and anxiety, as well as the constant ridiculing. There is the worrying about a public persona or being a non-conformist. For some people, there are no worries about a public persona, but Gustave strongly doubts that he will live it at Octavia’s College.

If anybody can create a movie, he could try to pursue a degree in fashion. Of course, he would not refuse having his own director’s chair or his name being broadcasted on a big screen (if he can get compensated for a job without any hassles), but who is going to hire him if he tries to be a filmmaker? He has over a 50 stories that he never published, typed out, but would have to rewrite them into a script format. He would be more than a scenarist. Who would not want to be a filmmaker? It sounds like an easy job, but he knows that it’s not.

Honestly, he does not think he can name over a dozen filmmakers, which company is the a sister company of a film company, and is okay if he is just independent.if he has a blue-collar job or white-collar job, does not have to deal with workplace harassment, and gets compensated for his time, he thinks that he would be okay in life. His future girlfriend can be a pink-collar worker and he would not care if she earns more money.

If you ask him who is his favorite makeup artist, he could not tell you one, but all because Darius wanted to pursue an acting career and one time when Gustave was 8, he said, “I want to create a movie when I grow up,” Carl wanted Gustave to attend film school. The oddness is that, no regular person would think to waste their money to send their child to college if they knew that the child would not utilize their degree. One thing is for sure though. If Gustave is to create a movie, it definitely will not have Darius in it. Darius does not have independent skills, so how would Darius be able to act out the lives of others, even if he had stage makeup on?

What exactly would be a movie that the world would pay to see? He could think of any groundbreaking idea for a movie and absolutely nobody watches it. Maybe his idea could be to have the main character receive a hand transplant after enduring a car accident and is able to fight off a mob from in a dystopian society. Maybe the main character gets lost in a cave and he aims to rescue sex trafficked victims, with a beacon of hope to escape alive.

Chapter 7:

Daisy and Who?

He receives a warm feeling of satisfaction after spending over 6 hours texting her. He can imagine her being his competent gym partner, watching movies together, and eating together. The problem is that she lives in Texas, he lacks a car, and if he saves up traveling money, his dad will try to prevent him from meeting an onliner.

Gustave texts her pass 10:00 P.M., he reveals exactly what he is doing at the moment when asked, just as she does.

Incorporating all of the love languages (words of affirmation, acts of service, receiving gifts, quality time, and physical touch) into his his future relationship and exceeding them, with his future spouse would be beneficial. It surely seems like Daisy is luring him into a future relationship, but he is inexperienced with an authentic relationship.

Maybe Gustave will remain like a hermit. There are different types of love, according to the Ancient Greeks. Eros represents sexual passion and Gustave actually despises hugs, even if it’s from relatives, so he is unsure if he would be a non-cuddler with his partner, but feels like he would show affection. Philia represents deep friendship and it is possible for Gustave to develop a friendship. Storge represents a love for his family. It may be so that he is unsatisfied with how his family treats him, but he still loves his family… sometimes. Philautia represents a love for himself, in which he has not found yet or does not think he found yet. How can he love someone if he does not love himself can be like saying how can he help somebody else if he cannot help himself. It is possible though.

The types of loves that he does not know much about are ludus (playful love), pragma (longstanding love), and Agape (a love that comes from God). He thinks that he would be okay mania (obsessive love), but only if the significant other is not cheating or capable of harming him. Part of him may not want an obsessive girlfriend in the future, especially if he was to keep Jesus in the center of the relationship.

“What are you up to,” he texts.

“Just sitting here, texting you. I’m about to visit my friend, Grace in a minute.”

“What are you up to,” she texts back.

“Sitting here. I’m going to watch a movie with my dad.”

“What’s the name of it?”

Forgetting the name of the movie makes him overthink, not wanting to ask Carl about the name. Carl calls Gustave’s name, hands him a transparent glass bowl of salted popcorn, and sits on the living room couch. Gustave sits down, then when he sees the title of the movie on the flat screen, he knows what to text back.

“It’s some movie called The Unstuck Took Me Here where some lady is driving around in the desert and because steps out of the car to go back near a campsite, she falls in a volcano where her only help is a loyal dog that she brought on the trip. I wouldn’t be stepping out of the car to look around. I’d drive back home.”

“That’s what I’d do,” Daisy texts back.

“The internet says that there is a 1970s movie called The Unstuck Took Me Here. It’s a crime-thriller about finding out who is the infamous serial killer behind 30s years of destruction.”

“I’ll check it out. I wish you was here with me,” she texts.

“I would be so happy being over there. What would we do if we met up?”

Carl stares at Gustave angrily, saying, “You gonna watch the movie?”

Gustave says, “I’m watching it,” taking a moment seconds later to read Daisy’s text message, “I don’t know. I’ll do whatever you want to do. There’s a lot to do in Texas. We can stop by some stores and watch a movie.”

Carl pauses the movie with the remote control, then says, “You can go back in the room if you’re not gonna watch the movie,” then Gustave texts Daisy, “Okay. My dad keeps looking over and wants me to watch the movie. Have fun with Grace.”

“Thank you. I’ll text you later. Enjoy the movie,” she texts.

What Carl said makes Gustave remember several occasions when he eagerly wanted to watch the latest horror movie from the video rental store, then Carl yelled at him, bringing up how he should be focused on “positive things,” how “demons manifest” through horror movies, and how he should be “getting to know Christ.” May a week later, Carl would be watching a movie, still complaining about the moment when Gustave thought to try to pick out a horror movie a week ago, only to say something similar to, “I just don’t like that paranormal mess. They take it too far.” Gustave could pick out a movie from the video rental store about serial killers and least likely get yelled at, but it is probably fine to watch a shoot ‘em up action movie or physical combat action movie involving multiple deaths. Yet, Carl watches multiple television shows about unsolved murders and Gustave cannot even rent a book about serial killers without Carl thinking that he can turn into a cult leader, turn into a mass murderer, or something sinister.

If Gustave was to pick out a movie that he thinks is interesting from the library, it is likely that Carl will try to see which movie he picked, even saying, “What you looking at” or “What movie did you get, boy?” If the movie just so happens to have profanity in it, then Gustave would be viewed as if he was the director of the movie, or friend’s with the director, having Carl to make comments like, “Why’d you pick this movie,” “All of this profanity,” “Turn this off.” Yet, Carl uses profanity a lot, but literally acts holier-than-thou.

About 20 minutes in the movie, Carl’s phone rings and he actually pauses the movie to talk with Vinnie about gang activity in downtown Chicago. Gang members are running up behind innocent people and striking them in the head to steal their property and Carl eventually says that the group of people are the n word with the “er” at the end, making Gustave uncomfortable.

Carl then talks about having Darius visit them or coming to visit him in a couple of days, as if it is a good idea. “Gustave needs somebody to talk to because he be up in his room and God knows what he be doing. Darius still has problems. Just yesterday, he came calling me talking about he was never told about how to have a relationship and blamed me, saying that I was trying to end his relationship. I ain’t stopping nothing. He can go outside whenever he wants now and he can’t blame me,” then says to Gustave, “Why do you think your brother acts the way he does?”

Not wanting to answer the question, he says, “I don’t know. He has mental issues,” then Carl interrupts, saying, “Don’t you ever say it’s mental issues. Those are demons. Like all of those horror movies you watched with your mom when she was around. Those are demons. They mess with your mind and one you open yourself up to the demons and they get in control of your mind, there’s nothing that you can do.”

Gustave texts Daisy, “Enjoying your time with Grace?”

“We’re having a good time. It’s her mom’s birthday, so we both gave her our gifts and I think Mama Grace loves it.”

“Cool.”

“How’s the movie,” she asks.

Killing the good vibes that he has from texting, Carl says, “Has Darius ever been bullied?”

“In a way, people would make fun of him at school, but that’s only because he brought so much attention on himself. He was popular when I think about it,” Gustave says.

“Did he ever tried to force you to perform oral?”

“No,” he says, (resenting that Carl would mention such a thing) only to remember a couple of times when Darius asked him to suck his penis in exchange for no longer being bullied.

Gustave refused to perform oral sex on Darius. He remembers a comment that Darius made about wondering why Asian women are not the most raped women because supposedly they are the most beautiful people in the world. Statistics can broadcast unreal numbers and countless people would be gullible, so who knows what identifying race is the most raped. Maybe on Saturdays, another some makes in another race are practicing male supremacy by raping at a rapid rate, even if it means deflowering females. He remembers that Darius made a comment about how it would be easy and more pleasurable to have sex with a baby. He also remembers comments that Darius made about wanting to kill the family, only to not want to hear about him.

“You have to forgive your brother. If you don’t forgive him, Jesus won’t forgive you.”

“It’s nice, but slow. I’m still watching it, but almost fell asleep,” Gustave texts Daisy.

“We were up late texting each other yesterday,” Daisy texts back.

He texts Daisy for 19 minutes, then Carl ends his conversation with Vinnie on the phone, playing the movie, saying, “You gonna watch the movie?”

His time texting Daisy while in his bedroom makes him wonder if Carl is spying on his silent back and forth text messaging. No woman has ever showed as much interest in his life as Daisy has, texting until it is 2:00 A.M. a sustainable future with Daisy, a woman he never physically touched or laid eyes on in person, could be perfect for his sustainable future. Will she be perfect for him or somebody else?

The moment that Gustave wakes up, exhausted at 10:00 P.M., the first thing he hears is Carl say, “Gustave! Do you be on your cell phone late at night?”

Gustave responds, “Yes.”

“What you be doing late at night on your cell phone? I can hear the loud texting while I’m trying to sleep.”

Now, if Gustave turns his cell phone on silent, he runs the risk of leaving it on silent, then Carl would complain if he missed a phone call from him. To tell Carl that he is texting an online friend and has deep feelings for would still cause problems. She would not only be despised for liking emo-screamo, but would be viewed as a possible serial killer because Carl grew up in the slums, where there are countless tragedies involving death, as well as well as heard about stories of people killing their online lovers.

Gustave says, “I…”

“Turn your phone down at night,” Carl interrupts, as if though he was filing for unemployment insurance and was interrupted.

It is the next day. Falling in love with an introspective emo girl, who is communicating to him feels like the best thing that could’ve happened to him. He checks her social media profile online and she has over 5,000 friends, but the website malfunctions, giving him over a full minute of access to her inbox section. He cannot be hallucinating. Thus, he notices that there is an an atheist named Sean, who inboxed her 10 minutes ago her, but he is too in shock to think about taking a picture as evidence to show her.

Sean’s message reads, “Hey baby. You wanna come over again, so that I can make you happy?”

She sends Sean a happy face emoji. The rest of the conversation is full of sexual comments, then the website switches to her profile page.

Daisy, who is originally a blond, sends Gustave a picture text of her dyed blue hair, black eyeliner, a choker with silver spikes, a half-sleeved polo shirt with grey and black stripes, blue skinny jeans (with silver pocket chains attached to pendants of skulls), and black skate shoes. She is an attractive emo female, but at this point, Gustave does not care.

Gustave texts Daisy, “You look good as always. I have a question.”

“Ask me anything,” she says.

“Do you flirt with another man online?”

“No. Why would I do that? The only person that I’m interested in is you.”

“When I was on my computer, it malfunctioned, leading me to your inbox message page, where I saw a message of somebody else flirting with you.”

“You’re the only one that I’ve been seeing…”

“Who is Sean?”

“I don’t know who that is.”

“I’m going to message him.”

“He’s a friend. You didn’t think that you and me had a thing going, did you,” she texts back with a vestige of truth, knowing that Sean is more than a friend.

At this moment, Gustave knows that Daisy, who seemed to be luring in him into a relationship, is actually seeing somebody else. Does Daisy have insecurities and need external and internal validation? May Daisy have a knack for lying? Like how someone can walk express to him without fully knowing him, “The world does not owe him anything,” maybe it does, but he just have not thought about exactly what yet. Even if he feels robbed out of much in life, he has to continue living without the viewpoint of blaming anybody.

Maybe she truly is not his future soulmate? Everything seemed to be going well. Gustave, who believes in faithfulness and monogamy, avoids messaging Daisy for hours, wanting to use his manpower to break an object that he does not have to pay for. Part of him wants to strike somebody without having the consequences of getting attacked in return. He is unsure if the heartbreak will fade, but only if this was all just a dream or a relief (being a joke), then he may feel better tomorrow.

One of Daisy’s messages read, “You’re just going to ignore me? I’m sorry that I hurt you, but you have to talk to me.”

Gustave texts a female named Elisha, “Hey. You busy? I wanted to talk to you about Daisy.”

Elisha texts back, “Open up. I’m at your service.”

“The computer malfunctioned when I was on her profile page, then I noticed that she inboxing somebody else named Sean, who sexually replied back. When I asked her about it, she pretended like it didn’t happen, only to say that she’s sorry. I’m not trying to get worked up over this.”

“That’s six months down the drain. You don’t need her,” Elisha texts.

“We were not dating technically. We never even met, but she was leading me on. Had it not been for the malfunction on the internet, I would’ve probably grown up taking care of children that were not mine. I would’ve masticated food for her.”

“First of all, gross. From some of the text messages that I saw, she was. I’m going to be in Chicago this weekend to visit my boyfriend.”

“Cool. It’d be cool if we finally met,” he texts Elisha.

“It’d be awesome.”

Familiarizing himself with every recent text message that he received from Daisy would be too much to bear. He does not want to see another person named Daisy or daisies (the flower). He does not even want to see egg whites, egg yolks, or whole eggs because eggs in general will remind him of offspring, making him think about sexual intercourse, then he would think about Daisy mating with Sean.

What if Daisy is not making love with just Sean, but hundreds and if not, thousands of other males? What if she is in a DDLG (daddy dom/little girl relationship where the dominant man represents the daddy figure and the woman represents a little girl). What if she is gazing into so other lovers eyes and having pillow talks? What if she has so much sex, she has difficulty walking due to abrasions or soreness? In order for a woman’s legs to shake after sexual intercourse, the odds are that she received an orgasm.

Even if that living organism, Daisy, is making sexual advances toward others or accepting multiple sexual requests, what if she is sorry about her actions? He does not want to be in self-denial about what he recently noticed. Is there an official way to resolve this issue and erase the memories? He addressed the issue that she was texting Sean and hopefully, he is not just one out of multiple past friends with a commonly expressed concern about the similar issues.

Then, it occurs to him, “How exactly was Sean’s first impression interacting with Daisy?” Is Daisy enduring muscle pain in the hip adductors, hip abductors, and gluteals? Was Sean screaming like a lead singer of a rock band while having sex with Daisy until a room smelled like fertilizer? Are they involved in the BDSM community, which is bondage, discipline (or domination), sadism, and masochism? Does Daisy literally have a soul tie attached to Sean?

Was Daisy in a prone or supine position when she was having sex? Was the female who he would provide his solicitude for in every sexual position known to humankind, plus the experimental process of rubbing her until she moaned, suffering from laryngitis (like a singer with voice loss). Why could she lie about a physically-demanding Sean being just friends if she was not leading him on into a possible relationship? Is she limping after she surrendered to Sean’s heart? Does she have a pimp? Is she in love with Sean?

Ultimately, he feels like Daisy, who was an emotional life-saver is now a heartbreaker, who is perceived to be happily penetrated. The thought of Sean penetrating Daisy’s nurturing soul repeats in his mind. He barely knows who Daisy is anymore and probably never knew her.

Questioning on rather or not he is still has a friendship with Daisy, who is a female, he also questions everything that she told him. Daisy can quite possibly have a butt lift (also known as a gluteal or lower back lift) and she can have a breast lift (also known as a mastopexy). If it was not for him seeing online videos of her on social media, he would not believe that she is real, but not once has she done a video chat with him or talked over the phone. She can be married and have children and he would be clueless.

He texted with Daisy about what feels like 3/4, if not all of his life. He left his heart open, being vulnerable and now, he wonders if there is a natural alternative to love? A different type of love still exists in friendships, but how can he trust a friend? He could not trust Wade, who was a male, so his trust has nothing to do with gender. If he was to have a sex with Daisy, then he is unsure if he would experience premature ejaculation or would last long enough to fulfill her desires. Maybe he would need a stopwatch to ensure that he performs long enough, but he would be preoccupied, thinking about other males that she had sex with. The males that she shared her body with could be the same type of males that would make fun of him just for being himself.

Would he even perform sexually better than other males that she had sex with? Part of him would prefer to not associate himself with her, if she is having sex with others. The thoughts that he has are ongoing, possibly consuming his brain cells.

Oxytocin (a hormone) produces euphoric feelings similar to opiate drugs. Being in love increases the production of dopamine (a neurotransmitter that also activates when experiencing addiction). Love, which is like a painkiller, can activate the same part of the brain, responsible for the addiction to opiate drugs.

Since being in love can imitate the addictions of substances, then Gustave thinks that drugs can imitate the feeling of love. Thus, why would he want a woman in his life to use drugs? He made an exception for the attractive Daisy. Daisy smokes cigarettes and uses cannabis, which makes him wonder if it assisted her decision-making to lie to him about Sean.

A luscious Daisy whose lips could taste like graham crackers (also could have been performing fellatio), only to want other males to kiss her. Gustave would not want a friend (who is a female) engaged in such an activity, being aware of her promiscuous past. The bright side is that he does not have to worry about a wedding ring turning into an entity if he was to misplace it. He thinks, if she had sex with multiple people, and can freely lie to him, was she lying about the first person that she ever dated and/or had sex with?

What if Gustave just is not man enough to handle a woman? Realistically, he still has personal hurdles and lives with his dad. He probably has about $2.00 in his brown, leather wallet. What type of a woman would love him like it is a career decision? To love him, a woman would probably be in a pre-fatigued state.

He wonders about if males are equal to females, only to want to no longer ponder about anything at all. He has to think about something, even though he remembers that he is currently breathing. Do women need to be surprised in relationships? If so, they must not be equal to men. Every woman may not prefer a loyal relationship, even if the relationship is repetitive and boring.

The moment that an angry Gustave slips in his earphones to listen to music on his cell phone, he hears the same exact music playing in the living room. Curious on if it is a coincidence or technical difficulties, he clicks on a video of a bodybuilder being interviewed, then exits the living room, confused. Carl, who looks somewhat suspicious, is also not on his cell phone like usual.

“What’s that noise,” Carl says like he witnessed an illegal baby factory being disguised as a private medical clinic, orphanage, or social welfare home.

When Gustave presses the pause button a video, the sound coming from a smart speaker (with wall-to-wall stereo sound, Wi-Fi, and more other features) stop. He presses play on the video and the sound erupts from the smart speaker.

“I’m not sure why the audio from my cell phone is playing on the speaker.”

“Take your phone off of airplane mode. My phone switches to airplane mode without me touching it, but I don’t have the issues you have.”

When Gustave takes the phone off of airplane mode, he plays the video again, and this time, the music is not coming from the smart speaker.

“That’s weird. You should change the settings.”

“No way. I like the way my speaker is. It lets me know what you’re doing in that room while you have the door closed,” Carl unapologetically says, with the egregious behavior of chuckling.

What type of a Christian would invade his privacy like this? He does not believe that Carl is a true Christian and if he is, why would he want to go to heaven to repeatedly experience such behavior that he does on Earth. He would disagree that hell is just a state of the mind and heaven, which is considered happiness is what you make of it. How he reacts to his life issues could determine his future, but life is not so simple.

One person may upload a video being born with only one eye and claiming to still being happy, claiming that others should not have an excuse. Another person may upload a video of being in a wheel chair or overcoming visible abuse. If Gustave was to tell others why he is sad, most people will feel like he is not suffering like those with mental and physical disabilities or visible abused victims.

To be misunderstood is can take an emotional toll on him, so part of him prefers loneliness. He still has to job search and live independently though. His lack of freedom makes him not want to read the full Bible, especially after thinking about how long it is, and how often various people talk about it. Why cannot he experience fun-loving people?

“There is water on the counter,” Gustave says.

“What are you talking about?”

“You have to wipe the water up from the counter.”

“You wipe it.”

Gustave wipes the water from the kitchen counter.

“You going or not?”

“I’m okay.”

Saying something that could be worse than a touch of reform school, Carl says, “Come on. Grandma wanted you to come.”

“Sure.”

The expectations of watching the news to know the weather is irritating to him, but he could glimpse at weather apps or search online. If it’s 70 degrees outside and it is windy, he is not always sure about what to wear, not because he alone would have a poor choice in style. If he puts on a light jacket, he is worried that his dad may yell at him about how the jacket looks or if it is perfect for the weather. Yet, he can walk outside and see some people wearing thicker jackets because the wind may be cold from their perspective.

Well, it is actually 70 degrees outside and it is windy. Literally, he is wearing a brown jacket (but with wool on the inside) over a white t-shirt, blue jeans, and the same gym shoes, but as if Gustave is dressed up like a goth, Carl yells, “You look crazy! It’s seventy degrees outside! Wear my jacket. I don’t like that shirt that you’re wearing. Put on my dress shirt.”

A miserable Gustave grabs a purple dress shirt from Carl, having a feeling that some people will either know he did not buy the shirt or think that he may be homosexual. Afterwards, he puts on silver chain link cufflinks. Thus, he thinks, maybe being a fashion designer is not what he should attempt to pursue if he cannot figure out what to wear in the weird weather. The weather could be sunny one moment, then in five minutes, it can be raining (like the news does not always predict). Or it can be 90 degrees, then the following day, there is a snowfall.

“We have less than ten minutes. Let’s go,” Carl says.

One thing for certain is that Gustave hates rushing. He grew up being forced to race his older brother, being expected to race others because his brother likes to race others, as well as being mocked. They exit the apartment. Carl locks the door. Then, they rush to the train station.

After finally making it to the train station and taking the 45 minute train ride to downtown, Chicago, Gustave sees his grandma.

“Hey, Carl! Hey, Gustave!”

Excitedly, Carl says, “Hey,” hugging his mother, then Gustave says, “Hey.”

Grandma hugs Gustave.

“How you’ve been Gustave,” grandma says.

If a currently misanthropic Gustave actually expressed how he felt, he would further have less freedom. Daisy does not have the utmost respect for him and does not respect him the way that he would’ve liked. He is being spied on by his dad and is gaslighted as if nothing is wrong. Anything that he tells grandma, grandma will just tell Carl anyway.

“I’m fine,” Gustave says.

“That’s good,” grandma says, “Working on any new artwork? Are you gonna paint me a picture that I wanted?”

Grandma, demanding an art piece that she is not even going to pay for. Last year, his aunt took a painting from him without paying him. All his aunt did was ask to see his artwork, then after showing his aunt and her boyfriend, she says, “These look good. I definitely like this one. Why don’t you sell your artwork?” What seemed like a compliment was mixed with an insult, especially since Carl gossips about him anyway.

Why don’t Gustave sell his artwork? It is complicated to just sell artwork. Does Gustave have a loyal fan base? He has not officially sold one physical art piece. Only one time did he sell digital art, but he is still learning how to digitally create. All art galleries are not public and all of them do not want contemporary works. The art galleries may even prefer a certain race, have an age limit, be exclusive to only artists in a specific location, or simply want fine artists.

A better question than “Why don’t you sell your artwork” is “When do you expect me to compensate you?” Sure, Gustave feels like he is creative with art and have potential to improve his already impressiveness (that perhaps even a mail-order bride can appreciate), but anybody can come up with an excuse as to why they do not want to buy a product from him. When Gustave said, “Do you want the painting,” his aunt, who has a luxurious, furry purse, smiles and takes the painting.

Being so optimistic about what just happened, her not paying Gustave makes him feel like maybe she did not have to pay her. Maybe she deserves a painting or it is just considerate to allow her to have one. She is a relative anyway.

How has Gustave been? Right now, Gustave has to talk to grandma about basically the same thing. It is usually her greeting him, a question similar to “How have you been,” sometimes questions about his artwork like “You paint anything new,” “Do you still draw,” “Do you still paint,” and rarely, questions like “Do you still exercise,” “Do you help your dad clean up around the house?” In order for him to get respected, he would probably have to have an abundance of of money and be independent, but his relatives, as well as Vinnie will bring up that he is inexperienced in the workforce.

He gets asked questions and half of the time when there is a family get together, Carl will interrupt him with belittlements. Usually, relatives will find a way to insult him or find a long-lasting verbal interest in others.

If he talks to his family about anything else, he is belittled by Carl, the topic of him not having a job may come up, or even family, for example, he can ask “When is your birthday,” then after grandma answer the question, she brings up the cousins birthdays and other relatives. He can say that he is working on a new artsy project when asked, then grandma may say which relatives have the artsy skills, but he is not close to them anyway.

“I can paint a picture of the landscape piece. I just would have to know exactly what you want me to paint,” Gustave says.

“I’ll give you a picture,” she says.

“Ah. Mom. He ain’t gonna draw nothin’. He ain’t gonna draw nothin’. You call that art,” Carl sarcastically says.

Carl confuses drawing for painting again. If Gustave was homeless, in which is not too complicated to imagine anymore, he would still want to paint. Hopefully, if he was homeless, people walking pass him or interested in his work will not confuse drawings for paintings. Hopefully, he will not be assaulted, but he is sure that he will be insulted. If he is assaulted, a vast majority of people will follow the bystander effect, so he has to be able to defend himself when most expected and least expected. He has to always be well-guarded, but if he is well-guarded, that should not mean that he experiences muscles stiffness.

A homeless man approach them, saying, “Spare me a dollar.”

Gustave does not have a dollar in his pocket. He looks at Carl and grandma, who have money. The last dollar that Gustave had in his wallet was given to Carl because it was asked for. Even if he was to have a $1,000, he would likely be too busy trying to save money in order to be independent, than to risk giving money away. If it was a beautiful goth woman or someone that he knows does not belongs in poverty, he would probably try to give them something. He’s given away money to the homeless before.

Being a starving artist is not something that he imagined as a child, but it is a possibility that he could be one. Maybe Gustave can defend himself, but what if multiple people have guns and he does not have a gun? What if he is injury-prone? Anything can happen, including his artwork being stolen. He would need enough money to eat healthy foods and the time that he would use to possibly exercise and practice fighting without healthy meals may reduce his energy,

“My grandson can paint me something. I’ll pay you next time,” she says like Gustave was born with the innate ability to paint.

“Next time,” Carl says while laughing, “Look! Next time. I love some of his artwork though. People would pay a lot of money for it,” then grandma laughs.

Why is it that the only time he is shown additional attention by his relatives is when the subject of art comes up or it is his birthday? They allow him to eat food. He is allowed to live with Carl. Not too many parents want a grown man that is their child still living with them, but something is still wrong. Carl and Carl’s mother can effectively communicate and talk about nearly anything, laughing on numerous occasions? Why cannot Gustave have deep conversations, let alone regular ones with his relatives without feeling like he’ll be gossiped about, mocked, interrupted, and/or ignored?

If Gustave was to have the common cold, rubbing camphor ice on his chest would simply be a placebo effect. Why is it that whenever he coughs, he may hear and/or see somebody else nearby cough, which can even be a total stranger? Why is it that when he yawns, somebody else nearby yawns? Such thoughts make him think off topic about is there scientific evidence that menstrual synchrony exist.

Feeling like he is either a part of an oppressed underclass or is victimized alone, Gustave yawns and he notices that a stranger yawns. He also feels exhausted, wondering about why it is complicated to have an erection at the exact moments that he wants. Furthermore, at times, he feels like he has Stockholm Syndrome, questioning if he should be furious or not. The days that he grew to be numb to emotional pain, he only got somewhat emotional again, without expressing much emotion. Does he deserve freedom?

Perhaps herbs can improve his incoming erectile dysfunction like Panax ginseng (taking 200-400 mg daily), saw palmetto berry (160-320 mg per day), Rhodiola rosea (150-200 mg per day), Ginkgo biloba extract (60-240 mg taken orally twice per day), and nutmeg (taken 1-2 mg per day for approximately three months). Having just two teaspoons of nutmeg to sprinkle in his coffee can result in death, but he only tasted coffee twice in his life, remembering that he prefers water.

To an extent, he thinks that he has empathy for some mass shooters. Maybe a mass shooter was an bullied in high school and his crush ridiculed him or lied to him, only to have a no strings attached relationship with somebody else. Maybe the nonstop stories of friends with benefits would never stop after graduation and sometimes the popular students that were bullies got their dream jobs, got promoted, and disguised their childhood attitude.

A psychologist would likely tell him to seek a therapist, who would try to put him on medication. There is nothing wrong with him, as PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) is a mental illness and multiple people can get depressed, but it does not mean that they will follow through with committing a crime. Most professions just continue their job in order to get compensated anyway.

If doctors told the masses about the cure to every disease, ailment, or condition in the world, which most of them can be reduced or prevented, they would lose a fortune. It is saddening to be susceptible to diseases, but from watching the news and seeing and hearing about ongoing tragedies, it leaves many people emotionless or insensitive. They can pretend to care as easily as wearing a fake smile. If police officers simply got rid of every romance scammer and hacker, they would lose business, so how can he trust that police officers are not involved in human trafficking? The ongoing thoughts about life is frustrating and society would thrive on the misfortune of others, as much as most people love chocolate.

Chapter 8:

Oh, Too Goth!

The throat is one of the weakest parts of a human body. Lions are called the king of the jungle and when they attack their prey, they aim for the throat in order to interrupt the breathing. No matter how many neck exercises that someone does, if someone is punched in the throat, they most likely will react. Oh! Shaolin monks have been recorded bending spears with their throat and some Shaolin Monks are capable of breaking the bendable spears.

Jesus is the Lion of the tribe of Judah. What makes people in general consider themselves an alpha male if the lion is the king of the jungle? Do some people not at time refer to themselves as beasts?

Truly, women have more control on the sexual partners that they can choose, but men have more control on who they want to marry. Women do not have to tolerate disposable egos, but can make exception to grandiose plans and how you make her feel (right now). The risk of marriage is to have a divorce, risking to lose half of your earnings, not to mention that the government will tax you for the money you worked for. A divorce leads you to running the risk of losing your property, which includes the house that you stay in. You can lose custody of your children and have to pay child support. Even if you refuse to get married or date a woman, but are like a father figure to a child, the court can force you to pay child support.

Giving a woman so much attention subconsciously leads to most women not wanting the men, thinking if it’s easy for the man to give them attention, the man may not be worthy of much or the woman may be superior. Why would Gustave want a woman now? It is like wanting a piece of candy that you cannot have, playing with your cell phone, only for a pet cat to try to walk in the way (because the cat wants attention), and wanting to get to know the shy person, only to avoid him because he is too shy.

Countless women are objectified in society. One thing about Gustave is that he would not dare catcall anyone. Instead, he would value a woman’s intellect, but that does not exclude the insecurities that he has about him not being muscular and not being attractive. He is neither popular nor hilarious, but wants to make the right woman feel like they are included in his world, without them worrying about being ogled at.

If a female paid him to catcall her or simply wanted him to, maybe he would do it, but to catcall a female without knowing if she likes him, is not his character. He does not understand public displays of affection in the same way that other do. Why would somebody showcase that they are kissing their partner and how they kiss their partner in public?

Contrary to such a thought, he also would not want to hide the fact that he would have a partner. A partner who is willing to understand his entire life and not say, “I hate you,” “You don’t love me,” “You don’t understand,” would be a nightmare turned into reality.

Gustave despises the idea of rape. Rape culture is far from being a myth. Just like a child can get taken advantage of by an adult or revered authority figure, the child could be told that they are lying or that it is their fault, if they decide to speak out. Just like in prison, males can be raped by other male inmates, then they blame the raped victims for not preventing the forced attack. Some men can physically, emotionally, financially, and spiritually, take advantage of women and vice versa.

If a female is ever drunk, he would avoid trying to flirt with the female. After the female becomes sober, what is your say that she does not remember what events took place, regret them, or want to claim that it was against her will? Never has he gotten drunk before and he does not intend to.

The idea of waiting to have sexual relations after marriage is mind-boggling. He agrees that sex should only take place between two consenting adults and that journalists and people in general should not substitute the word sex for rape. He believes that just because a female dresses attractive, half naked, or even decides to strip naked at a beach, it should not lead men into trying to harrass the woman. A woman that decides to take a selfie of herself and upload the attractive picture online should not be harassed.

Also, he is aware that some women can blame a man for raping her when the man did not commit the crime and possibly not get imprisoned for it. Even if the dehumanized male is found not guilty of the crime later, his career and relationship can be ruined. His boss would likely not want a convicted rapist representing their company and the person he was in a relationship with could develop trust issues, date somebody else, or anything.

Basically, he was told that abortion is murder and in his heart, he believes that once there is a fetus inside of the body with heartbeats or any signs of life, that is a human. He hates the idea of abortion, but also hates that rapists can just try to rape any woman, then because of rules from a group of people, you are not allowed to do whatever it takes you want with your body.

Who would be forgiving if their girlfriend or wife was raped and the rapist either did not get imprisoned or only served one day in prison? How would anybody feel if a rapist can just try to pretend to be mentally challenged to be placed in an asylum, instead of facing the inmates? He also is not a woman, but he may try avoiding rushing into sex if he could, because he is unsure if the woman he may like will be agree with birth control and/or abortions.

The heterosexual Gustave does not lack a genetic disadvantage that manipulates his appearance in a way of being unappealing. He does indeed experience socio-structural underprivilege. He rarely focus on the subject of sex while talking to females and when he does, it is likely because they are already talking about the topic.

Pimps are aware how to single out vulnerable females growing up without parental figures. They psychologically take advantage of the females with techniques consisting of convincing the woman that nobody else will love them as much as the pimp and assault them. Assaulting the female keeps them fearful and obedient, which is done by some gang leaders as well. How is it that if someone is accused of assaulting a female and sentenced time in prison, they are hated and attacked, yet many pimps teach others how to take advantage of women in prisons?

The actions of a pimp are what he does not respect. He could get framed for a crime that he did not do, especially since he is of black descent, only to spot a pimp in prison. Thus, he would miss out on all of his dreams; he would not be able to have a regular career or have a gorgeous girlfriend. What he would hear after being framed is, “If you really loved your girlfriend, you wouldn’t be in prison,” “If you really loved your family, you wouldn’t be here in prison,” or “If you really cared about your future, you wouldn’t be here in prison.” People that think they know so much about him would disrespect him and even those that don’t know much about him would disrespect him. Ultimately, he does not care about the cruel mentality of similar people with.

The involuntary celibate community has terminology that is used. The following are some terms used by the involuntary celibate community. A virgin represents an incel. A Chad is a stereotypical name and refers to a white alpha male (or genetically superior male) that is muscular and popular. Tyrone is the non-white version of the term Chad, but specifically for blacks. The term Becky is an undesirable woman that is educated. A high-tier Becky is stereotyped as (having a minimum wage job and wears baggy clothing to hide small bosoms and flat buttocks) being outspoken. Mid-tier Becky’s will have other options than to ask out a virgin on a date. Low-tier Becky’s would wear fake skater shoes, read novels, and would ask out a virgin to prom. A Stacy is a white blond woman (depicted with a curvaceous body) who never has to work, wears expensive clothes (including makeup and jewelry), and secures sexual intimacy with Chad.

Everyone in a manosphere community may even be unlikely to welcome him with open arms. Some of the community members are sexist and racist anyway and he is definitely a dark-skinned complexion. Besides a Christian or any religious/spiritual individual, who can think of a grown, black virgin? Now, who can think of a grown black virgin that is an incel?

Some common allusions in the manosphere community are the “red pill,” the “blue pill,” and the “black pill.” He could take the red pill (meaning that he will see reality), the blue pill (meaning he will stay in the world of an illusion), and/or the black pill (meaning that he will permanently be an incel). So far, he is not a blackpilled incel, accepting defeat.

An Arabcel is basically an Arab who is also an incel. The term outcel is the female version of incel, but instead of desiring sex, the female desires love and perfection. A fakecel is someone who pretends to be an incel, but actually has a relationship with a female. A truecel is someone who is simply a true incel, incapable of having a relationship and/or sexual experience.

Terms like Sigma, alpha, and beta derive from the Greek alphabet, which are sometimes used to describe a hierarchy of superiority, success, and attractiveness. Imagine being fluent in Greek and hearing somebody claim that they are a Sigma, which is a letter. Will you have second thoughts about the person being mentally sane if it was your first time hearing somebody claim to be a letter?

The 7 Types of Male Personality Types:

Alphas are confident, charismatic, and dominant, often being the CEOs, managers or team leaders. They are extroverts that can lead naturally and are highly attractive to women and successful in their career choices. An alpha takes risks and thrives on challenges.

Betas are basically reserved people, avoiding risk-taking and suffering from low self-esteem and are unconfident. They desire women and are not as organized as alphas, but are respectful.

Sigmas are really an introverted version of an alphas. They are confident, but are reserved/lone wolves, clever, and cunning. Their mysteriousness and charisma is what attracts them to women.

Zetas are confident, and carefree. They are freethinkers, rejecting societal expectations by challenging the status quo.

Deltas are average people that are hard workers, but lack ambition. Attracting women is a struggle for them.

Gammas are unattractive and introspective. They break the social rules of the hierarchy. Though they are unsuccessful in attracting women, they may showcase an obsession for some women, turn into stalkers, and narcissists.

Omegas are the opposite of alphas, being the social outcasts, like clingy, unconventional geniuses. They are avoided by everyone. They are simply undesirable by women.

To call wolves alpha and beta comes from researching the creatures in captivity. Such terms are used to describe human behaviors. The leader of the wolves was claimed to be the alpha male, but it was a myth. The term Alpha male was claimed to be first started in 1947 or 1948 via a publication by scientist, Rudolph Schenkel. Wolves fighting each other in order to present their dominance where the winner has gets exclusive rights to mate in the group was a theory written by Dave Mech in a 1968 book. Later, Mech came to the realization that such behavior among wolves are only applicable to captive wolves in a group of various backgrounds.

Looking further back, in 1921, the term was first academically used by Monika Sumra (an anthropologist). The theory of the alpha wolf was later debunked in 1999 by L. David Mech in the paper “Alpha Status, Dominance, and Division of Labor in Wolf Packs” in the Canadian Journal of Zoology. There is no leader of a wolf pack; wolf packs are families, led by a breeding pair and duels. Many wildlife biologists stopped using the term alpha.

Elliot Rodger was a 22-year-old virgin, who became a notorious American spree killer and school shooter. There are two parts of a murderous rampage. First, he stabbed two of his housemates and another person to death, then began the second part of his rampage in less than two hours (after picking up a triple vanilla latte from a coffeehouse). After uploading a final video to social media, titled Elliot Rodger’s Retribution, from his $40,000 black vehicle with $300 sunglasses, he opened fire outside of a sorority house.

Afterwards, the incel who is nicknamed as the Supreme Gentleman and the King of Incels drove away and opened fire outside of a coffeehouse. He continued driving while shooting from his vehicle, including knocking over several people with his vehicle. He crashed into a parked car, being found with a self-inflicted gunshot wound to his head. The attack led to 14 people being wounded and an estimated 6 people dead, (not counting Elliot).

Earlier, prior to the Isla Vista Massacre, he wrote a manifesto titled My Twisted World: The Story of Elliot Rodger, which was emailed to several people, including his father (a film executive). In Rodger’s apartment, he had knives (including a 10 inch fixed-blade and 18 inch machete) and along with a print-out copy of his manifesto was a final message that read: “This is it. In one hour I will have my revenge on this cruel world. I HATE YOU ALLLL! DIE.”

By the infamous Elliot Rodger committing his crimes, various other incels committed copycat crimes. Some of the copycat killers inspired by Elliot Rodger (are Alex Minassian who replied, “I feel like I accomplished my mission” when asked how he felt about the death of 10 people, William Atchison who praised the “Supreme Gentleman” on several online forums, Nikolas Cruz who posted online that “Elliot Rodger will not be forgotten,” Chris Harper-Mercer who left a manifesto of his own at the scene, and Scott Paul Beierle who despised interracial relationships, groped women against their will, and expressed an admiration for Hitler.

Here is what is weird with Scott Paul Beierle showing admiration for Hitler. We already know that racism is immoral and that everybody should be treated with respect, but Hitler seemed to oppose Freemasonry. Sure, a persecution of Freemasons could’ve existed, but that does not mean that Hitler still was against wickedness. He practiced black magic and was still affiliated with the government. Hitler despised the Jews, but his mistress and wife was Eva Braun, who was a Jew. Hitler’s parents were cousins, (meaning that who knows if Hitler had a birth defect) which could have multiple people in awe from seeing his effective public speaking skills.

Chris Harper-Mercer’s manifesto would be more understandable to society if you exclude the fact that he was a murderer and new age satanist. In his manifesto, there are the quote, “My success in Hell is assured,” even claiming that his beliefs are of new age and that he aligned himself with the occult since he was born. The satanist obviously was aware that murdering people was wrong. He even expressed his hatred for black men, specifically thugs. Sure, Harper-Mercer was 40% black, but that does not mean he was not racist. Some messages from his manifesto says, “When the girls would rather go with alpha thug black men, we can all agree that something is wrong with the world” and “Black men have corrupted the women of this planet. All they care about is sex and swag.” Anybody to make an assumption can just say Chris should’ve looked at women with different characteristics or travel to another environment to notice that everyone does not share the same behavior.

George Sodini was rejected by his estimate of 30,000,000 women in over an 18 or 25 year period. The number 30,000,000 was really Sodini’s rough estimate of how many hot women there are in the United States, but that does not indicate that he spoke to them all. Still, he was willing to open his heart to a woman.

Sodini was not an incel, but the lasting effect of being rejected by women would play as an illusion like one is inferior. He was masturbating ever since he was 13, but how is was possible to be rejected by so many women for 18 to 25 years, especially if (and I mean if) he was not harassing women? At least one woman (which could’ve even had low self-esteem, been intoxicated, or anything) should’ve been interested regardless of how he looked, right?

He did mention on his blog on July 23, 2009 that his brother, (Michael, twice his size) would bully him, even in front of women, which affected his life tremendously. Before going on a rampage, he was a devoted follower of R. Don Steele’s seminars and showcased the book How to Date Young Women: For Men Over 35 in a video.

One of the things discovered in Sodini’s text messages reads, “Every black man should get a young white girl…. Kinda a reverse indentured servitude thing.” Sure, Sodini (the male who had sex 50-75 times in his life compared to others that had more experiences) went on a shooting spree, but his thoughts about race is not every mass murderer. If you had sex with a woman before, you probably would know what it takes to have sex again.

It is true that black culture has a horrible reputation of belittling others, talking about sex, threatening, murdering, etc. A lot of the rap music is reduced to glorifying sex and violence and there is the stereotype of black men getting women pregnant and not taking care of the child and growing up a product of the environment (making them go to dead, incarcerated, or paralyzed).

Sodini claimed to be taught by pastor Rick Knapp, who would “proclaim. Holy —-, religion is a waste” and you that can commit mass murder then still go to heaven. His blog even says, “Religion has a certain stink to it of guilt, shame, fear, and that moral standard that always contradicts the natural tendencies and desires of a person.” On June 5, 2009, part of Sodini’s blog post is, “One 16 year old does it usually three times a day with her boyfriend. So, err, after a month of that, this little — has had more sex than ME in my LIFE, and I am 48.”

On August 3, 2009, part of his blog reads, “Maybe soon, I will see God and Jesus. At least that is what I was told. Eternal life does NOT depend on works. If it did, we will all be in hell. Christ paid for EVERY sin, so how can I or you be judged BY GOD for a sin when the penalty was ALREADY paid. People judge but that does not matter. I was reading the Bible and The Integrity of God beginning yesterday, because soon I will see them.” What is wrong with the post is that faith without works is dead. Sodini believed in faith, but did not believe in the necessity of faith and works. “For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also”—James 2:26.

George seemed to be looking for an excuse to kill others. If he did not see much of a purpose for religion due to it being full of “guilt, shame, fear, and that moral standard that always contradicts the natural tendencies and desires of a person,” why listen to a pastor that taught that you can commit mass murder and still go to heaven? God is forgiving, but there are obviously Commandments/guidelines. “If ye love me, keep my commandments”—John 14:15. “Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God”—1 Corinthians 6:9-11.

An original killer or killer with a plan to gain attention, is likely to be remembered. It seems like to be a killer that is well-known, the killer would have to think about the future marketing strategies, which could mean that the killer will not be alive to see it. Life is temporary.

Elliot Rodger had self-hate, having the belief that women should be interested in him because he has money, a car, good-looking, and fashionable. The misogynistic man’s mother is Malaysian Chinese and his father was British. Elliot would express his hatred for Asians and blacks, Mexicans, as well as the rich and poor, childhood friends, roommates, and members of his own family in his manifesto. He expressed his hatred via misogynistic online forums (jealous of others, especially non-whites attracting white women). Ultimately, he wanted a hot, blond woman.

In his childhood, Elliot actually was friends with a black person. In his manifesto, he wrote, “Another one was Lucky Radley, the black kid I played with in father’s neighborhood” and wrote, “He transferred to Pinecrest during that very year, and he immediately became popular with the pretty girls of his grade. I hated him for it.” It is not that Elliot was incapable of befriending other races, (which could be a bonus in what can attract women), but that Elliot hated Lucky because of the attention that many women showered him with.

Anyone going on a killing spree, basically runs the risk of killing anybody. While someone may only want to kill women for feeling like they are opposed by them and men in relationships and having affection, killing anybody does not resolve the issue. For example, what if an incel is focused on killing multiple people and accidentally kills another incel? The movies, television shows, videos games, and other form of entertainment that an incel may enjoy was likely not created by an incel.

Going E.R. refers to an incel is planning to commit an indiscriminate mass murder, specifically targeting women. The initials of E.R. in the term Going ER stand for Elliot Rodger. He is a 22-year-old who carried out a series of mass shootings in Isla Vista, California, in 2014. Elliot had the objective to punish women for rejecting him and men for having sex. The term Saint Elliot is used as a way to celebrate Elliot Rodger as being a saint and/or hero for the horrendous crimes that he committed in the day (now, referred to as Saint Elliot Day by incels).

Tres Genco of Hillsboro, Ohio, admired Elliot Rodger and had a plan to kill 3,000 living organisms. He planned to kill “out of hatred, jealousy and revenge,” buying a bulletproof vest and a skull mask, and a rifle and handgun magazines. Though nobody was injured or killed, Tres was arrested by federal agents in July 2021, pleading guilty to the crime in October 2022.

In Genco’s manifesto titled A Hideous Symphony, there is the quote, “I don’t hate women in any other sense that I will never have one that loves me. . . . If only one woman had given me a poor excuse of an opportunity, I would not be writing these words, and more importantly feeling them within my depressed heart.” On a website, Genco made a post about “spraying “some foids and couples” with orange juice in a water gun, which is a task that Elliot Rodger, the Isla Vista shooter described doing in My Twisted World: The Story of Elliot Rodger. Foids means a combination of the words female mixed with a humanoid or a female mixed with an android, indicating that the females are heartless.

Prior to Jake Davidson’s mass shooting, he punched a 16-year-old male multiple times, then slapped a 15-year-old female, who could’ve been trying to intervene. After the event, he returned home to grab his pump-action shotgun, but his mother talked him out of returning, leading to his arrest and certificate taken away.

Jake was not charged for his crime, but enrolled in a Pathfinder scheme to help him manage his anger problems. He received his shotgun back months later and in less than a year, Jake went on a mass shooting.

He was so focused on being an incel, he argued with his own mother and eventually grabbed her by the throat, locking her up in her bedroom. He shot his mother twice with a pump-action shotgun. Together, he killed 5 people, which included a 3-year-old. He even turned the gun on himself.

With the ever-evolving knowledge of science, maybe one day people can determine if primates have an alpha male. There are some manifestations of alpha male behavior are viewed to come from primate attributes, but how is that possible if some people claim to debunk the theory of Evolution? By waiting centuries for primates to evolve into a new species, many lifespans would not see the results. What about at least one primate evolve into a human/Neanderthal. Evolve not into a humanoid, but a human. Maybe society will try to allow bestiality to further experiment on if evolution is legit, but that would be sinful.

Evolution, which was introduced by Charles Darwin includes natural selection, so if everyone on Earth was selfish and did exactly what they want, how are they proving to have good morals, after raping, murdering, stealing, and more. Those that are not spiritual, but practice morals may befriend those with bad morals or practice false doctrines anyway. “Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners”—1 Corinthians 15:33.

Are you still waiting for at least one primate to turn into human? With sex robots, clones, and a plethora of experimental inventions, it is possible for science to create it. Charles Darwin was a high-level 33rd degree Mason in Time Immemorial Lodge of Cannongate Kilwinning, No. 2, of Scotland, where he actually worshipped Lucifer. Charles Darwin was not only a Freemason, but his grandfather (Erasmus Darwin) and son (Sir Francis Darwin) were Freemasons. What exactly do people put their faith in if they believe in science and reject the Bible?

Having XY chromosomes, Gustave has standards. He would not want to date a female gang member (even if her breaths are like an air purifier) due to the high-risk environment of being killed for being around the woman. He would not want to date somebody with an ex boyfriend who recently got out of prison and wants to harm him. Any similar scenario would make him have second thoughts. Dating a promiscuous woman is not on his to-do list, especially one who is not trustworthy and does not know him on a personal level.

Why was the Big Bang Theory created by Georges Lemaître, who was a Belgian cosmologist and Catholic priest? In order to speak in the church, it has to be a calling from God. The Big Bang Theory is simply unbiblical. God created the heavens and the Earth, but in the Big Bang Theory, there is no exact assurance as to how the Earth was created.

Gustave writes a brief poem on notebook paper:

I duly wanted you during the droughts,

Rue me like I can grow sunburned wings,

Held like jewelry made for your thoughts.

Unruly hearts are shared like bee stings.

Spare the songbirds in the air-tight rooms

And free them to the tombs with dead trees,

Repelling insects when a plant blooms.

The singing tells your priorities.

Share a body with mine that’s soundproof,

Having peace and practicality,

Hugged in the rain on top of a roof.

My hands are clean like the wings you see.

Carl calls Gustave, “Gustave!”

Darius is in the living room making an unnecessary smile that lasts for over a full minute, but during the smile, he waves his hand, saying “Hey.”

Gustave says, “Hey.”

Carl says, “Try this green drink. I mixed it up with fruits and vegetables. I added an apple, banana, orange, berries, strawberries, spinach, arugula, broccoli, beets, a half teaspoon of spirulina, a half tea spoon of chlorella, and a quarter teaspoon of beet root powder. You want to try it?”

Gustave nods his head horizontally, saying, “No.”

“Come in! Try it, Carl says, “Here. I’ll pour both of you some. You all have to start eating healthy. Heart disease runs in the family.”

Gustave does not want to blend a green drink each morning because he would be expected to ask when he can start using the blender every day. He also prefers eating the nutritional fruits and vegetables without mixing them together, then is shown a cabinet having vitamins and minerals and a separate cabinet full of cans of sardines.

“There’s more sardines in the closet. You can have some sardines later. Look. I know Darius wants some sardines. You like sardines, don’t you, Darius,” Carl says laughing.

“Yes,” Darius says.

Carl passes Darius a cup full of the green drink, then passes a cup to Darius. They drink it.

“How do you like it? It’s not so bad, is it?”

“It’s okay,” Gustave says.

You just have to get used to it. You can even mix only fruits in a drink and it can taste like ice cream. You don’t need ice cream anymore. You can add all your vegetables, fill up the cup with water, then blend it. Why make two drinks a day when you can just mix it all together? Start mixing your fruits and vegetables together.”

Gustave hardly eats ice cream anyway. Mixing fruits and vegetables together would be a food-combining diet that can slow down the process of digestion, causing him to lose nutrients, gas and a bloating stomach, and be harmful to those with liver disease, causing gastrointestinal problems. Some gastrointestinal problems include hyperacidity, bloating, and diarrhea.

“I read that mixing fruits and vegetables can cause digestive issues and that fruits digest faster, so you should eat those first. You can eat… um… eat…,” Gustave says.

Carl interrupts, “Combine.”

“You can combine apples with vegetables,” Gustave says.

Carl says, “Yes. And carrots can be combined with fruits. Just start making one drink a day. I’m not wasting all of my water. You have some money to hand out? We don’t use tap water anymore. We use the water that comes from the water purifier,” he says, pointing at the water purifier on the counter, only to extend his hand out as if he expects somebody to give him money.

Darius laughs.

“Time to go! Nia’s waiting downstairs. Hurry up. We’re going make orange chicken when we get back. Where are your gloves at? You may need them.”

Without saying a word, Gustave heads to his room and grabs black, leather gloves. Carl is checking to see if he did not leave the stove on, if the iron is unplugged, and if the televisions are off. They exit the apartment, heading outside, then greet Nia, who is in the driver’s seat of a black sports car.

“Hey, ya’ll! Darius! I’ve not seen you in a while! How have you been,” Nia says as they step in the car.

Gustave sits in the back seat on the left side. Darius sits in the back seat on the right side. Carl sits in the passenger’s seat.

“I’m glad you asked that question. I’m doing astounding. I’m working on a new book.”

“Oh. That’s good. What’s it about? You working on any projects Gustave? How are you?”

Worried about talking while Darius is talking, Gustave says, “I’m fine. It’s like the usual.”

“It’s going to be about one of my characters, Nameless, who will fall in love with her a woman named Ginger. He was born without a name and abandoned… So was his friends,” Darius says while stuttering and forgetting what to say, “I worked long and hard on this book. I’m ten pages in. You want to read my book?”

“Right now, I’m driving. We all need to make it to the movie theater alive,” Nia says, then everyone laughs.

Jokingly, Carl says, “I’m doing terrific, aunt Nia! I’m glad you thought about me today!”

“I said, “Hey, ya’ll! Didn’t I ya’ll?”

Simultaneously, Darius and Gustave says, “Yeah.”

Nia says, “It’s quiet in here. Let me lower down the windows and turn on some music.”

While all four windows roll down, Nia turns the radio station from a rapper trying to sound like an author (whose words are not for the squeamish), to R&B music.

“You listen to that new Michael Madison song,” Nia says.

Excitedly, Carl says, “Black silly, you know that I love me some Michael Madison,” then sarcastically says, “Look! I’m only interested in Jesus.”

Gustave feels like the only person in the car that can realize the mockery that just happened. The type of no-no he recently heard is not even an appropriate joke. When he looks at Darius, Darius has a smug that turns into a sinister expression of rage. It just would take somebody like his family to keep Darius around, mock Jesus and force Him on Gustave, and to know about all of his whereabouts, interfering with his life.

Elisha texts Gustave, “Whatcha up to?”

“Just heading to a movie theater with my family to see Extra Ultraness. It’s going to be a long day,” he texts, “My grandma is going to meet me at the theater. I’m going to contact Rachel back.”

Temporarily, Gustave somewhat starts to think that all women are robotic, ready to not show him affection. Elisha, who he values, already has a boyfriend, and currently, he respects her decision. To his unawareness, finding romantic love is only going to get more challenging for him.

“Cool. I think she’s into you,” Elisha texts back.

The occurrence that happened with Daisy makes him suspect that Elisha may eventually stop being friends with him. It occurs to him that Daisy is treated like a sex object by other males and he has to accept it. Something seriously awkward may happen soon. Elisha can confess a love that she has for him and somehow and he would either have to be reticent to talk about Daisy or not bring her up, unless Daisy was to attempt to message him and Elisha has to know (if the information is important). If Elisha naturally asks him about Daisy, which may not happen or at least not often, then he can talk about her, but worrying about Daisy with any level of romance would disrupt the relationship he has with Elisha (if so she is romantically interested).

Even if he stops thinking about Daisy, he would have qualms about what Elisha ending the friendship. Elisha may just eventually get bored of the same conversations and actions, even if he seems to be the perfect guy. What he would be is just a perfect candidate, pushed into the friend zone. He may just be unremembered. He may be ignored or have to see, hear, or read about another man (who can be a low-value man, high-value man, or in between) with the lifestyle that he is supposed to have.

The song changes and Nia is smiling while chatting with Carl about how her children are doing. Gustave shows signs of wanting to speak by opening his mouth at moments he think their conversation may end, only to notice that they are still chatting. The extroverts are still talking.

When they stop talking, Gustave says, “Dad.”

“What,” Carl says.

“How do anchovies taste?”

“You never had anchovies,” Carl says.

“No,” Gustave says.

Nia says, “Erick had some anchovies a couple of years ago, bugging me about ‘em. Mom! Can I have some anchovies! Them things were salty. He ain’t like ‘em.”

“I didn’t like ‘em either,” Carl says, “Did you ever have anchovies , Darius?”

Darius smiles, making a hum for a yes, universally understood, “Um-hum,” then say, “I had some in high school. Luna gave me some anchovies. I like anchovies.”

“Luna,” Carl says, surprised, “I’m not eating no anchovies. Use your own money to get some anchovies.”

As the conversation goes on, Gustave knows by now that Carl is not going to take him to get anchovies to at least try them out. What was the purpose of him asking Carl anything? Everyone tried something that he was interested in doing, it seems.

Approximately 15 minutes pass and they make their way to the movie theater. Gustave’s grandma is waiting outside with Erick, Heath, and Tina. Nobody said that Nia’s children were coming to the movie theater with him. It is already having him overthink about what Darius’ unpredictable behavior.

They walk near the movie theater, having grandma to say, “Hey everybody! Hey grandsons.”

“Hey,” Darius says dramatically excited, then grandma hugs him.

“Hey, ma,” Nia says as her mother hugs her.

“Hey, Mom,” Carl says, then his mother hugs him.

Nia’s children greet Darius and Gustave, smiling excessively.

“Hey Erick. Hey, Heath. Hey, Tina,” says Carl.

The last person to say “Hey” is Gustave, then grandma hugs him.

Carl orders buttery popcorn and smoothies (that comes with free refills) for everyone.

“You still drawing, Gustave,” grandma says.

Yet again, a topic is about drawing and it does not feel natural. The talk feels as forced as a parent calling a child and having to answer to the parent like they own you. Gustave answers the question.

“I still draw. I’m working on one piece where it is more focused on drawing the hands and feet. I want to be able to draw every body part without using a reference,” he says.

“Oh. Drawing is a something. I wish that I was able to draw.”

Like his fourth time remembering telling grandma in a similar fashion, Gustave says, “It takes practice. You can start off by drawing an eye, nose, ear, and other body parts. Watch tutorials. Draw closeup images and images from far away. It could take hundreds of attempts to be…”

Carl interrupts, “Mom! Nia said Michael Madison is gonna want his pants back!”

Grandma starts laughing and says, “I’m gonna get you Nia!”

Clearly, there has to be something wrong. Nearly, if not every time he talks to grandma about an artsy project, Carl finds some excuse to interrupt him. It has to be intentional. What’s the point of talking to Carl about it, especially if he would just lie. Carl is a is fully capable of lying, just as much as he can put on the act that he will do something, only not to do it.

Heath digs in his nose, then puts his hand in his bucket of popcorn, then puts his mouth on the stainless steel bubbler head of the water fountain. Even Darius knows not to use the water fountain after Heath’s germs are spread on the water fountain. While Gustave looks at the occurrence in disgust, Erick and Tina then tell Nia about what happened.

Immediately, Heath starts to cry, as if he did absolutely nothing wrong and does is not aware of the definition of wrong. Nia gives Heath an angry look that only a true mother could give.

“Mom’s gonna kill you when you get back to the house,” Tina says.

Nia says, “Heath! You were putting your mouth on the water fountain? Come here!”

After a 3-hour long movie starring Ashley Pulse, (who gets lost on an island full of ravenous wolves after a hurricane redirects where the boat lands), when asked about if he enjoyed the movie by grandma, Gustave says, “Yes.”

Gustave finds no need to give more than one syllable as to why he enjoyed the movie. Giving more than one syllable would likely fuel up a reason for them to show hatred, even though Darius appears to be the black sheep of the family by some people. Darius is actually popular to an extent.

Darius says, “I feel like there Ashley wears too much makeup in every movie. I can do a better acting job than her.”

“Oh, Darius,” Carl says sarcastically.

Once they arrive back to the apartment, Carl is cooking orange chicken with the help of Darius. Erick, Heath, and Tina are preoccupied with playing a wrestling video game in Gustave’s crummy bedroom.

“I have more video games at home. You guys only have five games over here,” Erick says.

“You’re spoiled. That’s why,” Gustave says.

“I know, right,” Erick says.

Tina says, “We have hundreds of games. Next time, I’m bringing an extra controller. You only have one controller. There’s nothin’ to do around here. I hate it over here.”

“How do you think I live,” Gustave says.

Darius sits on the bed with a plate full of orange chicken, saying, “The food is ready.”

After Gustave, Erick, Heath, and Tina grab a plate full of food and return to the room, they see Darius is playing the video game. Heath screams, putting his plate on the floor to attempt to grab the controller. Gustave hops over the plate to sit down.

“You can play the game at home,” Gustave says.

Heath says, “I wanna play now! Let me play! I’m gonna tell!”

Darius says, “Tell ‘em.”

Heath runs out of the bedroom and complains, then a loud voice erupts, “Let Heath play the game,” Carl says, “You all can play any time.”

Darius passes the controller to Heath, then steps in front of the television screen temporarily, only to unplug the television. Heath is playing with the controller as if the video game is currently on. Darius then turns the television on. Gustave watches the moment as if it is normal.

Erick says, “What are you doin’?”

Darius turns the video game back on and Heath is still pressing the buttons on the controller as if he is winning the game. When the video game turns on, Darius sits back down. Erick and Tina are reluctant to sit back on the bed.

Tina says, “You’re weird,” then says, “Gustave. Your brother’s weird. I like you better.”

Erick says to Gustave, “Do you have a job? How old are you? Twenty? You still living with your dad.”

“Are you allowed to leave the house? Do you have a girlfriend? Erick has a girlfriend,” Tina says.

“Don’t worry about it,” Gustave says.

Tina walks out of the bedroom to ask Carl how old Gustave is, then returns saying, “He’s Twenty-two. Darius has his own place.”

“I’m sure he does,” Gustave says, knowing that his older brother stays at a mental facility.

Tina says while laughing, “Why don’t you have your own place? Do you have a job?”

While Gustave ignores Tina, Darius says, “Sex and masturbation are the same thing. They feel the exact same,” then proceeds talking sexually with vague descriptions.

It is a disgrace that Darius, who has anger issues, got to experience sexual intercourse before him. Darius has short-term memory loss, so how is it that he recalls the pleasurable experience of sex? What qualities did he have to offer a female. Any female to want to share their body with him already was not thinking properly, even during the process of kissing (because Darius can go days without brushing his teeth and washing up).

“He said sex,” Heath says.

Erick says, “What you know about sex?”

Tina says, “Y’all nasty! Oh my…”

Darius says, “Y’all nasty,” mocking them, “Here’s your momma with the janitor,” make dominated voices as if they’re having sex.

“That’s your aunt,” Erick says, losing his appetite.

“You’re right,” Darius says, only to continue making sexual sounds, saying, “Erick’s mom failed sex education. Erick’s mom has sex with the…”

Tina says, “Stop it!”

Monday, the following day, Gustave is glad that his older brother and cousins are no longer in his bedroom. He is glad that he does not have to hear his aunt. He is glad that he does not have to hear grandma’s voice and spend time with her just because she is around, without saying too much.

When he opens the bedroom door, he hears a sound and it is his grandma in the bathroom putting on makeup, saying, “Good morning.”

Carl says, “Good Morning.”

“Good morning,” Gustave says.

“Good morning,” Carl mocks Gustave sarcastically, “Always sounding so lifeless. Grandma’s staying over for the night.”

Thus, Gustave’s grandma laughs.

Gustave says, “Which church was I baptized at?”

Carl says, “You were never baptized. What are you talking about? I never said you were baptized. You’re scaring me, boy.”

Grandma says, “Oh, my… It’s your first day at Octavia’s College. Enjoy your day. You don’t want to miss your first day of class. What type of films are you interested in?”

The white-haired Grandma literally asks Gustave what type of films he is interested in. She if Gustave says he prefers a adult movies, then who would want to pay for his education? He is going to have to pay for his loans himself, even though he is not trying to create adult movies. Filmmaking is not his first career choice, but he would like to create a romance movie.

An hour and a half passes. Gustave is at Octavia’s College and is in a Television Production class. A chubby black brunette, Rita, carrying a luxorious, suede purse sits beside him. There is a blond woman with a ponytail and light blue eyes sitting across from him named Mandy.

Rita says, “You look so mad. In case you try to shoot this school up, they have surveilance cameras and cops all over the place.”

Why would Rita bring up such a comment? There are people that appear angrier than Gustave, but are not viewed as terrorists. Men considered creepy by women can also sometimes be unattractive men, and they are not always viewed as terrorists.

“Why’d you say that,” he asks.

“It’s just a joke,” Rita says, but Gustave’s has a feeling that it is more than just a joke.

After the class is over, Gustave is watching a video on his cell phone about a 22-year-old virgin who went on a rampage killing others, because women never showed interest in him. The male killed over 20 students outside of a college. Gustave cannot help but to read his manifesto about his early childhood of being bullied, having a female friend, reaching puberty, then the female friend treating him differently. The killer’s family did not show him the proper attention, teased him about sex, and women found any excuse to not date him.

Another video surfaces across the internet of a male named Derick, in his mid-20s, referring to the incel, “I’ve had my fair time of being lonely, gotten rejected, but I didn’t kill anybody. I’ve worked on communication skills. I’ve gotten out more and socialized. People like him should seek help. The guy was a psychopath, who deserves to rot in prison for the rest of his life. He should be killed, but that’d be the easy way out. That could’ve been your mother, sister, or daughter that was killed. I would not want the job of being a woman, being harassed every day by thirsty men and I work at a fast food restaurant. I flip burgers, so that you don’t have to. I don’t have a lot of money or an expensive car, but I make an effort to continue. If you don’t take anything else from this video, look at it this way. An incel is a terrorist group and it is particularly common for an incel to hate women. Thats one thing that I notice about all incels and I don’t know too much about them, but it’s clear that you can’t blame everyone for your problems. If women don’t want to talk to you, maybe the problem is you. Fix yourself up. Build some confidence. Get a pet. An incel can commit a horrific mass shooting and many incels in the community may praise the killer, even committing copycat attacks. If an incel has that much influence, an incel could just tell the community to relax and get through the days of loneliness…”

The video from Derick gets Gustave mad, then he exits the screen before finishing it. He is unsure exactly why he feels like he relates to the incel. He texts females sometimes. It occurs to him, he never actually been on a date before or had sex, but he desires a relationship. Society would try to label anybody as being mentally challenged, especially if they commit a crime. “Who has committed a murder whether grisly or not, that does not have a mental illness,” he thinks, then he thinks, “Is it a mental illness to want to fight somebody?”

Gustave knows that various people have a psychology in order to talk to women. Someone may wait a while before talking to a woman that they recently talked in order to not seem desperate or find a creative way to put their words together to build a connection. If the male is able to show the love language of touch and the woman is comfortable, if the woman puts makeup on around him, flicks their hair back over their shoulder, or even like many of their posts on social media (which can be marking their territory on who they like), those are signs that they may be interested.

A woman to walk with long strides to appear taller and graceful, only to get shot, is somewhat humorous to him. Nobody would want a female that they grew attached to to die, unless they were selfish, trying to sacrifice them for fame or fortune. He is aware of the Illuminati and he disagrees with secret societies, remembering text messages that he sent Daisy and Elisha about which celebrities sold their souls.

Meanwhile, Carl is at the apartment, logging onto Gustave’s desktop computer. After heading to a dating website that appears gothic, he grabs his phone. He calls Vinnie.

“I typed in Gustave’s password to this demonic dating website and I see him inboxing some goth female, sharing his personal business. It’s stupid!”

“Wow,” Vinnie says, “Did you call him yet?”

Carl says like his son fell madly in love with an active shooter in an emergency room, “I’m getting to that. He’s telling this woman named Rachel about how he writes romance stories and doesn’t like it over here.”

“He’s not getting this computer back. This is my computer. I bought it.”

While Gustave is eating lunch in a cafeteria, his cell phone rings.

He answers the phone, hearing Carl, “I was on the computer a page that you was on automatically popped up called Oh, Too Goth! You’re out here talking to online women. What’s your problem! You’re not getting this computer back when you get back home.”

Chapter 9

The Pizza Place

Still thinking about how he has no privacy, he questions why he is still breathing. How are other people in the world capable of committing suicide? He is not trying to get intoxicated just to attempt to jump out of a window, only to still show signs of life, not having the strength to move his limbs. A nightmare for anyone suicidal would be being in a coma, but worse than that is hell, which would be a real thing. It could be that he will live his final years on Earth socially isolated, even if he agrees with everything that a feminist says.

Elisha, who is proficient at empathizing with others texts him, “Hey.”

“Hey,” he texts back, “You want to talk on the phone?”

“I like texting better. Sure.”

“You want me to call first or will you call?”

Instantly, Elisha calls him and he answers the phone, “Hello.”

“Hey.”

“How’s everything?”

“Going back and forth to work at McArnold’s is keeping me busy. Next week, I’m going to move in with my friend. I texted you about that.”

“Parenting is rough,” he says, “I would help you if I could.”

“Yeah. My parents are another story.”

“Can’t be worse than mine,” he says.

“I don’t know.”

“You’re going to need your own phone in case your parents cut your service off after finding out you left.”

“I pay for my own phone bill,” she says, “I can find a way to call you back. Don’t worry.”

“Don’t forget to grab your birth certificate when you leave your parents house.”

“Ooh. I didn’t think of that. Thanks. What about things with you?”

“I can’t get on Oh, My Goth website anymore. It’d be too awkward, even though I got the computer back.”

“Right. You need to save up some money and move out. That’s too much going on.”

“Tell me about it. I still have a job interview today that I told you about. I want two jobs. You even met your boyfriend on Oh, My Goth.”

“I sure did.”

The sound of the doorknob at the front door opens.

“Yeah. I just wanted to hear your voice. Nice talking to you.”

“Yeah. We should do this more often.”

“Yeah,” he says, “Bye.”

“I’ll text you. Bye.”

“There he is,” Carl says practically singing, then says, “Were you talking to yourself? I heard you talking.”

“No. I was on the phone.”

“Oh. Okay,” Carl says, then calls Vinnie to talk about the neighbors, “I was walking back to the house, then Bernice is struggling to carry her grocery bags, so I asked Her do you need any help because I wouldn’t want her to fall down, break a hip or anything. It’s snowing outside. It’s slushy snow, but I wanted to help, but after carrying the groceries up, we stood in the hallway talking for a thirty minutes,” then says to Gustave, “You can make your green drink.”

Now, his dad is aware that he talks to somebody and it clearly is not his older brother. Gustave hardly exits his apartment at times, but when he does, his dad tries to come with him, bring a relative, or even a friend of his with him. He overthinks about how he simply cannot be himself in private or public, then thinks about how his dad may know that he was talking to an online friend. He thinks that his dad may be an FBI agent or something, but what dad, who is an FBI agent would spend so much time monitoring him? Thus, he overthinks while making a green drink.

“Can I start the blender,” Gustave asks.

“Wait! Give me a moment! Your grandma just called! Just start the blender. Start it! You didn’t want to make a green drink before and now you can’t live without one,” Carl says.

After blending the vegetables together with purified water, Carl walks by, saying, “Why is there spirulina in the sink! It’s wet! If the spirulina is wet, it can make us sick, then we can die because of it!”

“I dried the measuring spoons, then put…”

“If they’re dry, why is the spirulina wet in the sink,” Carl says with bass in his voice, “I have to throw the whole container of spirulina out if you put a wet spoon in there!”

“The spoon was dry,” Gustave says, “I dumped the spirulina and chlorella into the cup, then put the spoon in the sink, to rinse it off…”

“But there’s a lot of spirulina in the sink that’s wet. Let me see,” Carl, who is now shirtless walks in front of him to grab a container of spirulina from the cabinet and pour 1/2 teaspoon of it into a white, ceramic bowl. He puts a measuring spoon in it, taps the spoon on the side of the bowl four times, places the spoon in the sink, then runs water over it, saying, “I see more spirulina in the sink when you make the green drink.”

Carl walks away and two seconds later, Gustave tries to tell Carl that the extra green ingredients in the sink comes from when he washes the lid and cup to the blender, saying, “I think the green that you see in the sink comes from…”

Carl interrupts to say, “Can’t you see that I’m on the phone,” then continues talking on the phone, “I said to Gustave, this is the real exercise I don’t need to lift weights because I’m so used to carrying these heavy bags back and forth to the grocery stores. You’re not use to this type of workout.”

A full minute passes, then Carl enters the kitchen to add water to his bowl of spirulina and drink it.

Gustave enters the kitchen to say, “I was trying to say that the extra green ingredients in the sink could come from me washing out the lid and cup.”

“Or it could be that you don’t blend your green drinks long enough and is not coming out wet. So you may not be getting any of your spirulina,” Carl says.

It rains outside twenty minutes later. Gustave is wearing a black jacket and has an umbrella, nervous because he is going to his first in-person interview. Everything should be fine because the interviewer cannot fire him if he already does not have a job.

“What time is your interview,” Carl says.

“Ten o’clock.”

“Vinnie will drive you there.”

Now, Gustave is more nervous, having Carl and Vinnie in the same vehicle as he is in. He could be viewed as a failure if he does not get the job. He also wants enough money to be independent and maybe he can afford to travel to finally see Elisha, who lives in the same state. After working hard at his job, maybe he can actually hand over some money to the less fortunate if he was to head downtown.

Eventually, when Vinnie parks the car in the parking lot, she says, “You know what you’re going to say?”

“Yes,” Gustave says, feeling like he lost his other sock in the washing machine, even though he is wearing socks and dress shoes on both of his feet.

Carl says, “Enjoy your interview.”

“Thank you. Bye,” Gustave says,

It is 9:44 A.M. Gustave steps out of the car with a black umbrella, then the wind blows the umbrella inside out. He closes the car door and closes his umbrella, walking into the pizza restaurant called Rio Giant’s Pizzeria, smiling and greeting the employees and customers that walk by.

He walks to the front desk to say, “Excuse me, ma’am. My name is Gustave and I’m scheduled to have a ten o’clock interview with Jefferey for a Crew Member position.”

The name Susie is on her name tag and she says, “Thank you, sir. Jefferey will be right with you in a moment. I’ll let him know you’re here. While you wait, you can sit down by the window over there.”

“Thank you,” he says, then walks to the corner of the restaurant to sit down until it turns 9:58 A.M.

Jefferey walks out (wearing a light blue dress shirt, black dress pants, and black, suede dress shoes), saying, “Good morning. Gustave?”

“That’s me.”

“I’m pleased to meet you. I’m Jeffrey, the person who will be interviewing you today. I’m going to start off by asking you some questions. Is this your first time being interviewed,” Jefferey says, extending his hand out.

Making direct eye contact, Gustave smiles and shakes Jefferey’s hand firmly, saying, “This would be my first ever in-person interview. I’m glad to be here.”

“We all get nervous on our first time around. Relax. Make yourself comfortable. Right this way,” Jefferey says.

Gustave follows Jefferey to an area that only has one customer in it, then sees Jefferey sit down at a wooden table.

Jefferey says, “Please. Sit down.”

Gustave sits down.

Losing confidence, Gustave looks to his left side and literally sees a blond, teenage boy with a bob cut hairstyle playing a pinball machine.

“Tell me about yourself. Before you tell me that, is Gustave your real name?”

Gustave speaks, “It’s the birth name that my mother gave me. In May…”

Jefferey bursts out in laughter, then says, “I’m sorry. Continue.”

After the awkward moment, Gustave answers the previous question properly and clearly, even claiming that Jefferey can call him Gusto.

“Or I can call you Guts. Get it? Guts? Why do you want to work for this company?”

The interview is already awkward for Gustave. How can he relax? If he relaxes, he probably would not care about getting the job.

“Last week, I saw on The Back Hampshire website that you were hiring for crew members and I wanted to give this my full potential. I want to learn as much as I can about the crew member position, assist others, and possibly move up the corporate ladder in the future. I love the food here, have been to this restaurant with my family numerous times, and my favorite is the Mama’s Mac and Cheese.”

“That’s some good Mac and cheese. My mama cooks better than the dish served here. Don’t tell the manager. I’m the manager.”

“I also believe in courtesy and teamwork. I’m not afraid of getting jobs done by myself, am a fast learner, and plan to accomplish tasks without any supervision.”

“Okay. Do you feel comfortable handling money? The crew member position entails being a cashier, remembering orders, cooking the meals, and carrying the meals to the customer’s tables and cars. If you have your driver’s license, you can drive a truck and be the food delivery guy. The crew member position also requires that you wash the dishes, and mop the floors.”

When the interview is over, Gustave realizes that he is not getting hired. He may not have the most effective answers, but he felt like he was ridiculed. Instead of taking public transportation from a bus ride and train ride, and walking back to the apartment, he gets inside of Vinnie’s vehicle.

“How’d the interview go?”

“The interviewer laughed at me.”

Carl says, “He did what?”

“I said that my name was Gustave and started laughing, interrupting me.”

“Give me a minute,” Carl says, then exits the vehicle to head inside.

Gustave says, “I’m not sure what’s going on.”

Carl makes his way back to the vehicle, gets inside, then says, “I spoke to the real manager. The person interviewing Gustave was mentally challenged. I walked up in the restaurant and I said can I speak to the manager please, then Charles walks into from the back door with a name tag that says manager on it…”

“Wow! Just wow! Unbelievable,” Vinnie says.

“Carl says, “I don’t like it up here anyway.”

It is the last day of April on following day, which is on a Monday at 5:45 A.M. Gustave exits his bedroom, then the moment he exits, Carl says, “What are you smiling about? Walking out here looking crazy, smiling. You look crazy!”

Smiling must not be as appreciated as frowning. Some people in the world smile because it is morning. Maybe they smile to keep from crying or to showcase their resilience, thinking positive. Maybe there is a lot of pain that is hidden behind a person who smiles, but it is worse to be then told that “You look crazy.”

Gustave’s day is already a wreck. He was smiling because he woke up to a text message from Elisha that simply said, “Good morning.”

After routinely washing up, thoroughly brushing his teeth, swiftly putting his clothes on, and eagerly making a green drink, Carl ends his phone call with Vinnie. Carl then steps in front of Gustave and kicks his foot near his direction without touching him.

“You ain’t ready for none of this, boy,” Carl says, “You want me to duke you up? Huh? You want me to duke you up?”

Gustave does not answer the question because not too long ago, Carl was mad that he was simply smiling. Many conversations that he talks about with Carl turn into Carl just getting angry. Maybe people that are always angry during conversations are those that cannot effectively communicate, but if so, how can Carl communicate with others?

Carl pulls on the back of Gustave’s shirt when he walks away, saying, “Who you think you are? Showing off all of your muscles.”

Gustave does not feel muscular, but he does not want to hear a “Who you think you are comment.” Who is Gustave? He is somebody who wakes up early with anguish, exercising before going to college now. Exercising is a way of relieving stress, but the stress that he undergoes seems to overpower exercising.

The stress increases when he feels like he lacks natural reflexes because of how often Carl pulls on his shirt. It is like what bullies do when they push or touch others before deciding if they can strike them. Carl knows too much about how to manipulate him, but there has to be a way that Gustave can overcome adversity.

What would Gustave do if a stranger grabbed his shirt while he is wearing it? His natural reaction could be to do nothing thanks to Carl, then his life is in danger. With so much pent-up rage, he does not want to harm anybody, but another part of him think about it. Hopefully, he does not have to see anybody like Carl if he goes into the workforce.

Hopefully, he can finish his full exercise routine every day. Maybe the maintenance will not interfere. Maybe his grandma will not be arriving. Maybe he will not be asked if he wants to go to the gym by his dad, only for an employee to overcharge his dad’s credit card, resulting in him not returning again. Maybe if he goes to another gym, then his dad will head to the gym with him, but the only way he can workout at the gym is if his dad shows up. Thus, his dad may decide what exercise routines that he should try on first at times, say how he needs to have the right form when exercising, use full body motion, or even try to rush him (just to meet up with grandma or his brother).

Maybe even Gustave will look up more exercises and nutritious facts, exercise, then not even have enough time to do concentration curls (because his dad wants him to exit the gym to see grandma. Then grandma will ask, “Did you enjoy your workout.” What Gustave would be thinking minus the possible profanity is, “No. I didn’t enjoy my workout, as even if a woman who found me attractive was around, I couldn’t dare flirt with her, as she would be forced to talk to my dad all day, just to talk to me. I was rushed and could not finish my concentration curls, just to see you, who does not exercise, let alone talk about much that I’m interested in.”

“You want anything from the store?”

“I don’t need anything,” Carl says.

“Okay then. I’m gonna bring some goodies home,” Carl says, who is supposed to be eating healthy.

Gustave heads to a local grocery store with Carl, then after Carl grabs items like ground meat, beans, he grabs a chicken sandwich to put in the cart. The line is long and in front of him is a customer, who is a brunette with black sunglasses, turning around to have small talk. Gustave pays no attention to how the small talk starts, only to hear Carl laughing, saying, “This better be half off. Then I would’ve been using words that I have no business using.”

Finally, without his dad, on Gustave’s way to college, sitting on an electric locomotive, he is on his cell phone, then the train conductor arrives. The rotund train conductor does not appear friendly at all.

When Gustave shows him a monthly pass for the April, the train conductor looks at it, saying, “Your card is going to expire at noon.”

“I know.”

The benefit of having a monthly pass on a train is that he does not have to tell the train conductors where he is going. Around 25 minutes during the train ride, Gustave notices that a different male train conductor with a brown buzz cut is complaining to a female train conductor.

Walk male train conductor walks down the aisle, saying, “Some lady was yelling at me because she got on the wrong train! I’m not in charge of the train stops, so I tried to tell her to get off the train,” he uses profanity, then says, “The nerve of her. Everybody. Please have your tickets out and ready when I arrive! It makes the process easier.”

Currently, Gustave’s dad pays for all of his train fair, but the ongoing activities on the train makes Gustave want to own his own car. He does not favor riding the train, having strangers notice him. If he had a car, he would not have to worry about the train being overcrowded, as well as delayed and canceled.

On his cell phone, he sees a writer position for a video game website online called Trooper Now Gaming. All he would have to do is write online article about video games, transfer the written content on a content managing system (where he would input the title of the catchy articles, headlines, feature images and images for the body of the articles, search engine optimization, stay updated on the latest technology, and possibly more. He presses a button that says “Write For Us,” types in his name, email address, then copy and paste a message in the message box with links to his resume and cover letter.

When he attempts to press the submit button, the website fails to go to the next page, showing asterisk marks in the right side of where he is supposed to type his name, email address, and message. The issue is that he already typed the correct information and if he looks online for the email address of the company, it is nowhere to be found. The issue leads him to simply exit out of the website, never wanting to apply for Trooper Now Gaming. To his surprise, that is far from the only moment that Trooper Now Gaming claiming to be hiring will give him major issues.

A tender-hearted Elisha texts him, “It’s. This is my new phone number now. I moved over to my friend’s house.”

“That was fast. How do you like it over there?”

“We get along great.”

Looking through the window on the train, Gustave sees a building that construction workers are working on. He wonders if there are surveillance cameras around when the construction workers go home, only to continue working on the building. He wonders if somebody would think about bombing the unfinished building while the construction workers are not around or wait until it is time for them to work to set off the bomb. That probably would be a horrible idea for a horror movie, but he has to keep thinking of ideas, even though ideas are not what actually makes you successful. He would have to network and be in agreement with what other people want.

“Thank you for the unmasculine traits that my dad gave me. Lying. I learned to be a better liar because of how much privacy I lack. Sort of. I only lie when I think I have to. Did you leave the cellular data on the phone on for four hours? No, I’ll say. Then he may blame grandma instead of my brother because she is on the same cell phone plan. I can barely go anywhere even if my dad was to leave the house to go to the grocery store. If I’m at home, he uses me being at home to try to see what I’m doing remotely. He may attempt to do a video chat over the phone to see the background. What he likely will do is call at times to ask something like to make sure his keys are not still on the table, to make sure his credit card is not on the table and to read off a number for him. To read off a grocery list that he forgot to bring with him. Unorganized. I think that I’m a bit more organized with where I put items in my room than my dad. I only left my keys at the apartment twice and eventually found them. I can’t just leave the house to do anything, without him knowing about it all of the time. If I was to leave out, even a cashier would gossip about me and tell him about items that I purchased to him. I have a fear of rejection and abandonment. Judgemental. I don’t believe in the same things that my dad does, but I also learned to judge basically everything and everyone. It’s a good thing that I’m not thinking out loud.”

In Cinema Notebooks class, Gustave is sitting at a table and the instructor, Ms. Davison tells everyone to get into groups of four and work on a 5-minute silent film about anything that they want, having 2 weeks to complete the project. Undecided on where to go and which student will most likely like him, he remains seated.

Matthew, who has black dreadlocks, is wearing a plaid, black and orange button-up shirt, blue jeans, and white socks with black sandals, says, “You wanna work in our group?”

“Sure,” Gustave says, walking near where Henry is seated.

Before sitting down, a blond woman named Jessica (who has short, straight hair) is already holding a man’s hand, like they are dating.

Jessica’s boyfriend says, “Nice to meet you. I’m Henry.”

“I’m Jessica,” the woman says.

“Nice to meet you both,” he says.

“The name is Matthew,” the male wearing dreadlocks says.

Ms. Davison says, “Collaborate with your group. Own the project. Somebody has to be the cameraman. Somebody has to be the actor. Somebody has to do the video editing. The only actors that you can include in your film are in your group. Think fast.”

“I’m thinking maybe we go outside and interview those living in poverty on the streets,” Matthew says.

This is supposed to be so much of a college full of creative students that Matthew has the nerve to think of a project that anybody can do with a cell phone that has a functioning camera. What happens if a student in their group interviews a homeless person, only to get robbed, beaten, and/or killed? Is it selfish of Gustave to think that the film should be about something else?

“What do you think the film should be about, Henry,” Gustave says.

“I’m fine with what you all are doing,” Henry says, “I can be one of the actors.”

Matthew says, “I can be the screenwriter, the interviewer, and the video editor. I can’t have you all mess up the project.”

“This is all of our project,” Gustave says, “What about there is a man who lives in a world with no sound and he is trying to express to a woman that he is in love with her, but is too shy to tell her?”

Jessica says, “I like that idea. What do you think, Henry.”

“Let’s do it. Matthew. What are your thoughts.”

“Fine. I like my idea better though,” Matthew says, “slipping his earphones on, drawing 2D animation characters from a stack of 12 field animation paper, “The main character can bite an apple.”

The instructor, Ms. Davis is describing what white balance is, “White balance is a camera setting determining the color temperatures of different lights in a film. Can anyone answer this question? What is…”

“Black balance,” Matthew says softly, somehow making a reference to race.

“Five thousand six hundred degrees Kelvin,” Jessica says.

“Ms. Davison says, “That’s correct.”

After Ms Davison plays a short film where there is a scene of a black man being disgusted by two males kissing in a movie theater, Gustave laughs.

“That’s not funny,” Matthew says.

What is funny is subjective. Why ruin one of the only times Gustave may be laughing throughout the entire day? All because Matthew is homosexual, Gustave has to agree with everything he says, just to be accepted by others. All because Matthew claims he is pro-black at times, Gustave finds it difficult to associate himself with Matthew, who has opposing views, but Matthew is mean anyway. How exactly is Matthew pro-black if being gay is not exactly helping to procreate more blacks in the world?

Making matters worse, outside of the college premises, hundreds of people are protesting outside about three cops shooting a black teenager. Gustave just has to look behind himself, out of the window to see the protesting. The protesting is loud enough to hear.

Thus, Matthew talks, “They’re protesting about three cops shooting an unarmed Timothy Greenwell seventeen times because they thought he was going to attack them. Timothy was holding an inhaler. It’s a shame.”

“Yeah,” Gustave says.

The law-abiding Ms. Davison says, “They’re protesting again. If we can all just stay seated…”

Two weeks later, Gustave has a theory that most women prefer a man who is confident and ambitious. If she is not the main focus of their attention, she will want to be in it, like wanting what she can’t get. He would have to keep the woman chasing, like a psychology formula or like she is a robot, because many women think alike. If they did not think alike, then the Chad’s and Tyrone’s (popular, attractive, and outgoing people) would not have tactics in order to constantly date or have intimacy with women.

If a woman texts or messages him, he would have to not respond like he is too needy, wanting to know so much about her. Maybe if he is watching a movie, he can wait until the movie is over and allow the woman to constantly wonder what it is that he is doing, being excited when he messages or calls her back. Thinking about such things makes him want to stay away from women because it is robotic behavior and even women analyze the romantic tips (from online social media channels, books, magazines, etc.), so every tip may not be effective. This means that by the time it is his turn to use a psychology tactic, the woman can bring up that her ex did the same thing and took advantage of her or just not mention it.

How could a woman think that she is better than him, even if she is his beau? If he was to own his own house, then the woman may act like it belongs to her. Smart enough, he would not want a fauxmance, but at least couples that do not get along are in a relationship, have one. At least normal people may find a relationship or intimacy as easily as searching for a missing sock. At least if he was to get into a relationship, he cannot imagine harming the woman mentally or physically, even though somebody can be mentally harmed about seemingly anything.

Maybe loneliness is his biggest enemy that he has to befriend. Broken heart syndrome has to get used to him. Maybe if he is in public, he does not have to feel like continuing a conversation with a woman, especially if he does not know what to say next.

Maybe if he is pursuing online dating, he could read the entire Dictionary and Thesaurus, just to fall in love with a catfish. A catfish is a person who uses fakes images and various information in order to create an online persona, deceiving others. It could be that wanting a relationship is a waste of time, even though he cannot imagine cheating or breaking up with somebody that he genuinely loves. Maybe his first kiss did not come from an imaginary friend, which is a demon, but his mother, who kissed his boo-boo. Instead of seeking an online relationship and attempting to meet up in-person, maybe he could gain knowledge while having a book girlfriend.

It could be that a woman would view him like he talks to an imaginary friend if he mentions that he is spiritual. It could be also that a woman would be in a love triangle or want a polyamorous relationship. He questions if falling in love at first sight is real or specifically something that he will experience, only to think about major consequences, like finding out that he fell in love with an abortionist or finding out that he fell in love with a police officer.

Serious topics like views on politics, religion, abortion, and LGBTQIA2S+ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer or Questioning, Intersex, Asexual or Agender, Two-spirit and more) are likely to cause a woman to not like him, especially if he does not agree with the woman.

At 6:00 P.M. in a downtown pizza restaurant, Gustave is in a line beside Carl. Gustave, who would find it complicated to leave a proper voicemail message without stuttering, forgetting what to say, or saying the words the exact way everyone wants to hear, is actually out of the apartment again. He would rather order from a ghost restaurant than travel outdoors if he managed to buy his own house, but the idea of owning a ghost town would make him feel more accomplished.

The host of the restaurant informs Carl that the waiting time for the indoor seating will be 30 minutes and that the waiting time for an alfresco lunch will be 20 minutes. Carl agrees to the indoor seating. After Carl orders two bags of pizza-flavored potato chips, they sit down eating from a bag, waiting for it to be 30 minutes.

An attractive blond woman with blue eyes and exfoliated skin, who appears to be 18, walks across from a bench to sit down beside Gustave. Her head turns his direction. The vibe that she is looking his direction is there, but he does not want to assume. Thus, he sees her looking at him from his peripheral vision.

She talks, “Hey. It’s some good pizza over here. I love the pizza-flavored chips.”

Gustave says, “Me as well. Pizza is my favorite food.”

“First time here,” she asks.

“You can say so.”

“My name is Amanda. What’s yours?”

Carl looks at them as if they are going to be table sharing, then says, “Gustave.”

She asks, “It’s nice to meet you. You must be…”

Carl says, “I’m his father. He attending Octavia’s College to be a film director.”

She says, “Congratulations.”

Who would be upset with the possibility of being a film director and creating any movie they dream of or telling the real-life events of others? He would prefer to be talented enough to make a B-rated movie look more advanced than any movie (full of computer-generated imagery) that A-list actors are in. It was brought to Amanda’s attention that he is going to film school, so is that supposed to make this lady attracted?

More importantly, was Amanda born with lady parts? It looks like she was. Even if someone looking like Amanda was to be his wing woman (a female friend who attends social events with him with the objective of having him find a partner).

He cannot even seem to have a regular conversation with other without there being an interference, let alone issue that tests his morals. If he tried to contact a beautiful woman who looks like her online, the odds are, she would claim to have a boyfriend, friend zone him, or ignore him. It could even be that she may want to date him online, but maybe she lives far in California and because so, he would have to plan on how to make his way to California (especially with Carl not wanting him to meet strangers).

Chapter 10:

Then There Were Three

It is a 9:05 A.M. on a Tuesday. Dmitry (with a black crew cut hairstyle, a green t-shirt, blue shorts, and red gym shoes) invites Gustave to his dorm room. The dorm room is on the fourth floor, having a balcony that leads to a picturesque view of multiple buildings near an ocean. There used to be a black flat-screen television mounted on the plaster wall, which is painted orange.

“This is my dorm. Rita texted me and said that she will be arriving in five minutes with the camera. We have just a week to finish this short film. After she shows up, we can get to filming,” Dmitry says.

“What’s that in your room,” Gustave says, pointing at an opened room, full of film equipment.

“That’s is my film equipment. I have cameras, lenses, lighting equipment, music software, sound recorders, and microphones. I have years worth of collections stored up. Let me know if you can rap, so I can put you on. You know somebody that can rap?”

“I’ve heard of people that can rap. It’s not me, but I’ll keep you in mind if I hear about someone. I’m not sure what type of rap music you like.”

“I like everything,” Dmitry says.

Dmitry turns on the television to channel surf, then he watches basketball, celebrating when his favorite team wins the game, laterally moving down the living room in a squatted position. The moment is awkward for Gustave because maybe by him pretending to be a fan of basketball, Dmitry would care. Really, Gustave would prefer playing basketball than watching it on television and will not pretend like he does watch it.

Dmitry answers a phone call to talk to his girlfriend (who likely spends over an hour in the bathroom to do her hair, only to go out on a date with him and play with her hair), all while applying for a job as a bartender at a pizza restaurant. When he ends the phone call, he gain curious.

“You ever had weed before?”

“Not at all. I heard all types of stories about weed.”

“You should smell it,” Dmitry says, heading into his room, then grabbing a plastic bag full of cannabis.

Gustave sniffs the cannabis when Dmitry positions it up to his face.

“No, thanks. I’m fine,” Gustave says, knowing that often Dmitry shows up to class late anyway.

“We can get started on the project. You’re going to be the cameraman and I’m going to be the person talking. By the time Rita gets here, we’d already finished the project.”

Dmitry grabs a professional camera from his room and sets it up on a tripod, then turn the device on. Gustave stand behind the camera.

“Action,” Gustave says, pressing the record button.

Dmitry wounds up talking about why exactly his made-up film company about is unique and is worthy of attention. While recording, Dmitri’s cell phone rings. Dmitry puts his cell phone on silent.

A few minutes later, Rita arrives, saying, “No time to talk. Let’s get this show started.”

“We’re using Dmitry’s camera,” Gustave says.

A few hours later, Gustave arrives back to Carl’s apartment thinking about how he is an incel, but not wanting to interact with others in the incelosphere (which is an online community focusing on their inability to have a romantic or sexual partner). Various users have misogynistic and racist views. Gustave is depressed, even though he is an adult in college. Is he really an adult or considered a man, when some people consider a man to live independently? He is breathing, but does not feel alive at times, yet is able to feel pain.

Gustave receives a text message from Daisy, which says, “Please message me back. I want things to go back to how they were.”

Gustave texts, “Hey. What do you want to talk about?”

“I’m a bad friend. I was interested in Sean and you.”

“Are you still with him?”

“I’m pregnant,” she texts him.

Suddenly, Gustave feels worse than ever, knowing that another man got Daisy pregnant. Could still texting her be a sign that he does not have personal boundaries? Is Sean, who is fortunate enough to touch Daisy, being a good boyfriend? Will he stay in her life to take help care of the child? Then, it occurs to him, she is not even married with Sean.

Gustave thinks about not responding to Daisy, wanting to shout in crier. If he cries loudly, his dad will hear him, just as he can already hear his dad complaining over the cell phone about the a grocery store overcharging him avocado oil.

Would Daisy trusty respect him for being involved in her life after she is pregnant with Sean? What happens if Sean gets jealous that she is talking to him? What happens if Daisy’s children grow up to find out that he is not their dad? What happens if he loses a romantic attraction for Daisy after thinking about her loving Sean so much, only to just want sexual advances?

What is the point of wanting Daisy? She got to live the way she wanted in the moment, so why can’t he live to do what he wants? Will he still be a virgin by the time a promiscuous woman thinks about settling down in a serious relationship that can lead to a full-time marriage?

Gustave exits his bedroom, depressed, then Carl says, “Turn that frown upside down. What you frowning about?”

Gustave says, “Nothing.”

Elisha texts Gustave a message that says, “Hey. How’s everything?”

Then, Rita texts Gustave, “I spent $1,000 in one night yesterday all on liquor. I had a good time. How are you?”

How is Gustave knowing that Rita has extra money to spare, but does not financially help him out, if she considers him a friend? Friendship is not about money though. She does in fact have a husband and three children, but why would she brag about getting so much money? She is materialistic, making him instead, want to message Elisha first.

Nearly 2 years later, it is the last day of college. Gustave whispers an idea about a film project in Rita’s ear, who shows up to the classroom. Everyone is simply staring as Rita’s face switches to a proud look, as if she wants to collaborate with him on the project or steal his idea.

Matthew says, “You’re not going to amount to anything,” then the instructor dismisses the class.

After exiting the class, Gustave wonders why Matthew would make a comment about not being successful. Maybe it was playful or competitive. Maybe Matthew is jealous, but someone who claims to be for the black community was showing disrespect to him, who is of black complexion.

“You’re not going to make it into the film industry,” Matthew laughs ominously, as if he has networks with every influential filmmaker in Hollywood.

Not wanting to antagonize Matthew is not enough to be respected. He does not have to return back to school, except until his graduation. The least of his worries should be seeing Matthew in the workforce, who ranted about how much pro black he is, if it’s not about being a homosexual aspiring filmmaker.

Gustave has a flashback about a muscular teenage male in high school who tries to fight him in the hallway while dozens of students watch. The scene switches to two months ago at his college when Matthew is sitting at a desk saying, “Someone’s going to steal your ideas,” then the scene switches back to high school, when an unsettled Darius strangles him in front of three nice-looking women while waiting on the school bus. The flashback switches to a scene where Darius is 12-years-oldyelling in his underwear, threatening to throw a baseball at him, then his dad’s friend rushes in the room to prevent it. Then the scene switches to Gustave hiding a hammer in his book bag on the last day of school, but Darius nosily removes the hammer without telling him, leading Gustave to search for it. Darius says, “You have to fight. I had to fight in school.” Without showing a sign of rage, he walks off of the school premises after exiting the flashback.

On his cell phone, he is on a dating website on his cell phone, inboxing a woman, “I’m free to meet up tonight.”

The female named Susan inboxes him back, “Meet me by X’s and O’s Public Library at 4:00 P.M.”

“I’ll be there.”

Once it turns to 3:50 P.M, Gustave is waiting inside of X’s and O’d Public Library where a rapper is cleverly freestyling on the microphone. The audience is cheering and multiple people mention words that the rapper can freestyle, but Gustave is wondering if Susan arrived to the location early. The rapper freestyles all of the words mentioned, even mentioning how Gustave is staring at his cell phone instead of watching the performance.

“How is it possible that anyone can freestyle,” he wonders.

He sits down and watches the performance. Multiple people perform raps and it eventually turns 4:05 P.M.

“It’s 4:05 P.M. I don’t see you.”

“Susan messages him back, saying, “I’m coming.”

Eventually, at 4:15 P.M., she arrives, wearing a red fedora hat, black anime book bag on the back of her black winter coat, blue skinny jeans, and red gym shoes. She is even with a male named Jabari, who is wearing a black beanie, prescription glasses, a gray winter coat, blue jeans, and black gym shoes. They listen to the performance for 10 seconds beside Gustave without introducing themselves.

“Hey,” she says.

“Hey,” he says.

“This is my friend Jabari,” she says, then Jabari waves.

He says, “How long have you been here?”

“We just got here,” she says and starts dancing, “Hit ‘em wit’ it Dontrell! That’s my song!”

Gustave, the man (with a Bachelor’s Degree in Film Studies at Octavia’s College) who was is now expecting to meet a goth woman to arrive somehow gets a woman to arrive 15 minutes late to an open mic event at a library. When she arrives, she is actually behaving like grew up in a poor urban population. Nothing exactly about her wardrobe indicates that she is a goth and her friends are boisterous, favoring the hip hop culture.

“How are you,” he asks.

The woman appears so heavily invested in the performance to answer the simple question.

It takes approximately 10 seconds for her to answer the question, letting Gustave know that she is not interested in him, making him not interested in her.

“I’m fine,” she says.

After just watching two performances from the awkward silence, he says, “I’m not sure how they freestyle like that.”

“Just write down some lyrics, then memorize them. You can get up there and perform if you like. You got any poems you want to perform,” she says.

“Not right now.”

What should Gustave talk about with the woman? He could’ve randomly said how drinking cold water can cause heart attacks, just to try to avoid an awkward silence, but he is not even interested in her behavior, let alone style. From looking at her in person, he is not even attracted to her physical appearance, looking androgynous.

When it turns 5:00 P.M., they walk out of the library. The day is already weird to Gustave, making him wonder why did he even meet up with this particular woman.

She says lowly to Jabari, “Weirdo.”

Gustave overhears what was said and walks her half of the way to her destination, before heading back home. Susan does have a dark skin complexion, but that cannot be the reason she was not acting goth. Maybe next time, he can attempt to meet up with a woman that does nit have dark-skinned complexion, he thinks. How was he possibly being weird when she was unprofessional in not arriving on time and did not show much interest talking? Is it not weird that she would arrive if she thought he was weird prior to arriving? It is possible that Susan even has a sexual relationship with Jabari, but who knows if Jabari is gay anyway?

While multiple people on Earth are falling in love, there are people being victims of murders. If Susan is making love to Jabari, she is making love during unsolved murders. While she is happy, another person on Earth is angry, which makes him feel like the outcast in society.

Gustave returns home writes a poem out of boredom:

Jogging in gunpowder,

I see sweating and bloodletting.

Flyers seek the wind

And welcoming fires are in alleys,

Uplifting the forgetful

Like the products they’re selling.

Until they get burned,

I tell you, nothing is upsetting.

Children key cars and merchants

Snatch them from the streets to sell.

Their trust is wrapped in rebellion,

But they have ambitions.

What if they’re committing and submitting

To show-and-tell?

Well, their pacifiers are like plungers

Used for resell.

Their wounds are the size of a bathtub stopper and they cry.

When their um-hum’s and ah-ah’s sound like mama and dada,

Are they regretting seeing innocent seeds just too shy?

Why’s are dead like criers and dreams until children decry.

While Carl is in the living room, having maintenance over to fix a stove with a faulty spark switch, Gustave is in in his bedroom returning to the website, Oh, My Goth! A woman with the username Etiquette Girl is a blond with curly hair and has a petite body. She is an otaku, who is wearing a black distressed denim jacket, over a black tank top, black jeans, and black, leather boots. When he messages her, “Hello. How are you,” he does not get a message back. He messages somebody else named Avery who is a beautiful goth of a dark-skinned complexion, “Hello. How are you?” No response arrives and he thinks, “Like usual,” noticing that all 40 of the women have an empty green circle in their profile picture, notifying him that they were last logged in between 46 minutes and 24 hours ago. Not even romantically attracted to one female that he is messaging, he inboxes at least 40 females with the same message.

The following day, he logs onto the dating website, only to see that zero females responded to his message. Are there bots on the dating website? Is he so unappealing that women do not want to associate themselves with him? He heads to another dating website called Matchmaking for the Lifetime, (which is expected to be a cordial website) then types in the inbox of a woman named Jessie Anime, who is a brunette, “Hey. I like watching anime too,” then types what his favorite anime show is and types, “I hope you’re doing well.” Jessie Anime’s profile page shows a green circle that shows she is currently online.

Jessie inboxes him back, typing, “Hey. I have a boyfriend. I’m only searching for anime friends on this website. No meet ups. Are you okay with that?”

“Why are you on this website if you have a boyfriend,” he types, then Jessie Anime blocks him from her profile page.

After sighing, he checks his email on his phone and one of the messages are about a job that he recently applied for:

Dear Gustave,

We’re so glad you’re interested in joining our team! Now that you’ve submitted your application, a member of our Human Resources Team will review your qualifications for Associate Publisher, Acquisitions | Remote and get back to you soon.

To make sure you receive notifications about your application, please click this link to learn how to mark our communications as safe.

Our team may also use text messaging to communicate with you. Standard text and data rates will apply. Should you receive a text from Mission from The Rooftops, you may opt out from text communications at any time.

Thank you!

A message from a company that he applied for a couple of months ago shows up in his email. Thus, he maximizes the screen.

Email message:

Hello Gustave,

Thank you so much for expressing interest in Dive and Fly and the Managing Editor, Specialty Comic Book & Reference | Remote role.

We have reviewed your submission and carefully considered your qualifications. However, we have decided to pursue other candidates whose experiences and skills more closely align with the requirements for the position.

Should you have other active applications, you will be considered and updated separately for each position. You can view the status of all of your submissions and update your profile on your Take In Justice Careers Dashboard. We may consider you in the future should we have any openings that align with your skill set.

Best regards,

Dive and Fly Human Resources

Gustave replies to the message:

Human Resources,

Thank you for your time.

Sincerely,

Gustave Zona

Gustave looks at another message:

Greetings,

Thank you for submitting your resume for consideration. We are in the process of carefully reviewing and assessing your skills in line with the specific requirements for this position and fit on our team.

We appreciate the time you have taken to prepare your application and ask for your patience as we complete this process.

Due to the high volume of resumes that we receive, we are unable to make individual contact with each applicant. If we see your application as a good fit with our team, we will contact you.

We appreciate your interest in Bismarck in The Business and wish you the best of luck in your job search.

Kind Regards,

He looks at another email message:

We appreciate your interest in The Greenish Lungs Media Group and the time you’ve invested in applying for the Temporary Editorial Assistant position. After careful consideration, we have chosen not to move forward with your application at this time. The decision was not easy, as we received many qualified applicants. We’d like to thank you for giving us the opportunity to learn about your skills and experience.

We will be posting more positions in the coming months and encourage you to apply again. We wish you luck with your job search and professional future endeavors.

Best,

Mary Pera

Director of Human Resources

Gustave exits his email messages out of despair, then heads look on social media, seeing numerous pictures of Daisy’s baby girl named Carol, including pictures Sean with the baby. Seeing the existence of Carol is simply a reminder of what Sean did with Daisy. He exits the social media page, furious, resting in a supine position on his bed.

Thinking that all it can take for an emo woman to cheat is for a Hollywood heartthrob to arrive at her doorsteps (bearing her timeless gifts, being friendly, or even serenading), leading her to be a googley-eyed minion, he notices more flaws about himself. He is not in a rock band to see a woman who is readily available, is not rich enough to buy a woman the whole world, and is not famous enough to have an undying love. He does not own a kiss that can beautiful and already beautiful woman. He cannot imagine sculpting a woman’s body with a kiss and having her surrender to his intelligence.

He thinks about how he is fortunate that his family does not practice arranged marriages, how his family does not practice levirate marriages, and child marriages. The controlling world is disgusting to him, dictating on who he is supposed to love and what he should think and believe. It would come as no surprise if some members of his family want him to marry a doctor, lawyer, or engineer, not actually caring if he falls in love. It is quite possible that he can propose to a woman that will just reject him and not return the wedding ring, but his view that engagement rings are a waste of money may stir up a woman’s emotions, just as much as he knows that holidays are Pagan and Masonic. Valentines Day is linked to Lupercalia, which is a Pagan festival of fertility and prosperity of Ancient Rome, celebrated on February 15th. Thinking about the event makes him wonder if a woman will think he does not love her for not bearing a gift for Valentine’s Day.

The emotion of love can be deceptive because love is an action of the unconditional commitment that Jesus showed by dying on the cross for our sins, which is a genuine and selfless love that followers should strive to have. Love seems like something that nobody except Jesus can showcase. Maybe Gustave does not know what love is.

The moment Gustave open his bedroom door, Carl says, “Do you love me?”

There is awkward silence. Why is Carl asking him such a question? Gustave does not feel comfortable telling a family member that he loves them. If his grandma was to say, “I love you,” then “Bye,” he would say, “I love you too” and “Bye.” He would not actually feel like he loves his family members, even though he does not want to them to be harmed. He also does not want to be around his family members.

He remembers when he was 5-years-old, tried to hug Carl and Carl whooped him for the attempt. How is Gustave going to feel like he can trust Carl? Love is supposed to come with trust. Carl allows Darius to continue coming over, who at times yells at him, even physically beating on him.

Carl’s cell phone rings, then he says, “Huh? Do you love me? Answer the question.”

Gustave stands in the same position, wondering how this day is going to end. He hears a text notification coming from his cell phone in the room, thinking that it must be Elisha or Daisy. Carl answers his cell phone to talk to Vinnie, then says to Gustave, “We’re going downtown today.

“When Neil was here, he said that nobody complained about problems with their stove in three as long as they lived on this complex. He was trying to make it seem like I’m the problem. I was tired of complaining. I walk up to the main office and the leasing agent says that Neil is complaining about you. I was the one having his back, saying that he is understaffed, but he does half,” he uses profanity, “…work. He comes up complaining. What do I have to do now, like I just mentioned an issue with the stove. I mentioned this two weeks ago. I’m going to write a letter. It just had to be a,” he uses the racial slur word for blacks, but with an “er” at the end, then says, “I’ll never hire a black person. All of my thirty years of being in apartments, I’ve never heard anybody talk to me like Neil. It wasn’t a white person.”

What can Gustave say? If he tries to be understanding long enough, the conversation will turn into him being misunderstood and seeing signs of rage. He remains silent.

Gustave returns in his room to look at his cell phone Elisha texts him, “You’re such a good friend.”

While Gustave is downtown in 90-degree weather, he sees his grandma who talks to Carl, “Hey, there. I woke up early this morning at five and got me some instant coffee, looked out the window and saw chemtrails or whatever smoke signals are in the sky.”

Carl says, “They’re trying to block out the sun. I don’t put nothing pass it. Mom. You have to stay in that Bible. Last days. Mom.”

The grandma says, “You’re right. I was reading my Bible last night in the book of Acts.”

“Chapter and verse,” Carl says.

“Then Peter said, Silver and gold have I none; but such as I have give I thee: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk. Acts chapter three, verse six,” grandma says.

A car speeds down the road, then Carl says, “Woah!”

“Woah,” Vinnie says.

Grandma uses profanity. “Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers”—Ephesians 4:29. Gustave knows that grandma heard that profanity is sinful, but wonders if she forgot or simply do not care. “But those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart; and they defile the man. For out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies:”—Matthew 15:18-19.

Carl says, “Did you see that? These people are crazy out here? They’re going to run someone over and be the first ones looking stupid!”

“It makes no sense,” Vinnie says.

Gustave basically follows them into a supermarket. There is one attractive, anonymous brunette that he sees with long, curly hair, black sunglasses, a yellow, silk split sleeve shirt, brown jeans, and black gym shoes. If he was truly interested in getting to know the woman, how would he approach her, without his family members or friends of his family blowing his cover that he is dependent on them? Maybe he can just walk up to her, knowing that his family will see what is going on, then pretend like he gets along with everyone, in which he does not. There is no win-win situation, even if she finds him attractive.

They head to a couple of more store, then make there way to grandma’s apartment on the 5th floor, after taking two 5-minute bus rides. Gustave is unsure about how he would get back home if he was alone. He does not even know what street he is on, but do not intend to visit grandma if he gets his own place anyway. After stopping by various stores, he loss track of where he was at, but thinks he may remember the streets after continuously heading outside.

At grandma’s place, she cooks egg rolls. Her sable cat is walking around the living room, but Gustave is allergic to cats. At least if it was a dog, there would not be a risk of him having an allergic reaction.

After Carl gets done complaining to his mother about Neil, she says to Gustave, “You still drawing, Gustave?”

From how often grandma repeats the same questions at times, Gustave could have a prepared answer, but preparing his answers could lead to Carl insulting him anyway. Does Gustave still draw? Gustave really wants to draw women that he is attracted to, but his most family and their friends would critique his work.

“Yes,” he says.

“That’s good. Your cousin Erick called me and said that he would like to know how to draw,” she says, laughing like she simultaneously caught a Charlie horse.

“No he didn’t. Boy. You betta’ get outta here. He gonna wait all this time to say somethin’,” Carl says as Vinnie laughs.

“It’s never too late to get started drawing, is it, Gustave,” she says.

“It takes practice. You just have to keep…”

Carl interrupts, “It takes practice mom! You heard the boy. Aunt Nia was talking to Carlos yesterday. She said that Carlos sells his artwork.”

Really, Gustave does not care if Erick got accepted into the major leagues and is too busy to mail family members postcards, because he is reciting his after-dinner speeches. He does not care if whoever Carlos is (which is likely one of Nia’s friends) decided to travel to North Korea and becomes a human rights activist and astrophysicist overnight. What Gustave really wants to do is be around his online friends, if they are truly his friends.

About 2 hours pass and before leaving grandma’s apartment, she says, “Do you love me?”

Carl must’ve been talking to grandma as usual, gossiping about why he does not like to use the word love. Because it is just his grandma, he is supposed to love her? If he was to have children with nine women somehow, does grandma automatically love the children, because they are related? Maybe he loves her and vice-versa. Maybe not. He simply does not feel like he loves grandma or at least he has an unreciprocated love. It is basically confusing and he would rather not be around his family.

“Yes,” the antisocial Gustave says forcefully, which does not really have much meaning if it is forced.

“Really,” she says.

“Yes.”

“See you later,” she says.

Vinnie gives his grandma a hug, saying, “See you later. My mom would love to meet you. Next time.”

“You’re right about that,” grandma says.

About 55 minutes later, Carl, Gustave, and Vinnie are at a Flossington Public Library. Gustave is walking around to look at what movies and book he can check out with his library card. He wounds up getting a poetry book, then has to wait for 30 minutes for Carl and Vinnie to get off the desktop computer.

Afterwards, they are ready to leave, but there is an issue. Three people who could be minors are sitting on a bench by the the entrance, horse-playing. There is a lot of slang being used and the two males of dark-skinned complexion are dressed similar to their favorite rap stars, minus having expensive jewelry.

An anonymous female, who is between the two males blushes when she sees Gustave walking behind Carl and Vinnie. The female, who could be 11 or even 15, pretends to accidentally drop a pencil, then her friend, boyfriend, relative, or whoever on the right side of her says, “Hey. Pick that up.”

Without expecting the guy to say, “Please” or “Pretty please,” Gustave picks up the pencil and hands it to the female, who says, “Thank you,” then he exits the library.

Why would he be interested in dating a 15-year-old? It is not like his cousin Tina never showed signs of attraction to him when she was 7, blushing. He does not even know the anonymous female that he recently saw, who reminds him of a female from high school that blushed from his sight, only to laugh at him for wearing the same clothes, as well as laugh at him when a muscular man tried to fight him in the hallway and scream directly in his ears (sitting behind him on the bleachers of the gymnasium) when a dark-skinned man starts to sing.

If he was the same age as the female he recently saw, he doubts that he would be attracted to her. In fact, he believes that he would prefer how somebody else looks, especially after being dissatisfied with her behavior, and the type of people that she spends quality time with.

Two years later, both, Gustave and Carl are sitting in front of brown, rectangular, wooden tables at a job center, then the headhunter enters the room full of people.

The headhunter says, “Good morning everyone! It’s been raining hard lately, but I’m glad you could join me today, as I’ve been researching consistently for the right jobs for everyone. Remember that by taking one part-time job, you can take another part-time job and make the same amount of money from a full-time position. Don’t just say it’s a part-time job and I want a full-time one, so I’m not applying. Get some experience on your resume. Jobs are looking for experience under your belt.”

A woman in her 30s say, “Do you have any remote writer positions?”

“Most remote writing work are scams. It’s extremely competitive to find and keep a remote writing position. I recommend applying in-house jobs,” the headhunter says, handing a couple of pieces of paper to Gustave, “Have you ever thought about being a line cook down at the Grunt Gravel Hotel on fifty ninth and Latterdale? It’s a part-time position…”

Carl says, “There’s a lot of gangs down on fifty ninth and Latterdale. I used to grow up around that neighborhood. Bad children. And it’s a part-time position.”

Trying to reason with Carl, so that Gustave can apply for the position, the headhunter says, “I’m presenting you an opportunity to work. I don’t control who is hiring, but I can talk to the managers and reason with them to set up interviews.”

On one of the sheets of papers that the headhunter passed out to Gustave, it says that there is a full-time position to be a fashion designer on 542 Mayfield Bay Street, only for Carl to remove the paper from his sight and throw it away in the trash can when the session is over. The irony is that Gustave would love to be a fashion designer, even having the ability to skillfully sketch and draw and create digital art. He can even paint, but what does it matter if he is not getting compensated for what he feels like he is mostly good at doing?

Hearing a headhunter talk is similar to a motivational speaker or salesperson talk. He could probably find a job himself, but feels like he should’ve been found one. He is in his mid 20s.

The head hunter is talking about having two part-time jobs and while Gustave would consider having two part-time jobs, he wants a full-time job and a part-time job. If he cannot find a good-paying job, then he may wound up getting kicked out Carl’s apartment. If someone was to be on the street begging for money and collect $1, all that person has to do is never give up and collect $1 about 999,999 more times, then they are a millionaire. Thus, they would have to pay for taxes, but to beg for money in the freezing weather or hotness that welcomes dehydration, to being ignored, insulted, and physically abused, is a greater risk. The homeless are more at risk of being victims of human trafficking.

After exiting the job center, Gustave is on his cell phone, seeing a message that Daisy sent, which says, “I’m pregnant again.”

The first time Daisy was pregnant, it hit him by a surprise, but now, he is not as surprised, especially after hearing about how much she cannot resist Sean, even though he calls her fat, ugly, and every other name nobody should call their girlfriend. Sean even is dating another woman. Gustave does not want to answer Daisy’s message immediately and waits about 10 minutes.

“You’re pregnant with who?”

“Sean,” she texts back.

A couple of months later, he heads in social media to notice that Daisy has images of all three of her children, including videos, reminding him that they are alive. Sean actually treats Daisy like she is worthless and unbelievably, Daisy desperately wants him. Daisy wants him so much, but when Valentine’s Day comes around, she posts on Gustave’s profile page that she is in love with him, making him doubt her feelings of loneliness.

Daisy, the same woman that Gustave wanted a long time ago is a reduced feeling of respect, making him thinking about going on various dating websites again. Thus, he creates various accounts on dating websites (even though women hardly contact him back) and inboxes at least 50 females. If he was to manage to get a response from a friendly woman and it surpasses a friendship, then would the woman cheat on him if she knew that he would never find out?

Overthinking about women partly makes him want to no longer be on dating websites. His dad’s friend, Vinnie, may be like a mother figure, but he does not have any deep conversations with her. She helps pay the bills and plants her lips across his dad’s lips. He still sees his grandma, who is a woman, but does not have experience with being himself around women. Yet, when he is himself, not worrying if the women likes him or not, there is an interference with his family, strangers, or the women will simply ignore him (if some do not make a dehumanizing comment about him).

One woman messages him back immediately, saying, “Hey. What brings you to this website?”

“I’m just looking for friends,” he texts.

“Same. I’m only looking for female friends,” she messages, then logs off the account.

For nearly every day for years, the only messages that he received from females are those having a relationship, having female associates, having a dislike for black men, as well as those willing to insult him and/or ignore him. The discouragement of further contacting women online is heightening.

This time, Gustave uses a 3-dimensional social app, searching the “About Me” section in various profiles. There has to be one woman who is interested in him, just as much as he would be her. It could take an encounter with God just to realize why women are not attracted to him. It could be that he is cursed.

One username that he finds interesting is Romcom Chelsea, who is a 22-year-old Californian brunette with a smile that could make a skeptic believe she has encounters with God. In one picture, she is wearing a blue camisole shirt, white, furry bracelets, as well as a white, furry belt and white, skinny jeans. In another picture, Romcom Chelsea has hands that could be designed for rock climbing, happily posing in front of a national park with five friends.

“Hey. I’m new to this website. Your profile interests me and I couldn’t help but notice your username. What is your favorite romcom,” he inboxes Romcom Chelsea.

One of the messages in his email that he checks:

Hi Gustave,

Thank you for your patience as we reviewed the work you submitted for consideration by Candy and Capeesh. We know that some of you applied as far back as summer of 2023 so we thank you for your understanding with the time it took our small staff to conduct another review. We received over 200 applicants for this round, and we are grateful you took the time to share your work with us.

Unfortunately, at this time we do not have a place in the store for your goods. We appreciate the time you put into the application, but with over 350 artists and makers from the Chicagoland area currently in the shop, we are striving to rotate through an array of art and products and will continue to add and renew inventory at our bi-annual reviews. We encourage you to apply again with any new products in the future. The next review will take place in spring of 2025.

We wish you best of luck in your creative endeavors and hope that you come by the shop and check us out.

Cecelia Strut, Director

—

Candy and Capeesh

Chicago Eatery Center

64 E Hazel Field St.

Chicago, IL 60602

After exiting his email and applying to more jobs, which is over thousands by now, Romcom Chelsea inboxes him back within 15 minutes, “Hey. Romcom is what I binge watch. My favorite romcom is Charlotte with Strings Attached, the television series. When season 3 gets released next month, I’ll be ready.”

“Gwen Carnis is overly dramatic in her movies.”

“I’ve never heard that one before,” she inboxes him, “She attended the same high school as me five years ago. I’m not following into the footsteps of my Gwen. I’m going to school to be a teacher…”

The trauma of how a male would smile if a bully slapped him in the back of the head occurs. Why would he want to be friends with a teacher, he wonders. Would the teacher know that there is a difference between a school indoctrination and intelligence? Maybe he could continue messaging Romcom Chelsea to see if he actually likes her.

He checks his email and sees one out of hundreds of messages. He attempted to sell his artwork to art galleries, attempted to apply for on-site jobs, attempted to apply for remote jobs, and to even sell his poetry. Nobody respect is showing him interest. How does he actually expect to cough up the money in order to meet up with friends, living afar?

One email message that he looks at:

Gustave,

Thank you for your interest in Freelance News Reporter . Unfortunately, our team has decided to move forward with other candidates at this time.

Should you see other Cu-de-sac News opportunities you may be interested in, we encourage you to apply! We do appreciate your interest in Cu-de-sac News and wish you the best of luck in your job search and all future endeavors.

Regards,
Newsweek

Like usually, another rejection. Maybe if he is honest with himself and admits to his friend that he is a starving artist, he gains more respect. Maybe he is getting too old to be respected for being dependent, but he continues to message Romcom Chelsea.

He types, “Maybe you can teach me a few things. I’m an aspiring filmmaker, who graduated…”

An hour later, Gustave exits his bedroom to grab a pear out of the refrigerator, then Carl says, “Gustave. Show me how you unfollow this person.”

Gustave walks toward Carl, who is sitting on a black, leather couch, (because he replaced his two chairs with a couch), then says, “Which website are you on?”

“It’s on an app…”

“Pad Rock.”

“Yes.”

“You can probably click on your profile page,” he says, making Carl click the profile button, then he says, “Click the following button.”

Carl clicks the following button, then unfollows the username, saying, “Thank you. Who you think you are,” rising up to hold on his shirt, upward, then let’s go, saying, “I washed the towels. They’re over there. Behind you.”

“They’re still wet,” Gustave says, touching a towel.

“You’re going to wash up with them anyway. They’ll be wet when you take a shower.”

“I’m used to…”

Carl interrupts, childishly talking over Gustave, saying, “Lala-fala-blah-blah!”

Carl is actively bisexual, having sexual intercourse with white and black males. Supposedly, Carl could’ve gotten his demons casted out. The sexually active Carl, who told Gustave about his sexual attraction when Gustave was still in college, at times sit like a woman (with his right knees directly on top of his left knee, with his calves positioned tight together, forming a diagonal with his feet to his right or left) and complain as much as the stereotype of a woman. Bisexual or not, Gustave does not want to live with Carl for the rest of his life.

Carl believes that being gay is a sin. Some people may claim that being gay is not a sin and that the act is a sin. Others, involved in New Age acceptance would not see a problem with being gay. “Thou shalt not lie with mankind, as with womankind: it is abomination”—Leviticus 18:22. “If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them”—Leviticus 20:13. “Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire”—Jude 1:7.

Thinking about promiscuous behavior reminds him of the time when his grandma, Angie’s chubby mom, invited his muscular uncle over her house. Gustave was only 9-years-old when he experienced this event. Gustave, Darius, and Dinky sat in the living room patiently. They waved and greeted their uncle, then see their uncle follow their grandma in the bedroom, shutting the door. Suddenly, there is laughter, R&B music playing, and moaning sounds, causing which caused Gustave to think that something was suspicious. Even Dinky made a facial expression of disgust when Gustave looks at his face, but Darius acts like there is a party in the bedroom and they’re uninvited, complaining saying, “Why can’t we go in the bedroom,” “How long do we have to wait out here,” “I wanna play the video game.”

Gustave even remembers being at the age of 15-years-old, and following Darius from the 6th floor to the 1st while Carl headed grocery shopping. After entering a washing machine room, he watches Darius open a washing machine and search through strangers clothes, eventually smelling an oversized, black bra, claiming that it could belong to one of the possible 12-year-old blond twins that he saw a couple of weeks ago in a nearby swimming pool. Thus, Darius steals it, imagining having sex with the 12-year-old white girls. He remembers when he was 9-years-old and a light-skinned friend of the same age said, “I was with my girlfriend and I made her say your name while I was having sex,” allowing him to listen to moaning sounds on a silver tape recorder.

After Gustave takes a shower, he slips his clothes on, then enters his bedroom. Gustave is watching an online video about boot camp, wondering if he would have the mental capacity and physical fortitude to handle the military. He does know that he would not consider being yelled at and belittle as a sign of discipline. He does not believe that soldiers are actually dying for their country, but during the process of watching the video, he notices a username in the comment section called Age of The Warrior, having the message, “Look up gang stalking. Look up Targeted Individuals. Look up remote neural monitoring.”

Gustave never heard the terminology of a targeted individual, remote neural monitoring, or gang stalking. He does have a feeling that he can elevate his knowledge, as even though he is confused about who Jesus actually is, he asked God to give him answers. Maybe he will not receive all of his answers at once, but he is willing to learn as much as he can.

When he looks up targeted individuals, the first video that he sees, he clicks. Maybe the video could be full of problem-solving skills. Maybe it could be full of gangs or a great awakening. Are there demons attacking him? He wonders about what he will see in the explanation of what a targeted individual is, then the video starts.

A male named Jeremy in a video is hiding a camera to where the footage is shot from behind him and he says, says, “These gang stalkers are at it again. I’ve been gang stalked for over fifteen years and that’s what happens whenever you take a stand against societal norms. Whenever you’re not so quick to be into the world like going to clubs, getting drunk, listening to music, picking up chicks, and getting into fights, the world picks up on that. They hate it if you’re a freethinker and notice conspiracy theories, even though the word conspiracy theory was just created by the CIA to make freethinkers look bad. Right now, I’m going to cross the street and tell me if you don’t notice them watching.”

Jeremy walks down the street and a blond man walks behind him from 36 inches away, holding a cell phone, directed at him. The blond man give off a thumbs up hand signal to a lady in a green car. The car drives in Jeremy’s direction and parks on the side of where he is walking. He enters a grocery store, only after an elderly man in a vacant parking lot walks in the opposite direction, getting in front of him, as if there is not much room to move.

When Jeremy gets in the grocery store, he notices that the same blond man he recently saw down the street arrives around the corner, still holding his cell phone. The anonymous blond guy then bumps right into him, as if it is an accident, saying “Excuse me,” then after Jeremy buys eggs, the same guy again is standing outside talking to a female with pink hair. The female with pink hair is recording Jeremy walk away from the store this time while there are two police officers in a police car around the corner.

Jeremy says, “That’s the same guy from earlier. I did not hire any actors. Many people around the world are speaking out about being targeted. Police officers are in on it. Doctors are in on it. Lawyers are in on it. Because the world hates you, remember that the world hated Jesus. Their goal is to have us lose our composure and wound up incarcerated, put in a mental institute, in poverty, or killed. Stay with Jesus.”

Suddenly, his mistreatment from his family, friends, and strangers seems to make sense, but he has more questions. The video makes Gustave wonder if participating people actually want to make his life miserable, but he is sure that they exist. He wonders if there is a such thing as a mother’s intuition or if the mother could actually be working with the government in order to know.

He wonders if what he is experiencing is real, only to look out of the living room window and see a red car park in the parking lot, then the driver steps out to wave. Had he not been living on the second floor and it had not been daylight and actually sitting on the balcony, he would think that someone waving at him is normal. But Gustave knows that if he heads outside and looks at the apartment window on the second floor, he himself would not be able to see what is inside.

In another video that he looks up on the internet, a man in a video says, “Have you ever wondered why you’re constantly being hated by others and you’ve done nothing to bother them? It can be a co-worker who insults you or wants to take credit for the work that you do. It can be a family members gaslighting you. It can be your girlfriend or boyfriend or your wife or husband. You’re a part of the One hundred and forty-four thousand, sealed in the forehead and your spirit irritates their demons. They do not want to be around you or hear the knowledge that you have…”

COINTELPRO was present between 1956 and 1971, but is secretly being used on innocent civilians in the world today. Much of the resources from COINTELPRO was used to marginalize, infiltrate, and disrupt groups like the women’s rights movement, the American Indian Movement, the non-violent civil rights movement, the Congress of Racial Equality, and other civil rights groups. Operation Northwoods was proven to be real in 1962 by where the joint Chiefs of Staff used false flag operations to justify a war against Cuba. Operation Mockingbird has been countlessly pointed out.

After looking up on the search engine about what a Targeted Individual is, he finds out that many people pretend to be Targeted Individuals in order to make the self-identified victims appear mentally challenged. Gustave feels like a guinea pig, even though he does not experience remote neural monitoring, which makes him curious on how accurate the information is. It cannot be a coincidence that his family mistreats him the way that they do and strangers oppose him.

The content that he is looking up is worse than he imagined. He is not a cat afraid of a broom, but a man finding out that most, if not, everything he was told about life was a lie. Sure, he is breathing and a human, but he now knows that the FBI, CIA, Freemasons, and more groups in order to experiment on selected human’s for mind control. There are actual patents with the description of having the legal capabilities of mind control, which is V2K (voice-to-skull transmission).

At the same time, invading somebody’s mind without consent is obviously an illegal act, but the government breaks the laws all of the time. Some Targeted Individuals have surveillance devices implanted in their body. It could’ve been implanted when they were born, through surgery, or any sneaky tactic, but technology is so advanced now, the government can remotely try to control victims.

It is legal for the police to lie to anyone’s face, so why would most of the police officers tell the truth about an agenda, especially if they do, many of them being Freemasons, a part of human trafficking, and other heinous crimes would spend life behind bars, receive a death penalty, or no longer trusted by society. Most of the police are involved in community policing and there are regular people that are hired, blackmailed, or threatened into going against Targeted Individuals. Sometimes, the gang stalkers are compensated for following and monitoring their victims, but gang stalkers are even willing to harass the Targeted Individuals. “For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows”—1 Timothy 6:10.

The issue is that most Targeted Individuals are innocent and regardless of anything a Targeted Individual did, it does not justify stalking them to the point of losing credibility and employment. Targeted Individuals are simply trying to defend themselves. Maybe a they are being gang stalked because they spoke out against the government to claim that 9/11 was an inside job, claimed that they believe in Jesus Christ, or refused to get into fights and party like others. It could even be that somebody was jealous and wanted to put a someone on a list to be Targeted 24/7. There is no way to avoid being targeted. Even if one chooses to be a gang stalker, which is really a servant of the devil, they will eventually be betrayed.

Chapter 11:

Who Believes You?

Gustave says, “I’m a Targeted Individual.”

“What’s that? Everyone is targeted. I’m targeted. Your brother is targeted,” Carl says.

“It’s when the government has you under twenty-four-seven surveillance and…”

“You need to stop looking up stuff like this. It’s demonic.”

“You didn’t let me finish talking.”

“What is it?”

“They harass you and try to incarcerate you, get you into a mental facility, make you homeless, and/or killed.”

“You’re not a celebrity. What use would the government need to be targeted you for?”

“You have to look it up…”

Carl interrupts, saying, “I’m not looking anything up. Talk like that to others and they’ll look at you like you’re crazy. Your boss will say something is wrong with you. I don’t have to focus on what the devil is doing because I have my eyes on God. Spend time on the Bible. That’s why I stopped watching all of those conspiracy theory videos of celebrities using devil signs.”

Obviously, Carl is not listening to what Gustave has to say. He is not a killer. He even publicly stated via social media that he is reading the Bible and following Christ. It just would be that the devil wants him to suffer and if the devil cannot take his soul, the devil will try to take the souls of his family members and friends, as well as strangers. Such an act could make him give up, but by keeping Jesus the first priority in his life, he cannot fail. Maybe he will not be independent on Earth, but he will be rewarded in the afterlife.

While Gustave heads back into his room, he receives a video text from Carl about how the the rapture will be. Gustave watches the video, which is 30 minutes and exits his room.

“Did you watch the video that I sent you? It’s some scary stuff, isn’t it?”

Gustave says, “I watched it,” feeling like Carl should watch videos that he would like to send.

Gustave knows that there has to be a bigger reason why he is a Targeted Individual. Is he related to a celebrity that is trying to perform a ritual against him? In fact, Carl mentioned numerous times that he is related to approximately 5 well-known singers, but he does not automatically remember their names. At least three people in his family served time in the military; his aunt and two uncles served time in the military. Maybe because he has relatives in the military, he was targeted or maybe he is targeted specifically for sport. He is reading the Bible now, so it makes sense that he would be hated by the world.

At 2:00 P.M., Gustave is downtown in a fast-food restaurant with Carl. Gustave is following his dad out of a restaurant and does not see a couple behind him until he exits the front door. The male behind Gustave (with black dreadlocks) dressed in attire like a rapper is 12 feet away. The male yells at Gustave, “Aye! Hold…”

The woman puts her arms around him and says, “Stop it!”

Gustave turns around, wondering how people misbehaving in public like him are allowed to live. The animalistic behavior is visible. He continues walking forward with Carl.

At 5:25 P.M., Gustave is on the train.

“I’m going to stop by the Flossington Public Library to pick up some movies. I’m going to make my popcorn. I’m going put some sriracha sauce on it. I’m going to get my blanket…”

Gustave can clearly see that somebody wearing red sunglasses in a seat across from him has their cell phone aimed at his direction.

After Carl end the phone call, the anonymous male says to Carl, “Forgive me. Where did you get those shoes from? I want some of those.”

Carl talks, “They’re finger shoes…”

The conversation continues, only for Carl to say, “That’s my son over there.”

The stranger says, “Hi,” which makes Gustave wave, saying “Hi.”

Gustave listens to Carl mention how he graduated from Octavia’s University, which is honestly none of the stranger’s business. The stranger could be anyone. Some people can dress fashionable and be well-mannered, receiving multiple job offers from people that network. Others can simply be victims of human trafficking or who knows what other devilish plans, but in Gustave’s case, he does not trust people, especially strangers. If his cousin Ben was not paralyzed from the neck down after being shot by his so-called friend, Gustave would still not trust him. He does not trust anyone, except Jesus, even though it is a struggle to understand the entire Bible.

Eventually, the stranger, (whose real name might be Gary) says, “They recently built a video rental store in Flossington, walking distance from the Flossington Public Library…”

After the stranger continues talking, Carl says, “I didn’t know that. Thank you for telling me. I’ll check it out.”

“It’s nice meeting you all. Take care,” then looks at Gustave, saying, “And you need to talk more. See ya.”

The ego of the extroverts is amazing. Extroverts are capable of landing more jobs, more and relationships. Many of them are loved by society.

“Are you getting off at Flossington,” Carl whispers loud enough for other stranger to possibly hear.

Carl has the problematic ability to whisper and still be heard 24 inches away, especially when he is frustrated. Maybe people unknowingly whisper loudly, even though whispers are sometimes supposed to be like a discreet form of communication. What is the purpose of using a whisper voice if the person you are whispering to is nearby and everybody can understand every syllable said?

“Sure,” Gustave says.

“Sure,” Carl sarcastically mocks him, “Sure. Everything is sure.”

The scintillating sun is visible and a saddened Gustave is walking into a local video rental store, holding the door for Carl to enter. A gleeful cashier named Courtney says, “Hi! Hi!”

“Hi,” Carl says.

“Hi,” Gustave says.

Carl says, “You can look around. Find us a good movie to watch. I’ll be over here,” pointing to the left side.”

Gustave looks at various movies, not really wanting to see any of them. What is going to happen when he sees the movies is he will focus more on the subliminal messages that the actors are showing (like the 666 hand gesture, triangle of power, and devil horns). He may notice scenes where the actors are mocking Jesus or showcasing orchestrated events that may happen in the future. He continues walking, then a stranger in the aisle on the right side of him purposely and forcefully knocks over multiple DVD’s off of a rack, causing them to hit Gustave. Carl turns around.

“Gustave! Did you do that?”

“No,” Gustave says before staring at the stranger with the same look, wondering why Carl was not looking at the event.

Any other time, Carl would be nosy and wanting to be all in Gustave’s business, if so he has any. Yet, Carl automatically thinks that Gustave knocked down DVD’s from the rack, which would cost money to replace if he broke them.

There has to be surveillance cameras in the store, but Carl would not care to hear him speak anyway. What he does feel is that his family is on the path to hell, just as the stranger that purposely knocked the DVD’s on the floor.

What was Gustave supposed to say? “What’s your problem,” so that Carl can try to say, “What’s going on,” somehow making Gustave look like a villain? Should Gustave had said, “Did you do that on purpose,” just for Carl to automatically say, “No. He didn’t.” Or what if Carl believes his son, then it leads to Carl knowing what’s real, but only being like an extremist, making actual Targeted Individuals look mentally challenged anyway. If Gustave fights the stranger, he would be discredited automatically and placed in prison or a mental facility, but he controls his emotions.

Eventually, Gustave exits the video rental store with Carl. Even though Gustave researched why a gang stalker would bother him, the covert harassment against him is now overt, but still done in a way to where it is nearly impossible to criminalize the villains. His dad is working with the government.

The following day on Tuesday, at 7:00 A.M., he is looking at an online video of a preacher giving a sesquipedalian lecture, then notices that the preacher preaches that you do not need works to be saved. He types in the preacher’s name and types in “exposed” in the search box, seeing multiple videos exposing the false teacher. The preacher was supposed to preach faith and works because faith without works is dead. He looks up a street preacher that is rude at times to strangers and has actors participating to make it seem like the preacher has supernatural abilities to perform faith healing. Another video that Gustave looks is a video of a person who predicted the wrong presidency and that the entire state of New York would be flooded 2 years ago and still has thousands of loyal followers, believing that she is a true messenger of God. The woman goes as far as throwing up Masonic signs in her R&B music videos, which does not glorify the Lord.

Gustave thinks about how if there was a 3-hour kissing booth line, it would be something that’ll prevent him from getting a kiss. Maybe he could get a kiss, but he still would lack a relationship and sexual experience. Still, the likelihood that society wants him to kiss others is slim. It could rain and suddenly, there is no more kissing booths available outdoors. It could be that the woman is not attracted to him or any reason in the world.

Chelsea Romcom sends Gustave a text message, “My real name is Alora.”

“It’s Gustave.”

“Nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you too.”

Suddenly, the vibes change after he receives the next text message, “Look, you black,” using a racial slur for blacks, then saying, “You stay away from my daughter! I don’t want you anywhere around my daughter! You have a problem with it? Come meet me in St. Clouds, Minnesota.”

Gustave stares at the message in shock, wondering why Chelsea’s dad does not bother to get to know him. Gustave was not going to abandon his child if he became a dad. Trying to impress a racist is useless. He can receive two jobs and the racist may not care, unless the situation benefits the racist.

“That’s what I thought,” the racist dad texts.

“Why can’t you let your be with who she wants? You don’t know what type of person I am. I’m not like others.”

“I just don’t want you around my daughter,” the racist texts.

Without arguing, Gustave blocks the cell phone number. Even if he was to form a romantic relationship with Alora and travel to see her, the tension between him and his father is risky. Alora’s father is the one that escalated the issue, regardless if he was concerned about who his daughter is dating.

On Wednesday, he receives an email message from Alora:

Hey. I’m sorry about what happened with my dad. He does not want us being friends. I understand if you do not want to talk to me anymore.”

Gustave exits the email message, then rests on his bed, squeezing his bedsheets, since he lacks pillows. Then, he grabs his cell phone and goes online to watch social videos. Maybe the social media videos can free his mind or alleviate his emotional pain.

Around 12 minutes is spent watching the online dating coach in one of her videos called 10 Things Types of Women to Stay Away From, then she says, “If the man that you’re interested in constantly got rejected by women in the past, I cannot allow you to date him. He is a huge red flag and no woman deserves this. Number seven…”

He clicks on another video, seeing an online Christian content maker who makes reaction videos, cover how the Bible relates to life, only to say, “I cannot imagine myself following a pastor or teacher under the name of Christ and I notice that they are not married and are seeking a relationship. I just can’t.”

After exiting the video, Gustave thinks about the time when he interacted with a woman on a BDSM website, shortly after being spied on watching porn on his personal computer. He exchanged numbers with a woman named Sally, talked about their hobbies, favorite foods, and even covered how he is simply looking for a friend because he lacks experience in a relationship. Sally claimed that she was “just looking for some sex,” even showing him a picture text of herself topless.

After hearing for weeks at times that he was writing a romance-horror story, she asks to read it. Thus, he allows her to read the story. She admits that she masturbated to the main character, who was a serial killer that raped women. One time, she goes as far as to inform him that she had sex in the church in the past, but only when Gustave jokingly said, “I’d like to own a brothel one day,” she responded, “Don’t ever tell a woman you want to own a brothel. Lose my number.”

He remembers contacting a woman online that he never met named Irene. After getting to know her, if everything she texted him was true, she asked to talk to him over the phone. He agreed. Calling Irene would only lead to more trauma.

One moment, when Carl exits the apartment, he asked, “Do you want me to call first?”

“You call first.”

He calls Irene, only to hear her laughing, calling him a “dork” and another woman in the background laughing, calling him a “lame.”

He remembers multiple times of not mentioning anything sexual to women, then they simply disrespected him, no longer wanting to message him. It is gross to think about wanting to date any woman. He does not want to date any woman, but women typically do not like him and the exceptions are taboos. It would take great resilience to overcome constant rejection.

Two weeks later, Gustave finally gets a job, also finding out that that Alora is dead), but there is no way to find out how she died without dealing with tension between her family. He cannot check social media because a year after they started talking, she died, it was posted that she died. He did not date the woman anyway.

At least when he wrote his last cover letter, his cell phone was not hacked, causing there to be typos in it that he knows was not there. At least he did not have to bear watching his cell phone backspace all of the work that he typed or copied and pasted without him pressing the backspace button this time. Now, he writes articles for video games and is compensated $5 per article. When he completes articles, the online payment account that he uses takes taxes out of the money that he receives. He is allowed to write approximately two articles per day for 5 days, so he cannot expect to make a living and the coworkers are doomed to try to get him fired regardless of his work ethic, if not the boss is. The IRS (Internal Revenue Service) will bother him, but he would have to search for an additional job, even though he is blacklisted. Most people do not want to hire him.

Daisy messages him, “I need some money.”

Gustave texts back, “How much?”

After giving Daisy money, he heads on a location-based social networking and dating app called Show-Out. After creating his profile with a picture of himself, and about me section (where his favorite food is pizza, but he would prefer exercising and eating nutritional meals, that he does not listen to music really, that he does not have a favorite movie, and believe in the entire Bible), one username that he clicks on is Maxine the Mauler. She has short, purple hair, talking in front of her computer, responding to ongoing messages that pop up on the computer screen.

Maxine the Mauler responds to a message that says, “How old are you,” saying, “You should never ask a lady her age. I’m twenty-four by the way.”

A username asks Maxine the Mauler, “How many tattoos do you have?”

“I have seven tattoos so far,” she says, pointing out where the tattoos are on her body, then says, “Anybody want to get in the box?”

There is a split screen effect and a username called Jameson Man enters the chatroom, but is visible on the right side. He has a British accent, suddenly making Maxine the Mauler attracted.

Jameson Man says, “Hey. I brought my guitar with me this time. I promised that I’ll play you something.”

“Hey. Please do,” she says.

As Jameson Man plays his guitar and sings in an incredible voice that must’ve either been never discovered by the music industry or just ignored, usernames in the comment section are typing about how amazing his talents are. In order to overshadow a gorgeous woman with talents, the artist would likely have to be skilled.

How long was the Jameson Man chatting with Maxine the Mauler prior to Today? Maxine is not Gustave’s type of woman anyway. It takes for Jameson Man to exit the screen after saying “Bye,” for Maxine to claim that she is a devoted Catholic.

He is not supposed to date a Catholic. The woman already seems interested in somebody else. A username called Cave Link 01 pops up on the right side of the screen and the man is naked masturbating, staring at the screen. Maxine blocks Cave Link 01.

She says, “You all will just keep getting blocked.”

“Sorry,” Jameson Man types.

Seconds after moment Gustave types, “Sorry about that,” he gets blocked from viewing Maxine.

Gustave takes a moment to think about why he was blocked, but does not see any reason besides that either he is black or that he is a Targeted Individual. Maxine must’ve known that he would’ve been arriving into the chatroom after looking at a cellular device that tells her how to treat him or she was remotely mind controlled.

He heads to another username’s chatroom called Veronica and Waffles. She is eating waffles with syrup.

Gustave types, “Hi.”

Veronica responds to the message, “Hi. How are you this morning?”

“I’m well,” he types, “You?”

“I’m well too. My car has a flat, so I need a thousand bucks to fix that up. Thanks for asking.”

The conversation continues, then perps/perpetrators arrive in the chatroom.

Immediately, one username called Juice 333 types, “She’s into black men. Gross.”

Another username called Bashem 23 types, “There’s so much negativity on this app. Are you a Christian?”

“I was raised a Christian and believe in Jesus,” she says.

Bashem 23 types, “Eating waffles every day is greed. Nobody in social media is a true Christian. The world was created by chaos.”

Knowing that Bashem 23 is a troll, he knows that automatically telling Veronica would make him appear mentally challenged. Juice 333 is also a troll. When it is his turn to make friends or anything more, the demons in people try to prevent it.

Juice 333 types, “Would you date a black man?”

“I’d date any race. Race does not matter to me.”

Why did not Veronica block the the accounts of Bashem 23 and Juice 333? It could be pointless talking to Veronica is she is willing to befriend the very usernames opposing him. Even if she blocks both of their accounts, she could be friends with a perp that will try to bother him.

Via social media, he looks at countless videos of Targeted Individuals. He reads countless perspectives of posts from Targeted Individuals (about their houses being broken into and items being rearranged, items being missing, street theater, and/or items being broken, about being stalked, having their computers and cell phones hacked, having electronic harassment weapons used against them, and more) and blocks the accounts of countless trolls pretending to be Targeted Individuals. Street theater is a carefully scripted harassment by neighbors and strangers, possibly including family and coworkers engaging in keeping a Targeted Individual stressful. People involved in street theatre cooperate in activities like making a lot of noise (which can be a neighbor playing loud music for example), getting in the way of a Targeted Individual that is walking to bump into them/walking too slow in front of them, bringing up real-life scenarios that happened or happens in a Targeted Individuals personal life, stealing items from a shopping cart while they are in the checkout lane, etc.

There are times when the evildoers will try to run a Targeted Individual off of the road with a car and shoot at a Targeted Individual, shoot at their belongings, or try to cause intimidation tactics by the sound of a firearm. They will try anything and everything in order to worship the government and many of them believe they are doing a good thing, stalking criminals, but are stalking the innocent. Some Targeted Individuals commit suicide from the constant harassment. They are stalking even the children of God. If so Gustave is on the path to heaven, he just has to continue doing what he’s doing, but try improving himself.

While Gustave is looking at one username called Jeff Free on a social media and social networking service, he notices that Jeff Free posts on a Targeted Individual group page, “You all need mental help.”

How is an entire group mentally challenged? For decades, the Defense Department poured an abundance of money into directed-energy weapons, which is estimated to be a billion dollar investment. Direct-energy weapons use concentrated electromagnetic energy. They are supposed to be used to combat enemy forces, but are illegally used to attach humans and cause destruction to the Earth. Technology advanced into the capability of reading minds like the neuralink. So advanced, nanobots can exist inside of substances and alter the DNA.

When Gustave looks at Jeff Free’s profile page, the first post that he notices says, “I once knew a woman named Daisy and I paid her bills in exchange for the goods.”

Gustave is aware that Daisy was having sex with various people, including friends in exchange for money. It is not a surprise if perps had sex with Daisy. Gustave does not want an actual relationship with Daisy anyway. She plans to get married with somebody else.

Another post that he reads says, “If you’re over 30 and still living in your parents house, kill yourself.”

Plenty years pass by. Gustave is 33-years-old and is downtown on a Monday at 7:00 A.M.. He remembers a decade 5 years ago when he nearly fell victim of a romance scammer with the made-up name Jane Terowsky, actually posting on social media that he had a girlfriend, only to find out that the person he was messaging started to focus primarily on him sending money. The romance scammer never did try to talk over the phone or video chat, which are obvious red flags.

Now, Gustave still lives with Carl and is at a gym, performing pull ups. When he catches his breath, a blond woman that could be his age or younger approaches him.

“Are you still using the pull up bar,” she says.

“I’m done…”

She says, “My name is Kiana. And yours?”

“Gustave. I’ve been at this gym for a month now,” he says.

She says, “Thanks. Two months. See you around.”

He waves at her. Gustave walks to the right side of the gym, then heads upstairs to use a rear felt fly machine.

Kiana uses an abdominal crunch machine, saying, “There he is. It’s Gustave,” reminding Gustave of when Carl would say the same thing.

Gustave is already done working out. He waves, then enters the locker room to get dress, meet up with Carl by the front desk, and exit the gym.

Sun-kissed Sugar Revamped Version

Posted by Isaiah Joshua Lawrence

Title: Sun-kissed Sugar

Medium: Acrylic on wood print

Size:18” X 18”

Date: 5/22/22-2/19/24

I decided to paint the poem on the back of the wood panel.

Poem:

What if I told you that

“I love you at

Mutual degrees Celsius,”

But I befriended

Hesitation to avoid

Rejection from my love?

You were perfection with good grace,

Ingrained in my mind,

Then I found Jesus.

The woman I’d have children with,

Far away has friends

And a lack thereof.

Sun-kissed sugar.

The pocket door to everything more,

We lack adventures,

But have progress.

We had belated blessings,

Then they came early,

Fulfilling our households.

I can seep my hugs in your skin

And live within,

But how can I express?

Loved more than

An entourage of reverence,

You’ll see how my life unfolds.

Sun-kissed sugar.

How you include me in your day,

I can’t seem to

Get over chapter you,

With full-flavored lips

Having an aroma,

I can only imagine.

Skin as real as silica sand,

You vanish in my dreams,

But look brand new.

Wherein will we meet, greet, and treat,

Loving more than kissing kin

Without sin.

Sun-kissed sugar.

Wanting more than

Amorous advances,

We’ll both receive the Crown of Life.

Would heirlooms fall

From the heavens for us to cherish

Or must we work hard?

Prosperity isn’t a necessity

For my love to be

My wife.

The ounces your hyped heart weighs

Are the seconds it takes to

Take my bank card.

Sun-kissed sugar.

Sleep and Salaries

Posted by Isaiah Joshua Lawrence

By the time I turn ageless,

I want to be a best-selling novelist

And a renown poet.

I’ll use 100% of my brain

Instead of just the right or left side

Out of hesitance.

The stories that I tell

Can feel like polygraph tests

With an authentic source of euphony.

My posture will tell you that

I can articulate every word

In the English dictionary.

Fans will thank my innovation,

Unlike 5-star libraries

That never respond to my emails.

I will be cheered for my dialogues

And sentence fluency

And my autographs will be worth homes,

But I will not sell my soul,

And I will worship the mediator

Between the Father and men,

Dog-tired, harnessing your happiness

Until your eyes are the color of grape sugar

That’s a ten.

My writing will have the bone-chilling longevity

Of wedging your foot

Into relationships.

Wedge your will into relationships

And do you mean that it is

A legal will or a free will?

You could not like me any more than you do,

Then there is the concept of love,

Tickling the ears.

Wait until you find out that I bulked up

On the words that you put into my mouth

For ageless years.

I’ve lost sleep and salaries.

I’ve lost friends and families,

Writing for my endless dreams.

I bulked up on sincerity

Like the equivalent

Of running out of bleached toilet paper.

Worrying will be eradicable,

Even if you have an undershot jaw

Because you’re you.

Talk me into an ice cream headache

And tell me that I’m supposed to utter

That it’s a brain freeze.

Succumb to tuberculosis

And I don’t need the king’s evil

Because I have the Lord who sees.

While I’m writing, you could be glowering at me

While gloating, across the globe

Like sold out tickets.

I am not a loquacious man

Using who and whom verbally

While reading kiss-and-tell novels.

Forgive me if I do not write

Like the doting work wives

That are wearing the face of kumbaya.

What if I talk like coming-of-age stories

With cars running in garages

Because of the law?

I was told that you’re supposed to write

The way you speak

And thinking too long about a subject shows.

I convince myself that the rich buy vowels

Like buy one, get one free,

Restricting the ways you speak.

Graphite colors my writing hands,

Which are dirty fingernails and when I type,

There’s autocorrect.

I do not request speech-to-text

Because AI may even

Try to remember my dialect.

I’ve lost sleep and salaries.

I’ve lost friends and families,

Writing for my endless dreams.

Before we start a buddy system,

I have some reasons

Why you may want to reconsider it.

I am not an award-winning actor,

But may know about psychology

A little bit.

Because psychology can help

With character development,

Remind me what I’m fluent in.

I know English, but my love language

Is words of affirmation,

So let the studying begin.

My writing could be like a people person

That is not a people pleaser,

But I’m improving

Like I’m giving my main characters

Catchy nicknames

And reexploring my versatility.

Writer’s block is like oxymorons

To geniuses and suspects

To citizen informants.

I put the cure in curiosity

And response in responsibility

For zero chants.

My notes entail police officers commandeering

Your car and fining you

If you dare refuse.

And skateboarders hating scooters riders

And every death-defying trick they do

Is made fun of.

Breakfast smell like crayons

Because I breathe art

Until I realize that countless contests are rigged.

My faith is bigger than my failures

Like hugs during mid-sentences,

Realizing when clothes are sprigged.

I’ve lost sleep and salaries.

I’ve lost friends and families,

Writing for my endless dreams.

Her In Black

Posted by Isaiah Joshua Lawrence

His Standards

Posted by Isaiah Joshua Lawrence

Who is reasonably riveting

And revered?

Who reciprocates

With the essence of effort?

Who hates squares,

But arrive to public squares a lot,

Beseeching the heroes

In nowness to get shot?

Convince them otherwise,

But the heroes are taught.

Who shaves with razor blades

When the power is out?

Who packs the punching power

That killed Houdini?

Who bats their eyelashes

At their ideal of men?

Who is the recipient

Of royalty’s pen,

Catching someone’s fall

While grounded like a yes-man.

Who is a ghostwriter

With a vesture of velvet?

Who is rectified

From kilometers away?

Who surrenders to nothing,

But their deepest thoughts?

Who holds their screams

Tighter than deserted garrotes?

Could the stouthearted know

That they can live without?

I’m not in your conversation.

I’ll reach God’s standards with my love.

Who is tarrying

When they want something from you?

Who is resilient

Because they don’t have it worse?

Who is the first to reign

With restraining orders?

Who is cursed

Like their privacy fell for hoarders?

Candidly, heroes need heroes

And some need words.

Who is smelling like Lad’s Love

For millions of gals?

Who is in a love nest,

Then hears a dispatcher?

Who trampled a Love-lies-bleeding

Because they can?

Who thinks there’s no such thing

As free love, but a man,

Careening

Into the custody of the pain?

Who is Love-in-a-Mist

With devils in the bush?

Who is a Love-in-idleness

And a heartsease?

Who don’t want them together,

But want two and two?

Who is recycled with self-love,

But excludes you?

Come from kindness

And mostly what you’ll hear is, “No.”

I Am Not Him

Posted by Isaiah Joshua Lawrence

I cannot ever be Jesus Christ

And I am not.

I cannot imagine watching the world

All at once,

Seeing the rich lives

Of profane musicians a lot,

Seeing the poor lives

Of muddled minds, murdering,

And seeing if they lack faith

And if they lack works.

Flirt with me

And you’re like an honorable mention

Because I feel

Like you’re living la dolce vita.

Maybe I feel like hearing my God tell me,

“Well done.”

Maybe I’m broke and you expect

The world from someone.

Maybe having fondness

Is like signing a waiver.

I am not destined for prank calls

On your burner phone.

Marriage is a scheme

Like a sales caller, awaiting.

You could be a caring consistency

For Tyrone.

Your speeches can be

The length of a master thesis,

Being more than friendly

With your fellow foot soldiers

I’ve been stomped on viscerally

As expected.

Let me place your insecurities

Inside a kiln.

I don’t have a Rose of Sharon

When I’m rejected.

Hook me like a kaginawa

And something goes wrong.

It’s something like the fine details

Of a love letter.

Like people want me to fight

With caltrops on the floor,

I imagine they’re cassia buds

And don’t fight at all.

Like I’m pushed into a 2-foot pond,

You can see a sore.

The dives you want more,

But even the water’s stagnant.

Do I have to put on my work gloves

And fight for you?

When your music stops playing,

When I see you half-praying,

When your soul leaves your body

Will you want to watch TV?

I prefer no songs

And hear the strings of psaltery,

But how do I win

A lifetime achievement award.

With 48 hours to live,

I imagine freely.

Am I a genuine man

Or am I more than so?

My extroverted self’s,

Pushed to be an introvert.

Have the gall to hug me

Until I’m in affliction.

Search for me in the mire

And mountains with climbing plants.

Take accountability

Like it’s your submission.

Have a strong opinion

And take refuge in my arms

After I accommodated you

With short-lived smiles.

I remember when those didn’t hire me

For a job

And if I was God,

I’m sorry that the gates are closed.

I don’t know if there’s gates,

But I won’t accept a slob.

Mobs are prohibited,

Cast into the lake of fire.

You’re see-though,

So you may as well hate me inside-out.

You feel important

Like an industry insider?

Are you too important

To excuse my countenance?

Are you above the law

And are you getting higher?

Since I find you compromising

With extortioners,

I’d sentence you to hell,

So be glad I’m not Jesus.

Though I am not God,

Have you repented before death?

Are you a goal-oriented rapist

On Mondays?

Were you sincere

Because after you take your last breath,

You die, see a bright light,

And is rejected by God.

Maybe you regret the devil

Who you listened to.

When your music stops playing,

When I see you half-praying,

When your soul leaves your body

Will you want to watch TV?

A Hermit’s Announcement

Posted by Isaiah Joshua Lawrence

A hermit who feels

A laborious love

Wants his full-time freedom,

But has a duty,

Not worth the rogues

Announcing a catholicon.

It’s a capricious killer

Of discipline

For a doubting Thomas.

He sells his decorations,

Then his home is austere

And he’s withdrawn.

Touch him bone-dry

And he still won’t cry

Like feigned depression, yet depressed.

Eluding the CEO’s

Of passive-aggressiveness,

He ponders

Like he’s a eunuch

Listening to a married couple

With penpals.

He hears blankety-blank

And didactic tones

From used-to-be lovers.

Observing pretentious

Readers of lips,

Outpourings from eyes to bowls,

He is upright

In a blind alley,

Persuading a Casanova.

Displeased with wasting words

While speaking is like reading

For the first time,

But reading books about bugbears

While conceived

By yesterday’s trauma.

Grips on reality is accepting

That she blanches,

Leaving him,

For she is unfit

For a competent man,

Dusk and dawn forever.

Alluring smiles form

Like they see

Giant novelty checks in caskets.

He could be bloodless

With brainchilds heard

Like cannonades to a neighbor.

When every creature can feel

Like a burden

With the barriers steep,

It’s the loyal liberals

Versus the

Countervailing conservatives.

The probability to think

What they’re thinking

Is repetition.

Ensanguined exes

Can be revived by storms,

But question who else lives.

Pharisees rebuke

His remission of sins,

Lest they offend others.

Surviving on this Earth

Takes iniquity

And immortality.

He would rather thirst

With the Bible

As a coping mechanism.

He would rather die

Than survive on a dying planet

He can see.

New Gossamer

Posted by Isaiah Joshua Lawrence

This web comic project that I worked on is basically pencil work. It’s not much fanciness going on involving having a flattener, colorist, and other stuff. It’s fully me doing this stuff, my way. Hopefully, some people can read my handwriting though.

The description: Rain, (the main character) a teenage girl and hometown hero involved in the goth scene has high ambitions of being the lead singer in a rock band. When there is a commercial of film director, Johnny Gossamer, advertising his newly built town called New Gossamer (where all goths are welcomed to explore over 2 million acres), Rain cannot pass up the opportunity. There are various apartment complexes and townhouses, grocery stores, cabarets, concerts, graveyards, and more.

New Gossamer Web Comic.pdf Download

Your Reservoir

Posted by Isaiah Joshua Lawrence

I am tired of waking up

With scratches on my body

Because they were not there when I fell asleep.

Devils try to toss me in the incinerator

Like I fell asleep on the phone,

But I am not.

I think you like poems,

But I am a revolutionist,

Relieved that people view me as a black sheep.

I am your reservoir,

But I am not your angel

Or accomplice exceeding a great gift of gab.

Doorknobs are objects that I’ve loathed

Because my earphones get stuck on them

Like Bible believing Christians.

God created me,

So I cannot succumb to a divorcee

Because I am who you want to grab.

I am told to not say I am

Because I am a mistake

Until I remember that I am me.

I could comfort you during earthquakes,

But I am not greeting millions of women

Just to get with five,

Willing to sell their bodies

Like bedroom paraphernalia

And the weight capacity holding nobody.

May you have mercy on my lips

Or be a killjoy

Like respectfully killing someone with kisses?

May I respectfully decline

The leverage of your promises

Because you will not stay with me?

You will fade like monitoring spirits

In a dark fortress

And you can be someone else’s mistress.

All of the Frazzled

Posted by Isaiah Joshua Lawrence

She can stop thinking

About having a soulmate,

Let alone a partner.

It’s my birthright to love,

But she follows me

Until she finds flaws in me.

Might I add that flowers last

For about a week,

But she gets prettier?

She joins saints with no complaints,

But on Earth,

There’s grandfather clauses to see.

I don’t want the one to forget

Her wedding vows

And I don’t want children.

I don’t want bad thoughts on them,

But want life

In the northern extremities.

In order for her to want me,

I have to do the job

Of 3 Wise men

And if there were not 3 Wise Men,

Then I am her job,

But without rupees.

Risking my life means that

She may think about wanting me,

But she is dust,

In the serenity,

Buried in the foggiest place

That I can find.

I gave her all that I have,

But was deluded

With her trust and stardust.

Please respect my privacy,

But everyone wants

To get inside my mind.

First impressions are deceiving

Because I try hard

To look different,

But she may even allow her parents

And grandparents

Whoop her children

Would her children be my children,

But mine are unborn

Like an accident

And it’s not a mere accident,

Because I am better now

Than I was then.

Replenish my riches

Of happiness like I’m married

On my birthday,

But I’m not because the world

Is a cutthroat competition

With cancer.

Must my words persuade the world

Or must I pose in front of bookshelves

And pray?

I pray by my lonesome

Wholesomely and no longer

Am I a poser.

Do you think that I think

That you think

About me?

Someone with no talent

Still has to enter

A talent community

Like being on house arrest

With no stores nearby

And still getting older.

I’ve not been to prison,

But have been imprisoned

By the merest tv,

Wanting to be spoon-fed

Puréed apples,

But I’m not because it’s colder.

I’m interviewed,

Tested, and set up

Without even knowing about it

And English is my native language,

But I still

Cannot explain my life.

When the moment is right,

The watchers are watched,

Wondering why you don’t quit.

When the moment is right,

The watchers know that God is watching

All the strife.

I can attest to you

That I’ve been questioned

On how I think someone looks.

Saying “Yes,” may make the person

Throw a tantrum,

But their action’s sincere.

When I’m at work, strangers tell her

How they won’t leave her sight,

But I read books.

It’s a pricy headache

Like feeling spit through a trumpet,

Lasting a year.

Like I’m in my 30s

Finding out

About the Council of Nicaea,

I’m aware that the New Testament

Been around,

But I’m not complaining.

May she accept

The Trinity

More than just a sweet-sounding idea,

Keeping her body Holy

Like her boyfriend friend zones women

For nothing.

I would not worship you,

But I would endure prolonged starvation

With you

And I would endure sleep deprivation

While you tug on

My love handles.

Should not love be

In my vocabulary

Because of what I go through?

The frazzled does not determine failure

And some failures

Are called rebels.

Do you think that I think

That you think

About me?

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Isaiah Lawrence

Love is perfection. Period.

romantic

Planet Baffled

Sun-kissed Sugar Revamped Version

Sleep and Salaries

Her In Black

His Standards

I Am Not Him

A Hermit’s Announcement

New Gossamer

Your Reservoir

All of the Frazzled