Josh

JOSH

It’s a bit like a hangover. I wake up the next morning, and I realize I have nowhere to be and nothing to do. I remember that I’m going to quit school, and I don’t have a job or any ideas about what I want to do…

Yeah, that spontaneous side people keep lauding comes with a few downsides. All the different aspects of that decision keep hitting me one by one, and I’m not sure how to feel.

Messy.

That probably sums it up.

I feel messy.

Interestingly, I don’t feel as conflicted about being messy as I thought I would. Not that I feel especially good about it either, but I think my main problem is not that I feel bad about being a giant failure, it’s that I think I should feel bad about it, but I don’t. So, in conclusion, I feel bad about not feeling bad about being a failure.

It’s a bit of a mindfuck.

It’ll probably be worse once my grandparents get a whiff of this. I should be more concerned about the fallout, but I just can’t find it in me to care anymore. I’ve tried to appease them for over half my life, and I’m done. I can fairly accurately guess what’s going to happen. They’ll try and convince me to change my mind, which I won’t do. There’ll be icy stares and prolonged silences and the ultimate condemnation in the form of, ‘You’re just like your mother.’

I don’t have the energy to care anymore.

Plus, whatever second thoughts I might be having, they all pale in comparison to the sheer relief I feel.

And there’s just a little bit of excitement slowly starting to lift its head, too.

I have followed the laid-out path for most of my life. I want to take detours and stop and look at the view. Most of all, I want to figure out my own destination and navigate myself.

If this means I’ll lose the last of the family I have in the process, so be it.

The one good thing about being a huge mess is that, at least for a little while, it takes my mind off Gabriel. But only for a little while, and then, since I’m unemployed and have absolutely nothing going on, I’m back to obsessing about him.

Where is he right now? What is he doing? Does he think about me at all?

Yeah. I’ve descended into full madness.

Give me a few weeks, and I’ll probably start stalking him. Or, well, I sort of already did that when I went to lurk around his sister’s café yesterday morning.

You know. Normal stuff.

I go even more off the rails when I dig out the old photos from our high school days. There’s only a handful that have Gabriel in them, and in each and every one, he’s not smiling or making faces or even acknowledging the camera. There are only candid shots of him, and in each and every one, he looks… kind of pissed off, honestly.

Kind of serious.

Kind of distracted.

Kind of perfect .

Great. We’ll recap what’s happening so far. I hallucinated a week with Gabriel, and now I seem to have some weird crush on that hallucinated Gabriel. Who, and I cannot stress this enough, I made up in my head.

You know.

Normal.

Stuff.