Normal

My name is Brandon Lake, and I am a normal person. I work a 9-to-5, just like so many other people are forced to. It’s not glamorous or interesting, but hey, money is money. I own a small apartment on the third floor of some building in the city - again, nothing fancy, but I’m happy enough just to have a roof over my head and food on my table. I’m just handsome enough to be a mostly successful flirt, but average enough that I don’t stand out in a crowd, which is how I like it. Yeah, that’s me. Average. Everything about me is no different than anyone else.

On this particular day, I feel a little more tired than usual. Nothing major - it happens from time to time, days when my desk chair feels a bit tougher, my paperwork feels a bit more unbearable. Nothing that couldn’t be fixed by treating myself to a few drinks at some bar down the road.

Sighing, I switch off my computer for the day and heave myself out of my chair. I automatically return the distracted waves of my few remaining coworkers as I pass by their cubicles on my way out.

Exiting the building, I am swept up in a wave of people on the sidewalk during rush hour, desperate to escape from the prisons where they’ve spent the past eight hours or more. Across the street, a neon bar sign catches my eye, barely visible in the slowly darkening evening. Why not? I think to myself. Maybe I can have a little fun.

The first hour is a blur. A few coworkers show up, and I talk with them for a while out of courtesy. The popular, beaty music pounds in my head. Then I see her.

She’s pretty. Young, blonde, alone. Perfect. I manage to catch her eye from the other side of the bar. I buy her a daiquiri - my favourite. We talk. She tells me that she’s an English major, graduating next year, and that she’s originally from a small town about two hours away. We exchange a few witty remarks, and I start to enjoy myself. She’s interesting.

She seems uncomfortable with the idea of coming back to my place, or of me going back with her, so I suggest taking a walk in a nearby park instead. She seems relieved, glad to know that I haven’t been talking to her just so I can use her once or twice, then abandon her.

We talk for what seems like hours, sitting near a small, artificial pond, gazing up at what we can see of the stars. I smile, a genuine one for perhaps the first time all day. I’m starting to like her.

I’m not really sure what I do to freak her out - maybe I laugh at something I shouldn’t, or maybe I don’t when I should. Maybe I let something slip by my carefully planned responses for these situations, or go too far with a joke.

It doesn’t matter now. The mood has been killed.

She inspects me closely, suddenly uncertain about talking with a stranger in a park in the middle of the night. I can feel her growing distant.

What’s the matter, I ask her. She doesn’t respond, and pulls herself to her feet. I ask again.

She turns to leave, telling me over her shoulder that she feels creeped out all of a sudden, and gives some half-assed excuse about having to work tomorrow. I can tell she’s lying.

I ask if I’m the reason she’s leaving. She hesitates. I know what that means.

She thinks I’m a freak.

My hand closes around the nearest object, a heavy grey rock lying on the ground near me. I stand in one fluid, practiced motion, clearing the short distance between us by the time she spins around to face me again. I can see the whites of her eyes, open wide in fear, as I raise the rock clenched in my fist above her head.

She doesn’t have time to scream. The only sound she can make is a small exclamation of shock and pain that is quickly drowned out by the sickening thud of the rock crashing into her skull. She falls limply to the ground, and I continue to bash her head, over and over, until she’s no longer recognizable, until I get sick of the nauseating squelching noises that accompany each blow. Finally, I straighten up again, surveying my work for a second, the rock, now slick and red, still in my hand.

I stand next to her bleeding, broken body for a few minutes, looking up at the stars, barely visible behind the glow of city lights. I sigh heavily.

Great. So much for my relaxing evening.

I drag what’s left of her into the pond, dropping the stone in after her, and scrub the blood and brains from my hands. My movements are practiced, robotic, as if I’ve done this a hundred times before.

How many times have I done this, anyway?

I leave the park swiftly, walk a few blocks away, then call a cab. Luckily, I’m able to use my coat to hide the remaining bloodstains on my sleeves and chest.

I return to my apartment and change clothes. I go into a nearby alleyway and gingerly place my ruined garments in an old, metal trash can that the homeless in the area often use for warmth and set it alight. I head back home and settle into bed.

As usual, morning comes far too early. I unwillingly trudge my way back to work yet again. When I open the door, my office is silent. My coworkers are all standing, transfixed, watching the news on the television. A reporter in a royal blue suit is talking about the body found in the park earlier that morning, her eyes full of sorrow and concern. She says that the victim has been identified, and a recent picture of the girl I had spent the night before with flashes up on the screen. I stared back at her.

A shame. She really was quite pretty.

My name is Brandon Lake, and I am a normal person. I’m an office worker, enjoy a good daiquiri after a hard day, and don’t really get the appeal of loud, repetitive dance music. Like anyone else, I have certain likes and dislikes. I’m perfectly normal. And I fucking hate it when people say that I’m not.