A creative writing exercise from undergrad's

They

“TRUE! –nervous –very, very dreadfully nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad?” The Tell-Tale Heart Edgar Allan Poe

“They say I’m stupid and crazy… That’s not true… I might be no genius but I’m not stupid nor am I crazy. My mother told me that. She’s told a whole lot of other things and I believe her, always have… and always will… She told me that when I was a boy… I’m a man now and she’s dead. But still I believe her… They say I’m ugly. Well that part is true… They say: I have the devil’s eyes and a donkey’s lips… My mother used to tell me that I have a face that only a mother could love… I knew she wanted to be nice to me. See? I’m not stupid. I know she meant I was ugly. I’m not stupid”

“Why are you telling me this? Does it have something to do with what happened last week?”

“Of course it does; otherwise why would I tell you that… Do you think I’m crazy?”

“No. Please carry on.”

“So when I was a boy, they always picked on me. “Donkey lips” they’d call me! My mother told me they were jealous. But why would they be? We were poor, I was ugly and I wasn’t good at school. I’m not stupid… they couldn’t be jealous… I knew she wanted to be nice to me. Since then, I figured out why they didn’t like me. They are mean and evil… That’s what they are.”

“Who are you talking about? Who are they?”

“You are they… the whole lot of you… Vile, bad, vicious you… You hate me because I’m ugly… Well that’s not my fault… nor is it my mother’s. She tried her best and she was good to me, not like them! She used to read me stories from an old book, written by two brothers… What was their name? Hum… Grimm, yeah, that’s it! But their stories were just the opposite, especially the one where a frog turns into a prince when a princess kisses it. My mother told me: The day a princess kisses me, I will become a handsome guy.

At first I didn’t believe her and even if it were true, no one would kiss me, they hate me… they all do. But I’ve always believed my mother and sometimes I believed in her story and then once, I was watching TV and I saw it with my own eyes. My mother was right…. I said to myself: you’ve got to find a princess as soon as you can, so that she’d kiss you and you’ll become handsome and they won’t hate you anymore.

I don’t like being with them, other people, but I needed money. So I started working at the factory and when I told them I was looking for a princess, they told me there was one in downtown in Gared Ope Avenue and they were grinning…”

“Wow! Slow down… So you went there last week, on Monday?”

“Yeah… Pretty nasty place. There was trash all over the place and people were yelling and swearing and girls in weird clothes were standing on the porches. Nasty place I tell you. I said to myself: There can’t be a princess here. But I asked around, and they pointed out a black girl standing on a porch, like the other girls. She was wearing a crown, all right, and a white gown. It was short though and I didn’t know princesses could be black so I went and asked her and she said: “The hell I am!” so I believed her and wanted her to…”

“Calm down, no rush. Do you want some water?”

“No! Stop interrupting me! I’m really tired of you interrupting me, that drives me mad and you shouldn’t drive me mad, things happen when I’m mad… bad things!”

“Ok. I won’t do it anymore. You wanted her to kiss you? Is that right?”

“Yeah. I wanted her to kiss me and make me handsome but she said: “It’s usually 50 bucks but for you it’s 60 and I ain’t doing no kissing!” I did not understand at first, so I gave her the money and followed her into a corridor and up to the 2nd floor. She made me wash my hands and started undressing… That was mean and offensive. My mother told me it was rude to be naked in front of people. Hers obviously forgot to tell her that. So I told her to stop but she started laughing. She laughed loud and said I was retarded and that got me mad… Yes it did!”

“So you hit her, didn’t you?”

“Yes, I wanted her to stop, but she was laughing again… I hit here in the head and she tumbled down and started crying. I didn’t want to hurt her. She got me mad and that’s what happens when I’m mad.”

“What happened after that?”

“I don’t know. Someone hit me from behind… Cowards… I just wanted her to kiss me and when I woke up, my head was aching, the place was messy and I was missing my wallet. Princess was lying on the ground and her crown was torn apart. At first I thought she was just asleep but when I tried to kiss her, she wasn’t breathing, just like my mother the day she died. So I called for help and they called the police and the police took me and they told me I killed her… I did not kill her. I just wanted her to kiss me, but she was laughing at me.”