The only thing that remains.

They say every day is a fresh start. That life is like a novel, and you don't know what's next until you turn the page.

You grow up hearing such optimistic things, but eventually you learn that everything's eventual.

So one day you wake up and realize that you're still thinking about her. You try as hard as you can to tell yourself not to think about it, but you can't stop thinking about whatever you're trying to stop thinking about. You know you saw her in a dream again, even if you can't remember what it was about. It may not have had a plot, any side stories, but you know you were thinking about her.

You tell yourself not to, and look at yourself in the mirror. Where did I go wrong? You ask yourself. You can't look at yourself anymore, so you stare at the drain in the sink instead. The water flowing into it, disappearing.

You're fine so far, you've done a good job of pretending she's not there, in the back of your head. Gnawing away, nibbling away, scratching at the surface of your brain. The border of your worst nightmares.

You look around you, and everyone seems too busy to notice. The lack of life in your eyes, the lack of appetite and desire for anything. This one's your own burden to carry, you tell yourself that. Over and over, that you'll be fine. You were born alone, and that's just how it's supposed to be.

You're doing fine. You've been doing fine. You've been alive for 23 years, by yourself, must account for something, you tell yourself. All the while, ignoring that scratching, nibbling at the back of your head.

You try, and find things to occupy yourself with. You play mindless video games all day, driving over people, shooting imaginary guns. Reading your books, doing your computer things. Anything to not think. Anything to keep yourself distracted. A facade you play with yourself, day in and day out. They say it's the only thing that will help. You start hating "them" by principle of conditioning.

Then one day, you're going through your hard disk because you've managed to fuck up your computer again. All your back up is on your hard disk, and on accident you run into the folder with all of her pictures.

This is when you realize that it wasn't just a small nibbling, scratching, gnawing in the back of your head. It's also the huge void in your chest. The deep darkness in your lungs. The abyss you can not do enough justice to no matter how much you try to verbalize it, to describe it.

The fact that no matter what you look at, experience, your first instinct is to run to her and tell her about it. Like a fucking puppy, bringing dead birds to their owner's door step. Look at what I've accomplished, look at what I've learned. I wanted to share it with you, because you seem worthwhile, and I'd feel selfish otherwise. The best person in the world.

Everything's eventual.

The fact that you can't go back to your music, or anything else that made you feel comfortable, because it's all tainted by the memory. The only thing that remains.

So you stay up all night, thinking about everything that you had, and everything you have lost.

According to Arabic literature, "love" has seven stages;
Attraction, infatuation, love, reverence, worship, obsession, and death.

Makes sense to me. And maybe that's what the whole problem here is.

Myself.

I typed out another rant filled with hate, anger, angst, sorrow, agony.

It didn't make me feel any better.

I feel as numb as an ice pick.

As lonely as ... well, myself. Perhaps always will, until the end.

Oh, Reddit, some more.

"School"

I remember in fifth grade, we had a substitute teacher for English.

While everyone else was busy running around sniffing daisies and roses, I was borrowing assigned reading from seventh graders. They give me looks like I was retarded, but I didn't give a shit.

My English workbook had been filled till the end, it took me two days to complete it. Even further than was assigned for the semester. Somehow the substitute teacher found out, and all she would do everyday was grab my workbook and jot the answers down from it on the blackboard for the rest of the class to copy off into their own.

Chapter by chapter, day by day, every day, as I just sat there and watched the rest of the class.

I still remember the kind of looks they all gave me. Like something was wrong with me. Why would this kid not go out and play, but rather choose to sit here all day and end up doing more work than was supposed to be done? I still remember the look I got from the teacher when she realized all her work was already done for her.

The look always portrayed confusion. This wasn't something she was used to, or expecting. It was something none of them ever got used to.

I remember in Computer Science class in 9th Grade, when the teacher walked out of the class for a minute locking the computer behind him. I walked up to his computer and broke in to it, bypassing the lock. He walked in right as I yelled "yes," without even thinking about it.

He just looked at me, looked at the computer, told me to go sit down, while trying to figure out how I did what I did. He didn't say another word.

I remember in 7th grade Computer Science class, when the substitute teacher walked in and bragged about how she was going to teach us how to create our own websites. I walked up to her and handed her a piece of paper with the address to my website on it. She didn't teach us shit for the rest of the day.

I remember when my dad signed me up for extra curriculur shit during the summers at his work place. They had reading, writing and running around in fields as activities assigned for kids. I remember the looks I got when the counsellors and people in charge couldn't figure out why I didn't want to go out and play with the other kids and chose rather to hide in the corner with my books or my pencils and paper. They graded our work. I came in "second" that year. Maybe if I was a bit more social, I'd come in at first.

I remember getting beat like a mule almost every day in school, after we reached 9th grade. "He's extremely brilliant. If only he would get his priorities straight."

"It's not that he's stupid. He just doesn't seem interested."

"I don't understand. Don't you want to do something with your life?"

Why would I give a shit when so early on you proved to me that I didn't need you, School?

When I left the rest of my "colleagues" far off behind, and without second guessing myself knew more than the teacher did, why would you even expect me to give a shit?

By the time we got to 10th or 11th grade, we had stopped going to class altogether for our own reasons. We would be in school, but attending class or actually paying attention in class was something else altogether.

I started failing almost everything, I just didn't give a shit anymore. Except for English and Computer Science, of course. Never really needed to even open a book for those two.

My dad was supposed to sign my monthly reports, and so he'd either just yell at me, tell me how I wasn't going to go anywhere in the world, before eventually signing them and forgetting all about it.

"If you keep this up, you're going to end up without a job and having to rely on your brothers."

Thanks, Dad. You know how to work wonders for a child's self esteem.

Not to mention all the times you beat me half dead, to an inch of my life. The times I couldn't stop shaking, because the pain was unbearable.

The time you told me you were going to kill me, and told me to go sit in an empty dark room to wait for eminent death. And I sat there for an hour, dad, perhaps more, without moving. I was too scared to. You, on the other hand, completely forgot you had asked me to wait for you.

Imagine the look on your face, dad, when you eventually remembered and walked in the room to find me just sitting there.

Just sitting there with a blank expression, staring at the wall, in pitch darkness. I still remember, dad.

Or the times you said I was probably not your real son and got switched at the hospital. Because I made a mistake, or just didn't want to pay attention in school anymore.

Worked miracles for my head, dad.

In 10th grade, we had made a habit of playing hookie from school. We weren't really loaded in cash, and had expenses to cover. Like lunch, cigarettes, drinks, a few games of pool.

Because we were who we were, we would grab little kids and tell them to go raise funds for us. They never even questioned why. The little kids would run to even smaller kids and extort them for money.

We made 75 Riyals in 30 minutes that day. Without doing shit.

The guard in charge of the doors to the outside was in on it with us. We'd blackmail him, by telling him we'd tell the principle about his tobacco chewing habits. Or bribe him by saying we'd get him some chewing tobacco. Either way, we were on the way to play pool on a cab that day, smoking our cigarettes.

The first time I ever put a cigarette to my lips, two of my friends did the same. We were 5 kids altogether, two of which had been smoking for a while now.

Luckily for me, my house was a minute away from school, so I had time to go clean up. The rest of my friends weren't so lucky that day, and got busted when they walked in to school.

A friend of mine, Arsalan, and his brother Nabeel both got caught smoking the same day. When the school called their house to complain about Arsalan, Nabeel would pick up and pretend to be their father. End up giving the school shit for ever letting us bail to begin with. When the school called to complain about Nabeel, Arsalan would end up pretending to be the father, yelling at their incompetence.

We had left forging signatures way behind, that was child's play.

My friend Omair got caught with two packs of cigarette, a cologne, and some "Niswaar," in his bag. The fucking idiots actually thought he was drinking cologne to get high.

When I got busted for having a cell phone in school, the idiots didn't know the "N-Gage QD" had an external memory card slot. Before they walked me in to the vice principle's office, I had already slipped the memory card out, all the while the phone was still inside my pocket. They couldn't find shit to incriminate me with, then, could they.

During our exams and tests, we wouldn't bother whispering to each other for answers. We'd just slip each other our respective answering sheets. To compare notes, of course. They would never find out.

I remember we started hiding each other's school bags for fun. This one time the principle walked in to one of our friends looking for his, that me and Fahad had hid. He complained to the principle that he couldn't find his bag, and in turn got the shit beat out of him in front of us.

Talk about being fucking fair.

This other time a friend threw another's bag out the window. It landed in the ministry next door. We're standing outside during recess, wondering where his bag could be, when we notice the doors to our school fling open and a soldier wearing camaflogue walks in carrying it. The ministry went on alert that day, they thought it was going to fucking explode.

In 8th grade, we'd throw pieces of chalk at the English teacher while he was busy trying to teach us shit. No one ever really paid attention.

In 9th grade, my friends started chewing tobacco. The teacher saw us one day and gave us a lecture on how it wasn't good for us. As soon as he turned around, the tobacco went straight in the mouth.

Day in and day out, these "teachers" would walk in to class, half hating themselves for it. They'd try to get to us, to teach us shit. But it's kind of hard to pay attention to what he's trying to say when the rest of the class is busy talking over him. About their cell phones, about girls, about cigarettes.

And the teachers couldn't do shit.

This one time a teacher saw a kid talking to another and walked up to him, smacked him in the head. The kid stood up, cursed at the teacher, and pushed him so far that he ended up falling on his desk. The kid just walked out of the class after that.

You couldn't really blame them then, could you, when you would witness them beating the shit out of some poor kid that wouldn't fight back.

Or blame me for the six months I pretended I was terminally ill just so my parents wouldn't send me to school.

"You actually waste money on books? What's wrong with you?" A kid in my class once said to me.

I once got beat in class for reading a book that wasn't associated with the class.

In 6th grade, they asked us if we wanted to go out and play or go read in the library. My voice couldn't be heard in the midst of the fucktards that all wanted to go kick a fucking ball around.

Imagine the yelling I got at home later, when my parents found the rant I had scribbled in the back of my notebook. "Fuck school, and fuck these assholes. All I want to do is read a book, but these fucktards want us to aimlessly run around."

"Are you insane? You could've gotten suspended if they ever saw this!" yelled my Dad at me.

I'm sorry if I couldn't find the right expressions then, dad, I really didn't know how to feel.
Neither did I feel like feeling bad for something I didn't do wrong.

Sanction me for your fucked system.

Blame me for not giving much of a shit anymore.

Blame me for figuring out I've never needed this shit.

Blame me if I decided not to let schooling get in the way of my education.

Blame me if I all I've ever wanted to do ever since is be the catcher in the rye.

Don't you worry, I'll find it.

I'm actually re-blogging myself.

I don't buy into "Astrology" much anymore, but this one seems to hit a little too close to home to completely disregard.

When your Gemini child finally grows up, lots of people will tell you disapprovingly that "he has too many fingers stuck in too many pies." You'll smile then, and they may be annoyed. But you'll be remembering one spring day when he was seven. He stuck his fingers in your chocolate pies, his father's shaving cream, the fish bowl, the garbage can, a pot of hot soup and an electric socket. You were furious. Later, at twilight, you watched him run around chasing lightning bugs in the grass. After a while, you sighed, and asked yourself aloud, "Why must he rush around so? Why must he get into everything? What in the world is he searching for?" He overheard you and it troubled him. You'll never forget the look in his bright, clear eyes when he answered. "Gee, Mommy ... I don't know. But don't you worry. I'll find it."

Oh, Facebook.

So, I've just found out there's a person on facebook that's an apparent mutual friend, named "Wifey Material." If this was any more ironic, it'd be on the periodic table.

Not only is her profile picture a self shot through a mirror. She's also in Hijab, and has a leg up on a chair or something.

"If ya dont no me, ur not guna get to no me :p" her facebook page says.

If she don't buy a book soon and somehow stomach her way through it, she's going to have a hard time getting anyone to know what she's fucking on about.

I tried reading through her favorite quotes, but the only one I could come close to comprehend goes:

"ιƒ уσυя ℓσσкιη 4 ρєяƒє¢тιση вυу уσυяѕєℓƒ α вαявιє ∂σℓℓ "

I was actually looking for something said or written by someone of at least relative fame, but this shit works too I suppose.

The rest of them looked like: "ĿĪĿ ß♡ĪS ṖĿΛY ΛŔ♡ƱИD ŔƐΛĿ MƐИ SƐŦŦĿƐ D♡ѠИ"

I'm no good at cryptography yet, but she'd sure make Dan Brown proud.

A friend got interested, and since great minds think alike or some shit, he decided he could pick some ideas for a funny blog post himself. After cross referencing, he asks me if "Wifey Materials'" facebook page has the numbers 16 after them.

I checked with mine, and mine said 56.

Which means, there are currently 56 known cases of people using "Wifey Material" as their facebook names.

My hands are fucking huge, but they're not enough to carry the weight of the facepalm that is required for this one.

Before I get accused of not having a life, and stalking other people to get a petty laugh or two, didn't you think this shit was at least a little funny?

As far as having a life is concerned; you're on here, reading this shit, aren't you?

Pain.

The nightmares have gotten a lot more vivid since the last time.

Dreams of being hurt by her, while being torn in between a broken self esteem and a pathetic desire to be desired.

You are consumed by whatever has your attention. It's a pity I don't have enough control over my own thoughts, or I wouldn't be constantly hurting myself like this.

Coupled by the fact that proper sleep is a luxury I haven't enjoyed in months.

How would I? Stay up to toss and turn with clenched fists, unable to forget everything that happened, like a broken record, the needle scratching the insides of my head and making every sensation hurt.

Over and over and over.

The little sleep that I do manage to sneak in only makes me regret ever trying, to begin with. Dreams of how things could've been even worse then they were, or perhaps the exact same as they were and my memory just isn't as great as I would like to think so.

I wish to completely forget about everything. I wish to forget about where I was, and never go back. I wish to start completely over.

It pains me greatly to think how the dynamics of our acquaintanceship changed. It pains me to feel the polar opposite of how I used to when I used to think about you.

It pains me to know that it had to come to this, things could've been different. I didn't want to feel this way, I never have, but if only you had left me any other choice.

I wasn't asking for too much.

It's just not fair... Why do I constantly feel like shit, and not have the will to look forward to anything anymore?

I fucking hate you more than I've ever hated anything else.

Consumed.

We walk into the cafe, and are immediately greeted by Ricardo at the door. Ricardo's eyes brighten up as he sees us, and we nod in unison, as if to ask him how he was doing. We shake hands, because that's what you do here. "How's it going, Ricardo?"

"I'm good sir," he says, all the while still flashing his smile, his eyes still lit up like a Christmas tree. Or the streets on Eid, I suppose, doing as the Romans do.

"How about two Saudi champagnes, then?"
"No problem sir," he says, as if something could go wrong while mixing fruit and juice.

Saudi champagne being the oxymoron that it is, considering it's as alcoholic as a glass of water, and the fruit dare not be even a week old.

He scurries to perform his faithful duties, and why wouldn't he? We've been tipping him pretty well for the past 5 years or so, at least. All the while with that smile of his, that seems like he just wakes up in the morning and puts it on like a mask, or make up.

We sit down on one of the tables, and the pockets start to get lighter. Out come the packs of cigarettes, sometimes several different brands mind you, depending on how many people there are. Then the cell phones, the keys to the cars - with their specific key chains, equipped with buttons to lock the doors, unlock the doors, or simply make that honking sound, because why not?

Sometimes even the wallet isn't allowed to sit in the back pockets, because it's just not comfortable, is it? The fatter it looks, the better. Even if it's just filled to the brim with old receipts and mostly useless foreign currency. Canada, the United Kingdom, the United States of America, the United Arab Emirates, and sometimes even Pakistan.

The layout is usually the same. Cell phone goes on top of the wallet, lighters go on top of the pack of cigarettes. All aligned neatly next to each other. The car keys lay idle wherever you want them.

It used to be, the cell phone's got to be as big as it could possibly get. It only meant it had all the more features, right? Things have since changed, and now it's supposed to be as small as it could possibly be, while equipped with the same amount of features, if not more. A camera on a cell phone is like a steering wheel in a car, just can't buy one without anymore.

Ricardo hurries back with the "champagnes," but he can't get comfortable yet, because we've been sitting at the "wrong table." One you can't sit at unless you're paying 30 Riyals an hour for it, because it's only available to customers shooting pool at one of the two tables at the secluded part of the cafe. The premium membership lounge of sorts.

"That guy's a real asshole," I tell Ricardo, talking about the douche that just made us get up off our table because we didn't want to shoot pool that certain day.

"Yes yes, I know, I know," Ricardo chimes in. A fine tuned harmony with the right amount of enthusiasm and agreement. Stating otherwise just wouldn't be loyal enough would it?

He's now apologizing for the other server while setting our drinks down, telling me it would've been different if he was serving the pool tables tonight. "Of course, I understand," Ricky boy. We've been pseudo helping out with you financing your family's luxuries back home in the Philippines.
Of course things would've been different if you were the only server.

"We're going to need another one of these, Ricardo." Since we have more company, right.
"Yes sir," he says and scurries back to his working quarters behind the bar.

Us, the minorities in the Middle East. Yet, royalty in our own right. So accustomed to luxury, and brainwashed to the brim to blindly follow consumerism, like rats following the pied piper. With our fancy cars, our fancy cell phones, our branded clothes from American Eagle, or Lee Cooper. Our Mercedes', our GMCs', and our Chevrolets'. Our Black Berry's, Nokias' and Sony Ericssons'.

Our "servants" every where we go, never mind the ones at home. Running after us, these even more singled out minorities, trying to feed their starving kids in all the 3rd world countries. "Back home."

Taking our shit, and smiling the whole time, while they curse us out in their spare time. They have a lot of that, while they can't sleep at night, asking themselves if this was the life they had envisioned when they decided to travel to make money.

Washing our tables behind us, picking up our glasses, and our ashtrays after we're done administering ourselves with the luxury of cancer.

Cleaning up after us, as we get up and walk to our expensive fucking cars with tinted windows, Bose speakers and subwoofers, and Kenwood fucking cd player with 6-discs changers.

Us, the royalty. Consumerism has us brainwashed, and we don't even know it, there's no sugar coating it or hiding it behind analogies. "We buy things we don't need, to impress people we don't like, with money we don't necessarily have."

But it works, doesn't it? Because we cease to be bothered about slightly more meaningful things, like what we're doing with ourselves, or how we treat all those that are way less fortunate than we have been. What we can rather be doing, with ourselves and our lives. We can't be bothered to discuss human life, or politics, or business.

We're too busy checking in to foursquare with our blackberry.

Us, the royalty, the consumers. Rendered neutralized, and well... consumed.

Another close brush.

There's construction work going on right upstairs my bedroom on the roof. Somehow this huge rectangular slab of concrete got blown off by the wind, and got tangled in the wire of the split air conditioner in my room, hence slamming through the window right next to my bed, right above my head. Luckily, it didn't go through all the way, or it would've fallen right on my head/face and it wouldn't have been pretty. No pun intended.

Another close brush with the Grimm Reaper. The second this year. The sixth overall.

Don't want to jinx-fuck this lucky streak, as much as I hate wallowing, I'd hate my family being sad even more.

Crush me.

Her: I don't sit there and map out what's gonna happen
Her: Stop taking things so seriously
Her: We're talking now and that's nice
She is typing...

 I want you to hurt me.

I don't want to say I get off, off of it, but I can't say I hate it either, can I? Evidently. Judging by the past and everything, right?

I want you to be the worst you could possibly be. Hurt me like I've never been hurt before. Say shit that I haven't heard some other woman already say to me. You'll have to take a while and think about it for a bit, I suppose, you might not even come off as original much, at this point in life. But give it a shot, would you?

I'd love it if you could manage to squeeze a few tears out of these eyes. Make me feel alive again.

Grab my heart and squeeze it at the center of your palm. Feel the pulse and the throbs, squeeze until it gets fainter. Or until it starts beating faster. I could not predict much anymore.

Grab me by my gut, and twist it. Make me weep my soul into your lap. Into your shoulders, into your chest.

Be the worst you can be. The worst person in the world. Destroy my identity, and crush my self esteem. Tread on my dreams, and walk all over my hopes.

Bring me back that unforgettable feeling of sorrow, right there in the chest. As heavy as a burden, filling up my lungs, and making my chest feel much heavier. Make me feel alive. A rush like no other.

Walk away from me and leave me behind. Pay me no attention, what so ever. Make it a lack of any attention. No matter how much I cry out for you to stop, or beg you to stay, or even make the pathetic and foolish request of asking you to come back.

Make my lips tremble, and my knees wobble. Make me regret being alive.

Watch me decay, and die away. Be the reason for it.

Cause me to self destruct.

And I'll love you. More than anything else in the world.

Just make me feel miserable again. I hate not feeling anything at all anymore.

Masks.