For the record, my first draft of this is being written in Comic Sans MS because fuck you. That’s not relevant, but it is the case.

And that opening line wasn’t added after the fact, either. It was the first thing I wrote, and as I write this now, it is still so.

I do this because it is a useful metaphor to that weird purgatory you enter when you have decided to kill yourself, but plan on doing it a little bit later. You start to kill time. The time dies before you do. You start to do goofy shit just because. Like, you might as well, because you’ve just got a few hours left of life. But you’re still depressed as shit, so you don’t do anything cool or epic, especially since you really really don’t want to see anybody. So yeah. No hookers or blow or whatever. Just this kiddie version of hedonism. Like, “Write some shit in Comic Sans. Nothing matters anymore. Be goofy, do what you want. There are no rules.”

Now to be clear, I am not in that purgatory right now. I’m just trying to recreate it for you. Try and figure out what you’d do if you only had six hours left to live, but couldn’t leave your bedroom and couldn’t call anybody. It’s like a riddle. Do whatever you want, but damn does it start to feel like a mighty small toolbox right quick.

It’s been about a decade since the last time I played this game. Better put: it had been about a decade since the last time I had played that game. I’m writing about something that happened a little over two months ago now. I didn’t die, thanks for asking.

All of this had been building up for a while, and I never quite decided to kill myself; what I decided was to start dancing on suicide’s outer rim. Late on a Friday night, breaking on the edge of Saturday’s dawn, I decided: fuck it.

Might visit nostalgia and chip my sanity
Still one with the heat of cigar ember
At peace with knowing I could leave forever tomorrow

So I took something like 6,000 milligrams of Amitriptyline. Looked it up beforehand and it seemed like I might die from it. Time to toss the dice.

I fell asleep just about immediately and woke-up some 30 hours later feeling like shit. Vaguely remember waking up at some point to take a piss and my roommate was in the living room with his bastard kid. Fucking awkward. Like, “Hey kiddo, if I’m sinking in laughing at something sunken in I am.” Went to a Peruvian joint and pounded down about 4,000 calories of greasy chicken with unpronounceable sauces. Puttered about for another eight hours and then slept for another twelve. Went to work and felt as empty and horny as ever. If you castrated me, I’d become an invisible man, you know.

Some holiday came up like three days later and whatever with your however so I scored some other shit with a name like some town Bill Clinton bombed in ‘99. Said it was for sleep and anxiety. Had a high risk for addiction, recommended dose was one, so I took 45. Again. There’s no guarantee. I’m a good American and I’ve got a gun on my nightstand, but fuck if that ain’t tasteless. I want some plausible deniability here. Like, everyone knows I’m a junkie and fuck around with pills I shouldn’t. Time to toss the dice.

But let me double-back. Taking 45 seemed like a pretty sure bet, so I took my time. I woke up some day and knew it was time and that’s when the purgatory crossed dimensions and wrapped me up good and full. Must’ve gotten up at 11 and didn’t start downing it until 2 or so. Those are the hours and their sensations I want to get at. It was a lot of instant coffee, a lot of YouTube documentaries about serial killers and sociopathy and kids in supermaxes. There was that indecision. That hesitation. Tossed an email to my ex:

There are days when all I think about all day is emotionally imposing on you, and sucking out your strength for myself, like a vampire

Began this take at 7:38
Head hit the board, enough that it aches
Wonder should I be working so late
Wonder should I be working so late
Well the nothing song sticks to your mouth
Like peanut butter on the brain
Nothing ever stays the same
Nothing, yeah nothing, nothing, nothing
And like this, I do

Was that cruel? Vindictive? You bet, thanks for asking. But who could care in a life like this one? Bitch didn’t respond and I didn’t fucking die. Fair is fair. Fucked around on Instagram and watched plenty of porn. Porn is always the preamble to suicide. Every time I’m there, I start buying up subscriptions and hunting for a sex act I’ve never seen before, like bearing witness to a whole new orifice before snuffing out the light will give me a key to the Kingdom of Heaven in the life to come.

If you’re worried this piece of writing is coming off like the manifesto of a school shooter, you’d be right. After all, before the pill-binge, I cruise 4Chan and a prophet of modernity has written for my erudition:

Remember that since you have no respect for your life that you could be wasting the rare chance of an heroing through mass shooting.
If you want to die, why not go out in style and make sure you’re not going down alone?
You could make the next Columbine or Jack the Ripper be a reality, anon.
Heck, if you want to die, you might as well try becoming a serial killer for a couple of days, see how you like it, and if you still wanna die, then you do the shootout.
That’s what I would do in your position.

So yeah. Right? A few other apostles let me know they’re thinking about the big stuff:

Does it even count as incest if what you do can’t lead to pregnancy?

Fair question.

I smoke a bunch of cigarettes and drink enough coffee to give me diarrhea for life. I get hungry and the fridge is empty. So that’s how the buzzer on the suicide clock goes off. I’m not fucking going out to shop right now. Like, right now of all times? Whatever. But I don’t like being hungry, so this death metal concert is kicking off.

My ex still hasn’t responded to my email and I hate myself and I hate her and all of this has nothing to do with her. How could it? Never treated her good anyway.

Well the nothing song sticks to your mouth
Like peanut butter on the brain
Nothing ever stays the same
Nothing, yeah nothing, nothing, nothing

I take all these fucking pills and go outside to smoke a quick cig with a coffee before I collapse. There, I think about how my cousin once told me that depression is cascading, and that if you have it, every wave is exponentially worse than the last. She told me that nobody survives the fifth wave.