The city exhaled its damp, grey breath against Abdi's apartment window. Rain slicked the streets below, blurring the neon signs into watercolor streaks.
Inside, the only light came from the monitor casting a pale glow on his face, highlighting the tension in his jaw. Twenty-nine years old, and the world felt like a locked door he perpetually lacked the key for.
His fingers hovered over the keyboard, the silence in the small room broken only by the rhythmic click of the cooling fan inside his outdated computer tower.
He scrolled through forums, digital spaces where bitterness festered and grew like mold in damp corners. Threads filled with familiar complaints, echoed frustrations about women, about society, about the unfairness of it all.
Each post, each shared grievance, felt like another small stone added to the wall around his heart. He saw himself in their words, their anger validating his own gnawing emptiness. He wasn't alone in his feelings, yet the collective resentment offered no warmth, only a shared coldness.
His reflection stared back from the dark screen when he momentarily switched tabs – hollow cheeks, eyes that seemed to sink deeper into his skull each week, framed by tightly coiled black hair he rarely bothered to style.
He'd arrived from Mogadishu with his family years ago, filled with a quiet hope that quickly eroded against the indifferent shores of this new land. Opportunities existed, they said, but they always seemed just beyond his reach, reserved for others – others who were smoother, more confident, luckier. Others who weren't him.
A message notification popped up. It was from 'DesertReaper7', a frequent commenter on the forums. 'They laugh at us, brother. They walk past like we're invisible. Time they saw us.'
Abdi typed back a simple agreement, the words feeling inadequate for the storm brewing inside him. He felt seen, acknowledged in this digital space, but it was a distorted reflection, amplifying only the worst parts of himself.
He pushed back from the desk, the cheap chair groaning in protest. The small apartment felt constricting, the walls pressing in.
He walked to the kitchen, a tiny alcove barely large enough for one person. He opened the refrigerator – mostly empty save for some wilting vegetables, a carton of milk nearing its expiration date, and leftover rice.
Hunger gnawed at him, but the effort of preparing food felt monumental. He settled for a glass of water, the tap water tasting faintly of chemicals.
Looking out the window again, he saw a couple huddled under a shared umbrella, laughing as they hurried down the street. A sharp pang, familiar and unwelcome, struck him.
It wasn't just desire; it was a corrosive blend of envy and profound alienation. Why was connection so easy for them, yet an insurmountable peak for him?
He didn't understand the rules of the game everyone else seemed to play effortlessly. Every attempt he'd made – hesitant smiles met with averted eyes, awkward small talk trailing into silence – ended in reinforcement of his otherness.
He remembered trying to join a local community soccer group months ago. He loved the sport, a connection to his childhood in Somalia. But on the field, he felt clumsy, out of sync.
Teammates exchanged easy banter he couldn't penetrate. Passes sometimes went astray. One evening, after he missed a crucial shot, he heard someone mutter, "Seriously? This guy…"
It wasn't overtly cruel, but it was enough. He never went back. Each rejection, small or large, was meticulously cataloged in his mind, proof of the world's conspiracy against him.
The online forums offered a different narrative. There, his failures weren't personal shortcomings but evidence of a rigged system. Women were inherently shallow, society was stacked against men like him, and the only rational response was anger.
It was a seductive ideology, turning helplessness into a twisted form of power – the power of the victim prophesying a deserved retribution.
He returned to the computer. New posts had appeared, darker in tone. Fantasies of disruption, vague threats veiled in ideological jargon. Abdi read them, a cold knot tightening in his stomach.
It felt like standing on the edge of a cliff, the wind urging him forward. He'd spent years cultivating this bitterness, feeding it with every perceived slight, every lonely night. Now, it demanded expression. It demanded release.
He opened a new document, the blank white page stark against the darkness of the room. What had DesertReaper7 said? 'Time they saw us.' Saw what, exactly? His pain? His rage? Did they even care?
The thought that they didn't, that his suffering was insignificant to the world, paradoxically fueled the desire to make it significant, impossible to ignore.
He began to type, not a manifesto, but a list. Names weren't necessary. Places. Symbols.
The coffee shop where baristas always seemed to look through him. The park where couples flaunted their intimacy. The office building downtown, monolithic and impersonal, representing the economic system he felt excluded from. Each location held a specific memory of humiliation or invisibility.
His planning was hazy, fueled more by emotion than logic. It wasn't about strategy; it was about making a mark, forcing the indifferent world to acknowledge his existence, even if only through fear or chaos.
The thought sent a tremor through him, a mixture of terror and exhilaration. He felt detached, as if watching himself from a distance, a character in a grim play moving towards an inevitable conclusion.
He looked at the date on the monitor. Tomorrow. It felt significant, arbitrary yet final. He minimized the document, saving it under a random string of characters.
He shut down the computer, plunging the room into near-total darkness, save for the faint city glow filtering through the thin curtains. Sleep felt impossible, yet exhaustion pulled at him.
He lay on his narrow bed, staring at the ceiling, the rain drumming a relentless rhythm against the glass. The city's ambient hum seemed to carry whispers tonight, echoes of the angry voices from the forum, merging with his own internal monologue of perceived wrongs.
Was this strength? Or the final surrender to despair? He didn't know. He only knew the path felt set, the decision made not by conscious choice, but by the sheer weight of accumulated bitterness.
The morning arrived grey and oppressive, the rain having subsided to a persistent drizzle. Abdi moved with a strange sense of calm, a numbness blanketing the anxiety that usually accompanied his waking hours.
He dressed methodically in dark, nondescript clothing. He ate the last of the rice, cold from the fridge, chewing mechanically without tasting it.
There were no grand pronouncements in his head, no final justifications. Only a dull certainty, a sense of purpose that felt hollow yet absolute.
He checked his phone. No new messages from family. They lived in another state, their calls becoming less frequent over the years, strained by the distance and his growing reticence.
He hadn't told them about losing his last job, a data entry position he despised but needed. He hadn't told them much of anything significant for a long time. What could he say? That he was drowning?
He retrieved a heavy backpack from the bottom of his closet. It wasn't filled with weapons of mass destruction – his plans were more intimate, more symbolic in their intended disruption.
Inside were cans of spray paint, a small crowbar pried from a dilapidated toolbox, and several containers filled with a foul-smelling concoction he'd brewed from household chemicals, meant to stink up spaces, to offend, to disrupt the clean, orderly lives he resented.
It was pathetic, perhaps, but it felt proportional to the scale of his perceived injuries – a campaign of petty vandalism and olfactory assault, designed to leave a stain, an unpleasant memory.
Leaving the apartment, he locked the door carefully behind him, a habit ingrained despite the feeling that nothing inside mattered anymore. The hallway smelled faintly of stale cooking oil and disinfectant.
He avoided eye contact with a neighbor leaving for work, pulling his hood slightly forward.
The city felt different today. Or perhaps, he was different. The usual anonymity he felt amidst the crowds now seemed like a cloak, allowing him to move unseen towards his objectives.
People hurried past, faces buried in phones or shielded by umbrellas, oblivious to the quiet storm walking among them. Their ignorance felt like confirmation. They didn't see him. Soon, they would have no choice.
His first target was the coffee shop. Peering through the window, he saw the familiar scene: young professionals typing on laptops, friends chatting over steaming mugs, the baristas moving with practiced efficiency. He felt the familiar sting of exclusion.
He walked around to the side alley, the air thick with the smell of damp garbage. Taking out a can of black spray paint, his hand trembled slightly as he raised it to the brick wall.
He didn't write words, just crude, jagged lines, ugly slashes meant to deface, to mar the clean urban aesthetic. He emptied the can, the hissing sound unnervingly loud in the narrow space. He quickly moved on, leaving the black scars behind him.
Next, the park. Couples still strolled, dog walkers made their rounds. He found a secluded bench, one near a fountain that usually served as a picturesque backdrop for photos.
He opened one of the chemical containers, the acrid smell hitting him immediately. He poured the viscous liquid onto the surrounding pavement and into the fountain's basin.
The water began to cloud, the foul odor starting to permeate the damp air. A woman walking her poodle wrinkled her nose, pulling her dog away. "What is that awful smell?" she muttered, glancing around suspiciously.
Abdi watched from a distance, a grim satisfaction mixing with the ever-present anxiety. He was making an impact, however unpleasant.
He continued his circuit, moving towards the downtown office building. Each act felt smaller, less significant than he'd imagined. Defacing a wall, fouling the air – these were nuisances, easily cleaned, quickly forgotten.
A seed of doubt, cold and sharp, began to sprout. Was this it? This petty campaign of disruption? Was this the grand statement he envisioned?
As he approached the imposing glass and steel structure of the office building, his resolve wavered. Security guards stood near the entrance, their presence a reminder of order and consequence.
His plan here involved the crowbar – smashing a ground-floor window, perhaps, a more direct act of symbolic violence against the system he felt shut him out.
But looking at the impassive faces of people entering and exiting, lost in their own worlds, his anger felt diluted, replaced by a crushing sense of futility.
Smashing a window wouldn't change anything. It wouldn't make them see him. It would just be another broken window, fixed by morning.
He stopped across the street, backpack feeling heavy, useless. The city's noise washed over him – traffic, sirens, chatter – but it felt distant, muffled.
He saw his reflection in a darkened storefront window. The same hollow eyes stared back, but now they held a different light – not anger, but a dawning, terrifying emptiness.
The rage that had propelled him, sustained him, was evaporating, leaving behind only the raw ache of his isolation.
He turned away from the office building, abandoning the final, most aggressive part of his plan. He started walking, aimlessly now, letting the city swallow him.
He passed graffiti far more elaborate than his own crude slashings, smelled odors far more potent than his chemical concoctions emanating from overflowing dumpsters. His "reckoning" felt childish, insignificant against the vast indifference of the urban landscape.
He found himself near the river, the grey water mirroring the sky. He sat on a cold metal bench, pulling his hood down further. What now?
The anger had been a shield, a purpose. Without it, he was just… lost. He thought about the forums, the shared resentment. It felt like a drug whose effects were wearing off, leaving a brutal hangover of clarity.
They weren't brothers in arms; they were just lonely, angry men feeding each other's despair.
A memory surfaced, unbidden. His mother, years ago, back in their first cramped apartment in this country. She'd been trying to teach him a traditional Somali song, her voice warm despite their struggles.
He'd been impatient, frustrated with his inability to grasp the melody, more interested in the video games that offered easy, predictable rewards. He remembered the disappointed look on her face, quickly masked with a smile.
How many times had he pushed away genuine connection in favor of retreating into his shell?
The realization hit him with physical force, a hollow blow to his chest. The world hadn't just rejected him; he had actively pushed it away, interpreting every setback, every awkward interaction, every neutral glance as confirmation of his victimhood.
He had built his own prison, brick by bitter brick, and blamed the world for the walls.
He reached into his pocket, fingers closing around his phone. He could call his mother. What would he say? Confess his pathetic, failed "day of reckoning"? Confess the years of festering anger and self-pity?
The shame was overwhelming, paralyzing.
He stood up, leaving the backpack containing the remnants of his planned disruption on the bench. He started walking again, heading back towards his apartment, not out of purpose, but out of sheer lack of anywhere else to go.
The city lights began to twinkle on as dusk settled, but they offered no comfort, only emphasized the vastness of his solitude.
Reaching his building felt like completing a meaningless circle. He fumbled with his keys, his hands still trembling, but not from adrenaline anymore. It was a tremor deep within his soul.
Inside his apartment, the silence was absolute. No computer screen glowed, no fan hummed. He didn't turn on the lights.
He sat on the edge of his bed in the darkness, the earlier numbness replaced by a profound, aching sadness.
He hadn't forced the world to see him. He had only succeeded in showing himself the depths of his own isolation, an isolation largely of his own making.
The "reckoning" hadn't been against society, or women, or the system. It had been a desperate, misguided lashing out from a cage he now realized he had locked from the inside.
There was no release, no catharsis. Only the crushing weight of understanding, the brutal clarity of his self-inflicted exile.
The unique sadness wasn't in failure or capture; it was in the stark, undiluted recognition of his own profound, unnecessary loneliness.
It was a chasm carved by his own hands, now too wide to cross.
The rain began to fall again, tapping against the window, each drop sounding like a final, solitary tear in the vast, indifferent darkness. He was seen, finally, but only by himself, and the reflection was unbearable.