2025-05-02 16:31:47 ¶ ●

From a young age you knew you weren’t wanted.

It was in the way your grandmother hesitated when calling your name, as though primed for a different one, and the fact you weren’t him wore at her as surely as you did simply by existing.

From a young age you knew you were cursed.

It was in the way that, by the will of some cosmic force, you weren’t allowed to keep your parents. Not even the memories, as you were just too young to have any that last aside from their ends.

From a young age you knew you were hated.

It was in the way that someone ten years your senior never once relented in causing you harm over the years you knew him, your grandmother never once intervening despite its regularity.

From a young age you knew the world was unjust.

It was in the way it should have been you, not the one who hurt you, to die. It should have been you and the fact you lived was a crime you could never repay but with your future as collateral.

From a young age you knew you weren’t meant for this world and you feel like everyone else knows it too.

It’s in the way they talk about you behind your back and in front of your face. No matter how civil you try to be. No matter how gregarious and magnanimous. You know you deserve nothing and so do they.

So you stop. Stop trying to be wanted or loved. Stop trying to care for anyone but yourself. It never got you anywhere anyway. Instead you turn to knowing and learning. Maybe you can understand why what happened to the poor unfortunate who took your place happened. Maybe you can understand why the world is unjust. Maybe knowing will give you a place in the world, no matter how small or awful.

Your name is Jonathan Sims and there was never any hope for you to not become what you did. It was already written for you before you even started.