"What the fuck is wrong with you?", she asked.
Good question.
I suppose it's better than 'are you OK', in a way.
Any writer knows repeating this inquisitive gem in your work is a no-no.
It should come up in the spell check 'don't use'.
Don't have your characters keep saying 'Are you OK?'.
They might say it in real life, but that's no excuse. This is NOT real life we are dealing with here.
It is more than that; so much more. So think of something else.
Like 'what the fuck is wrong with you?'
It is combative, sure, but at least it's not obvious.
Anything but obvious. Obvious is the death of everything.
Like logic. Rationality.
'Exterminate rational thought', Burroughs said.
Euthenaze the bloody obvious.
Still...originality aside- 'what the fuck is wrong with you' still hurt.
It sounded like the kind of thing Dad used to say to me.
Shit like 'Worthless Dog'.
He used to call me a worthless dog.
And hearing something like 'what the fuck is wrong with you' brings it all back...
Either Dad was dead right & I AM a worthless dog (& the woman who asked me 'what the fuck was wrong' was merely backing him up...)
Or there is some inherent worth inside me neither of these people have seen.
It has taken all the guts i can muster to hold onto the latter.
Every day, it is a battle between my inclination to believe these people are correct in their estimation of me...
And my inclination to prove them wrong.
Every day, it is a fight- against the odds- to surrender to the possibility that i am indeed a worthless dog- and and every cruel deed, foul twist of fate, sullen stroke of black luck is there to hammer the reality home...
Or there is some virtue to rising above the persuasive argument against my existence, and transcend the misery of adversity to a higher place.
I don't know...
