I Know What You’re Thinking
I used to be the guy everyone took advantage of. The pathetic nice one. Holding elevators, covering extra shifts, letting coworkers dump their problems on me while I smiled like an idiot and let them cry in my shoulder. “He is such a good listener,” they’d say. Yeah. Good. In other words, disposable.
Then came the neural trial. Experimental pay for rent money. One single surgery, and voices started flooding my mind a week later.
At first it felt like a miracle. I could hear my mom’s quiet fear that she was becoming a burden and I comforted her before she spoke a word. I lifted up my anxious coworker by addressing his hidden insecurities. People called me a saint. I believed them. For a while. I’d just wanted to do what was right.
You have no idea how ugly it gets when you live inside people’s heads.
Every smile hides the twist of the knife. Every “I’m fine” is laced with resentment. Your girlfriend moans your name while mentally comparing you to her ex. Your friends laugh at your jokes and immediately think how stupid and pathetic you are. Strangers on the street radiate contempt, petty cruelty, and violent little fantasies. The masks are paper-thin. Underneath is nothing but rot and filth and garbage.
I stopped caring. I don’t remember when. Why waste empathy on animals who secretly despise you?
I decided to make it hurt. At least just for the truly vile people.
The first time felt exhilarating, almost righteous. My landlord sat in his office fantasizing about evicting tenants just because he could, just to feel powerful. Trading sexual favors for rent extensions. I leaned in and whispered his exact thoughts back to him. Every sick detail. He turned pale very quickly . My rent dropped to nothing. The rush was electric. Better than any sex I’d ever had. Better than anything I’d ever felt.
I know what you’re thinking, but it didn’t stop there. I couldn’t. There were more people doing the worst things you could imagine I needed to take down.
After that, the floodgates opened. I started collecting. I needed more. That accountant Karen’s elaborate tax fraud. My boss Mike’s secret recordings of himself with his wife’s sister in his office. The HR director’s history of trading promotions for favors. I squeezed them all dry—cash, favors, public humiliation when it amused me. I made them cry ugly tears when they thought they were alone. I made them the most powerful people I know look over their shoulders on their way home. All from the anonymous comfort of the shadows. Their fear became my favorite drug.
It’s so easy to manipulate a situation in your favor when you know all of your opponent’s cards. Promotions, girls, whatever I wanted was at my fingertips. I changed my whole look to match. I know you like the leather jacket, the muscles I’ve gotten at the gym with my free memberships, the platinum encrusted watch my old boss wore before “giving” it to me.
But power brings enemies. I know they suspect me. Every “Yes, Sir” hides a plan to expose me. Every nervous glance is them whispering about how to rip this gift out of my brain. I barely sleep anymore. I can’t let them ruin this for me. I test people constantly. I push harder, demand more, break them faster. If I keep them terrified and broken, they can’t gather the will to fight back against the shadows. Against me.
Yesterday my oldest friend, practically my brother, came crawling for help. His marriage was collapsing. I already knew everything. His wife had been fantasizing about me for months, vivid little scenes that made me laugh. I told him I’d “fix” it… but only if he got on his knees and admitted I was always better than him. He cried like a child. I laughed in his face, loud and genuine. I don’t need friends. They’re all just plotting against me anyway.
I know what you’re thinking.
You’re sitting there reading this, judging me. Thinking I’m no better than the others. That this power went to my head. You’re mad at me and what I’m doing to people you don’t even know.
Cute.
You don’t know anything.
But I know everything you’re thinking, you know. I’m always listening. And if I sense even the tiniest threat to my power?
I’m coming for you next.