I thought that everything would change when I got the surgery. For years, I’d been utterly miserable. Everything and everyone seemed to communicate that I was unworthy, unlovable, and inhuman. Growing up, I figured maybe things would change down the line. It got to the point where I went to bed praying that God would fix me. But that never happened, and by the time I hit college I was still the same — still a miserable five foot, nine inches tall. In this society, that might as well be a death sentence.

It took a while for me to realize that my height was the issue in my life. When girls didn’t want to date me or opportunities came to other guys but passed me by, I assumed I just had to work harder and improve myself. Why wouldn’t I? That’s the lie that American society is built on — that you can overcome any odds if you’re willing to put the effort in. But after running into disappointment after disappointment, I stumbled onto a forum online where I came to understand the reality of my situation. For some guys — short or ugly — it’s just never going to happen.

The forum had spun off from a bodybuilding site. Some guys over there had gotten sick of working out and still not being able to get laid, and they eventually started to gravitate to the works of this psychology professor named James Hanson, who seemed to be able to explain everything we were struggling with. It wasn’t our fault, Hanson argued. By all rights, we should be able to get women.

There had always been variation in human attractiveness, but in the past, even so-so or downright ugly guys had been able to land a wife, he said. Feminism changed all that, shifting things in favor of the genetically-blessed men. Now that women could earn a living on their own, an ugly guy had nothing to offer them. And while men had diverse tastes, women were genetically predisposed to only be interested in one kind of man — the jacked, square-jawed superhero type.

So it all came down to physical appearance. And sure, my face was fine, with solid bone structure. I worked out enough to have a decent body, too. But none of that mattered, because I was short. Some of the guys on the forum preached acceptance and Zen bullshit, learning to play the hand life had dealt you. But no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t do it. It tore me up inside, knowing that every interaction I had was being influenced by my height. It got so bad I even thought about killing myself for a while. Why bother sticking out a life you know is going to be nothing but misery? But then I learned about the surgery.

Some doctors had adapted this technique used to fix birth defects so that it could actually increase someone’s height. Few American surgeons knew how it was done and even fewer would perform it, because it involved breaking “healthy” bones to carry out. Basically, they snapped your legs and surgically implant telescoping steel rods into the gaps. The rods were then connected to a remote control or an app on your phone and everyday, you would press a button to send a signal that told them to extend a little bit. Recovery took months, but by the time it was done, you’d gained an inch or two.

Learning about this was a revelation. I wasn’t cursed to be stuck in this worthless body for the rest of my life after all. If I got taller, I had a chance — with women, in business, everything. I knew then what I needed to do. While my peers spent their money on meaningless distractions like video games and drinking or pointless status symbols like cars and watches, I put my head down, ate cheap food, never went out partying, and saved as much money as I could.

I didn’t tell anyone what I was doing, of course. That’s the worst part about heightism — most people don’t even believe it’s real. Everyone knows that anti-Semitism, racism, sexism, all those things existed at some point in the past. But somehow, the idea that men are discriminated against for being short is unbelievable, even to social justice types. People — women, especially — laugh at you if you tell them you’ve been disadvantaged for being short, and I didn’t think my boss would be any different. So I cooked up a story about having to go take care of a sick uncle instead. It was enough to get him to agree to let me take some time off and then work from home while I recovered.

I flew to Arizona for the surgery. The doctor explained the risks the night before, though I knew them by heart at that point. The bones might never be as strong as they once were, for instance. It didn’t matter, though. I didn’t have to be strong, anyway. I just had to be tall. I popped a Xanax to get some sleep in my little hotel room that overlooked the airport, knowing that it was the last night of my old life.

When I woke up from the anesthesia, I was in agony. My legs felt shattered, ruined. A shot of morphine cleared that up, and I spent the next couple of days slipping in and out of consciousness in a hospital bed with both legs in casts, a catheter stuck up my urethra since I couldn’t even get up to piss. At first, the nurses would come by and press the button for me. Then they showed me how to do it. The amount of movement in the rods should have been too small for me to be able to feel anything, but I swear that I could sense it every time I sent them the signal. Those little metal rods were encouraging my bones to grow back longer everyday. It felt right, like my life was finally beginning.

After a week, the doctor was satisfied that there weren’t any complications and I was allowed to fly home. I stroked the little remote in my pocket all the way back on the flight. It was literally a dream come true — a magic button I could press that would fix everything wrong with me.

The doctor told me to manage my expectations. I knew he had to say that for legal reasons. I also knew that everything was about to change for me. The pain was excruciating some days, but it was easy to push through when I remembered what I was heading towards.

After weeks of recovery at home, I was ready to go back into the office. The first time I looked at myself standing in front of the mirror, I laughed — I’d forgotten I’d need new clothes. My pants came up short on my ankles, confirming that it had worked. I felt different. Better.

I walked into work the next day with an unfamiliar stride, but nobody seemed to notice anything at first. I didn’t expect people to point it out — I hadn’t told them about the operation, after all. But it quickly became clear that nobody was treating me any differently. By the end of the day, the sense of exaltation I’d felt in the mirror had mostly evaporated. I sought reassurance in the fact that my coworkers had known me for years, so their mental image of me might simply take a while to catch up to the new reality.

I hit a bar with a few of them after work, hoping to see how strangers would react to my new height. There was this one guy in the group of people from my office, Adam, who I loathed. Total Chad — 6’4″, chiseled jawline, strong cheekbones, neutral canthal tilt, thick dark hair. Objectively a nine out of ten, with only a few patches of rough skin blemishing his otherwise perfect face. A real piece of shit.

“Hey,” he said, in that smarmy, self-assured voice of his when I came back to the table from getting another drink. “There’s something different about you, isn’t there?”

“Don’t think so,” I replied with a shrug.

“No, no. There is. Don’t tell me. New haircut?”

“Nope.”

Another one of my coworkers chimed in. She had a nice face, ok body, maybe a 6 out of 10, but definitely getting close to hitting the wall. “Leave him alone, Adam. He’s been away taking care of his uncle for the past few weeks.”

I liked the way she was sympathetic to me like that, but then again, with her looks she couldn’t afford to be bitchy the way some of the other women in the office were.

“Wait a second,” Adam said. “Stand up again.”

I tried to crack a smile but I was seething at him. I wished he’d shut the fuck up. “Sure,” I said, getting to my feet.

Adam looked me up and down. “You wearing lifts or something? You look taller.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Well, maybe you just went through a little growth spurt or something, huh bud?”

“Maybe,” I replied, sitting back down. I held Adam’s gaze for a second longer than would have been natural. The conversation moved on, but for the rest of the night I felt self-conscious and sick, my hatred for this guy who just happened to win the genetic lottery twisting me up inside.

Hours later, everyone began saying their goodbyes. Most of my coworkers had left, and it was just me and Adam waiting for our cars to arrive. “Hey,” he said, grinning drunkenly at me. “I got a good new nickname for you. Want to hear it?”

“Not particularly,” I said.

“Pssh,” he said, gesturing dismissively as he turned towards the alley next to the bar. “You’re no fun, you know that? I gotta take a leak. Watch out for my car, will you?”

“Sure,” I said, having no intention of informing Adam’s driver, should he happen to pull up, that his prospective passenger was pissing in an alley.

“Thanks a lot, stilts, old pal!”

Stilts. He’d noticed I’d changed, though probably hadn’t put together that I’d gotten the surgery. The only person to have treated me any differently all night was this asshole, and he didn’t seem to respect me any more than he used to. I clenched my fists and jaw against the anger I felt swelling up in my chest and walked towards the alley, despising everything about Adam and all of the guys I’d ever met just like him. Dipshits who had everything handed to them, who never had to feel dehumanized for reasons completely beyond their control. The world, I realized in that moment, would never be a fair place.

Adam turned towards me as he heard me approach and before I could think about what I was doing, I smashed his head into the dumpster next to him. His skull struck the steel edge with a dull, wet thud and he dropped to the ground in a heap. He didn’t move. The anger in me then was driven out by something new. Something expanded in my chest, blossoming outward and leaving no space for fury or self-loathing or repentance.

I looked at Adam’s body for a moment, leaned down and checked for breathing. None. My mouth involuntarily curled and a short, sharp snort of a laugh emitted from it as I realized how fragile that seemingly-perfect skull of his had been after all. Nobody had come to investigate. Adam hadn’t made a noise as he’d gone down. I turned and stepped out of the alley with a casual gait, got into my waiting car, and sat quietly as the guy drove me home.

The next day, the police came by the office to talk to some of us who had been out the night before. Had there been any disagreements? Had anybody had a bit too much to drink and gotten into an argument with him? No, nothing like that. I told the detective who interviewed me that I’d been waiting for a car with Adam, he’d gone to piss in the alley, and that mine had arrived while he was gone.

“I see,” the detective said, his stony face not betraying any suspicions he might have had about me. He was older, in his 50s, but still had a bit of a youthful charm to his haggard features. His dark brown eyes stared out from beneath ungroomed eyebrows, and his wrinkled, slightly discolored skin betrayed years of sun exposure without adequate protection. He had a receding hairline that he clearly didn’t care to fix and his brown hair was marked with gray at the temples. He might have been a truly handsome man when he was younger, but he was too old to pull truly hot girls at this point. Probably he had a wife at home, anyway. He would have been just young enough to have gotten married before feminism ruined it for the rest of us. “Well, we’ll be in touch if we have any more questions,” he told me.

“Thank you, officer,” I replied, trying to sound shaken but not inconsolable, how I imagined someone whose work acquaintance had suddenly died might seem. “Can I ask, do you have any theories at the moment?”

The man shook his head. “Short of random assault, I’m guessing he just slipped and fell. Happens sometimes. People have too much to drink, they trip and hit their head, and that’s the end of that. It’s tragic, but there’s nothing you can do.”

“I suppose not,” I said, rising on my long legs to shake his hand as he got up to leave. I was taller than him, I realized with glee. “Well, thanks again. And if there’s anything I can do, please let me know.”

*

It was a little surprising how easy I found it to lie to the police about the whole thing. I didn’t even really feel bad about it. Maybe it was because of how straightforward the whole thing had been. I shoved Adam’s head, it hit the dumpster, and he went down. There was no struggle, no pleading or mess.

In fact, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that what I actually felt was disappointment. The sense of power and triumph that had surged through me after killing Adam had dissipated quickly. I couldn’t revel in it, because I couldn’t tell anyone what I’d done. My life went back to normal, and the surgery hadn’t seemed to have changed anything.

I was still at the same job, still feeling like women looked at me like dirt, still feeling shut out of the place I knew I should occupy in society. Those thoughts circulated in my brain, making me angrier and angrier. And I knew that there was only one thing that would feed that anger: I needed to do it again. And not just to anybody. It had to be someone like Adam, someone who represented everything I didn’t have. Someone beautiful, who had never been made to feel worthless for not being tall enough, or not having a perfect facial structure. I thought the surgery would put me among the ranks of the Chads and Staceys of the world, but it hadn’t. Now, all I wanted was to make them pay.

For a time I considered picking someone else at my office, maybe one of the square-jawed assholes with nice hair who periodically invited me over to play Halo with them and their buddies or something — what a fucking waste of time — but that would have drawn too much suspicion. It had to be someone with no connection to me. A stranger. It had to seem random. And besides, it wasn’t about them, specifically — it was about what they stood for. I decided that my mission in life was to revenge myself on members of the class into which I’d been denied entry by the unfortunate conditions of my birth. Beautiful people, successful people, people who had been given everything and worked for nothing.

I’d read about guys who’d done this kind of thing, of course. Some of the posters on the forum I frequented lionized them as heroes getting back at the world. In the past I’d thought of them as violent lunatics, but now, they simply seemed short-sighted and pathetic. Driving a car into a crowd of people or crashing a passenger plane into the side of a mountain might be spectacular, but it was essentially admitting defeat while trying to take down as people with you as possible.

My designs were grander. I didn’t want to die or go to jail — I just wanted to inflict my misery on as many deserving targets as I could. I wanted to strike fear into the hearts of everyone who’d ever made me — people like me — feel lesser. Deep down I knew that this wouldn’t change anything, that it wouldn’t alter how things worked. But it didn’t matter. It gave me a sense of purpose. So I began going out, night after night, looking for viable targets.

I found her one evening, a tall brunette wearing a long wool coat with her ankles and black heels visible beneath. She stood on the pedestrian walkway of the truss bridge crossing the river, smoking a cigarette. I watched her from a distance for a while, leaning on a lamppost. She looked as though she was waiting for someone, shifting her weight back and forth on her heeled feet. Her features, I could tell even from this far away, were well-defined and pleasant. From what I could tell of her body under the coat and what I could discern of her face, she was definitely at least an 8.

As she stood there, smoking her cigarette and pulling out her phone occasionally, I moved in closer. I thought about all of the attractive women I’d known who’d never given me the time of day because of my height, who still wouldn’t despite the hell I’d put myself through trying to make myself beautiful and lovable. I’d broken my legs, healed them again, all for this. And I didn’t feel any different, wasn’t treated any differently by women.

My mouth filled with the taste of iron and I balled up that rage and dejection and as I passed by her on the sidewalk I was able to see her face more clearly in the darkness. The light of her phone screen illuminated a sorrowful look in her eyes, her pretty mouth downturned at the corners. She was so distracted that she never saw me coming. I shoved her from behind, jolting her over the waist-high railing, and she tumbled screaming into the river below. I kept walking, hearing a crash a few seconds later when she hit the surface of the water.

I hadn’t been sure I was going to push her until I saw her face. That sad look, that pathetic expression of misery, had sealed the deal. As if she knew what it was to be miserable. Like she had ever really suffered. These people didn’t know what suffering was, but I was going to show them. I was going to render unto them the punishment that they rightfully deserved. Once again, a triumphant feeling arose in me. I felt that were I to jump off the bridge after the woman I’d just pushed to her death, that I would soar into the air on burning wings. I strode home, feeling a strange sensation permeating my body. My legs seemed to lengthen with each stride, becoming stronger and leaner.

When the story hit the news the next day, it was presented as a suicide. Nobody had been around to see me push her off, and the girl’s phone had been recovered from the river below. She’d just been dumped by her boyfriend and the assumption was that she’d been so devastated that she’d taken her own life. Maybe she had been thinking about jumping off when I pushed her. I doubt it, though. If she was, then she was even dumber than she looked. Nobody came asking me any questions this time.

There was just one problem: the surge of joy I’d felt had worn off even more quickly than it had with Adam. Was it because I hadn’t known her? Because it all happened so fast that I didn’t even get to see the body? I wasn’t sure. I tried to hold onto the feeling, the look on her face, but it slipped away from me with the passing of each day. Maybe, I realized, what I needed was for someone to know what I was doing and why.

I logged onto the forum and noticed that someone had already posted about the girl. What a joke, the topic creator said. This bitch had never experienced loneliness. Foids had no idea how easy they had it. She could have gone out and had a new boyfriend in minutes if she’d wanted. A few replies struck a more compassionate tone, but they were pretty quickly shut down by the deluge of responses agreeing with the original poster. I chimed in to bring up Adam’s death, suggesting that maybe the two were connected somehow. Wouldn’t it be wild, I asked, if someone was targeting these people? I got a lot of responses calling me a fag and telling me to shut up. A few people replied agreeing that it would be incredible, but that none of the basement-dwelling freaks who hated them enough could pull something like that off.

The casual cruelty of the forums didn’t shock me anymore. These were people who’d been told their whole lives that they were subhuman, disgusting, and worthless. Of course they would turn their venom on one another when they created a space for themselves. But I was going to show them there was another way. Instead of hating ourselves, we could put our anger towards better targets. We could let the Chads and Staceys of the world know how quickly their seemingly-perfect lives could be destroyed. That for all of their good looks and unearned comfort in the world, they were still meat and bone like the rest of us.

I dove back into the works of our patron saint, James Hanson. Returning to his writing with two murders under my belt, I recognized more strongly than ever its powerful genius. Even when he was castigating feminism for warping the sexual market, he was always careful not to go too far and argue for anything that might be seen as extreme. But the more I re-read his books, re-watched his lectures, the more I felt sure that this was a calculated move on his part. He was a university professor, a respected intellectual. In his position, he couldn’t argue for anything like what I was doing. But it was the natural endpoint of his arguments, anyone could see that. He had provided the theory that had helped me understand how the world really worked — I was simply carrying out the practice.

Weeks later, I found my next target. I’d been going to bars, clubs, anywhere I thought beautiful people might congregate. And I’d realized that I couldn’t rely on them being blackout drunk or lingering somewhere they might easily be pushed to their death, so I’d bought a knife. Gloves, too, since I wasn’t stupid. It was at a bar one night that I spotted him: this tall, blonde guy with a carefree air about him and a winning smile. High cheekbones, a nice tan. Hunter eyes — vertically narrow, deep set, solid canthal tilt and interpupil distance. He was wearing minimalist clothing — a dark blazer over a light tee and slacks that showed off his figure. I despised him as soon as I spotted him drinking a few seats down. It was easy to sneak something into his drink when he wasn’t looking. Women know to watch for that kind of thing, but men seldom think to. Guys like him especially, they don’t realize how vulnerable they really are.

Doubtless he was confused when the roofie started to hit him. He staggered out of the bar, maybe just thinking he needed some air. I followed him out, watched him walk uneasily over to a bench and collapse onto it, sweat beading on his blemish-free forehead. I closed the distance, noticed the way he seemed to be drifting in and out of consciousness, and scoped out my surroundings. It was late, and nobody else was around. Slipping on the gloves, I pulled the knife out of my pocket and dropped down next to him on the bench. He didn’t respond. I leaned over as if to see if he was alright and slipped the knife in between his ribs. I’d never stabbed someone before, but the feeling of the blade penetrating skin and muscle was stupendous. He gasped, a ragged sound pried from his lungs, one of which I’d probably punctured. I reached into his pocket, fished out his wallet, stashed it and the knife and pulled his blazer back over the wound.

He gurgled and foamed a little, flecks of saliva dotting his neck and chest. I sat there for a while and watched. It was the first time I’d actually had the opportunity to savor my actions. Adam had been an impulsive, quick thing. The girl on the bridge had been by necessity a singular moment. This was different. I drank in the sensations of this man drowning in his own blood, this beneficiary of society’s hierarchy of worthiness. He would never know why I’d done it, but soon, people would start to realize that something was happening. I grinned triumphantly at the dying man, got up, and walked off into the night.

The next day, I posted on the forum again about the murder. This one couldn’t be written off as an accident or suicide — it was obviously a violent act. When I linked it to the other recent deaths in the city, people started to listen this time. The idea that a killer was targeting the beautiful began to catch on. They called him — me — the Avenging Angel, quoted Hanson about the role feminism had played in bringing us to this point. These people had brought it on themselves. And finally, somebody was doing something about it. Beautiful people controlled society, inflicted violence on us every day through casual dehumanization and humiliation. This was the only way that we could fight back.

*

The days continued, predictable and staid. The nights were when I came alive, animated by a calling beyond anything I’d ever known. I realized that for the first time, I had a reason to live beyond the meager little prizes society had laid before me my entire life. And I felt incredible. That is, until one evening, when I saw Hanson being interviewed on the news.

They’d called him in as a specialist on young men and masculinity, having gotten the idea that the stabbing murder was the act of a disturbed, violent young man. They hadn’t connected that death to the other two, though. Hanson appeared in his spartan home office on a video call, a few books lining the shelves behind him, a lone plant standing in the corner. He was wearing a tweed jacket and a pressed shirt and tie, looking as he might while teaching a class of undergraduates.

“What you have to understand,” he said in his nasal tone, “is that young men today, especially young white men, are terribly disaffected. They’ve been born into a world where there’s no place for them. They’re told over and over again that masculinity is toxic, that being white is a crime, that they’re sinners simply for existing. It’s a horrible thing we’re doing to these boys.”

The anchor, a blonde woman in her 50s desperately trying to hide her age with makeup and styling, cut in. “Dr. Hanson, surely you’re not justifying these kinds of senseless violent acts?”

“No, of course not. All I’m saying is that people can only be pushed so far before they begin to push back.”

“And you believe that this was the work of such a young man pushing back?”

“Well, I don’t think the police have given any official indication of that yet. But if that turns out to be the case, then it should be a wakeup call. We cannot continue to treat boys as second-class citizens and expect them to stand by and accept it.”

“But would you condemn any young man who decided to take matters into his own hands using violence?”

Hanson snorted. “Yes, like any rational person I condemn violence in all its forms. Anyone who kills a total stranger is obviously a very sick and depraved individual. It’s just important to remember that sickness doesn’t manifest out of nowhere.”

I shut off the TV, a cold feeling settling over my neck and shoulders. Sick and depraved? Was that really what he thought of me? Hanson was my hero. He was the one who showed me the way things really worked. I knew that he had to say certain things on TV and in his books, that he couldn’t come right out and approve of what I was doing. He had said it himself — people can only be pushed so far before they snap. If anyone should understand, it was him. I decided that I needed to talk to him, needed to explain myself. The impulse was a dangerous one, but if my actions were going to have any meaning at all, that meaning was to be found in the practical application of his theories. Surely, he would see that.

It was surprisingly easy to find Hanson’s home address through his school. I took a car out there one evening without having contacted him in advance. He was a popular figure, but not a true celebrity, and he lived in a two-story house out in the suburbs — it was a half-hour drive, during which I sat in silence and rehearsed my conversation. I’d brought the knife and the dead man’s wallet, because I wanted to have proof in case he brushed me off as a lunatic.

I pulled up to the house and rang the doorbell around dusk. Hanson lived alone, having divorced years earlier. He had a couple of adult children, neither of whom lived in the city. It was just him in this large home. He must be lonely, I thought. I imagined he might in fact welcome my company, once he got to know me. After a few moments, Hanson appeared in the doorway. He was wearing a plush housecoat and looked somewhat out of sorts, his eyes glazed and slightly unfocused.

“Yes? What do you want?” He asked brusquely.

“Hi,” I began, “I wanted to speak with you about your appearance on the news the other day.”

“Talk to my publicist,” he said, beginning to close the door. I pressed forward. This close, I could see how frail and confused he looked. He was only in his late 50s, but his body was such a small thing, his messy gray hair topping off a wrinkled, stubbled head that seemed not to realize that it was attached to anything, the way it bobbed around.

“It’s important. I need to speak with you.”

He eyed me warily, looking for a second like he was going to try and fight me off. But then he stepped back and allowed me inside, shaking his head. I hadn’t been sure what to expect of his home, but it was less impressive than I’d been imagining. As he led me through the hall and into the living room, I realized that the place was somewhat barren. Maybe his wife had taken some of the furnishings. But if that was the case, then he’d been living like this for years, in a half-empty house.

He staggered over to a tall chair by the unlit fireplace and dumped himself into it, then motioned for me to sit on the couch across from him. Had I caught him at a bad time? Or was this his normal state of affairs? He seemed so different from the put-together, assured posture in his videos and public appearances.

“I don’t know why I’m indulging you. Do you know how many fans I get coming to my home to try and speak to me?” He asked, his tone wavering.

“I’m not a fan,” I said. “Well, I am, but I didn’t come here for advice or to get you to sign a book or anything like that.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Right, right. You said you wanted to talk to me about my appearance on the news. Well then, what is it?”

He seemed vaguely distracted or not entirely present. Was it drugs? There had been rumors to that effect, though I’d never believed them. How could someone as successful and knowledgable as him be an addict? Or was it that he’d seen things too clearly and needed to numb himself to cope? Sitting there, his eyes glassy, sprawled in his housecoat, I was beginning to wonder.

“Right,” I said. “In that interview, you talked about how society could only push people so far before they snapped.”

“Did I?” He asked. “I suppose I must have. Yes, that does sound like something I’d say. Well, what of it?”

“I agree. Society’s been set up in such a way that certain people are seen as surplus populations. It’s inhuman.”

“Sure, sure.”

“But then you said something else. When the host asked you, you said that you condemned violence, even if it was a young man who felt pushed to it by the extremity of his conditions.”

His eyes narrowed. “Of course I do. Rational people shouldn’t resort to such primitive methods of dealing with their emotions.”

My mouth twitched and I tried to disguise it as a friendly smile. “But surely society does violence to us everyday. Every subtle exclusion, bit of ridicule, instance of denial — those are all forms of violence. Is it fair to condemn the individual who takes up physical violence in return?”

“It may not be fair, but it’s the civilized thing to do.” He gazed into the dead fireplace, his hand feeling around for something on the table next to his chair but coming up empty.

“Civilized?” I asked, surprised he was keeping up the facade here in private, with no cameras on him. Maybe he thought I was recording our conversation. “You don’t have to pretend that with me. I’ve read your books. I know what you really think.”

“What I really think, eh?” He asked, leaning back in the chair. “What is it that I really think?”

I smiled. “That modern social ideologies have corrupted the western world, of course.”

“Well, yes, the influence of woke morality has been disastrous, that’s for certain.”

“And that we must fight back by any means necessary.”

“By any means…” He raised an eyebrow, gathering himself up from the chair and grabbing a half-empty bottle of scotch and a glass from the mantle, bringing them with him back to his seat and pouring himself rather a lot. “What exactly are you talking about, hm?”

“You know what I’m talking about. Direct action.”

Hanson looked at me over the edge of the glass as he sipped at the scotch. “Direct… action?”

“Yes. Like that man who was stabbed the other day. That wasn’t a random attack. He was chosen for what he represented. He was a Chad, one of the beautiful people. One of the people who rule this world, thanks to feminism.”

“What are you saying?” Hanson asked, his hand trembling. “What is it that you’re saying?”

“I’m saying that I killed that guy. And he wasn’t the first, either. There were others, too, though the police don’t seem to have connected them yet.”

Hanson just sat there, staring at me for a second. “You’re not making any sense. I think you’d better go now. Christ, this is what I get for letting a stranger into my home.”

“You don’t believe me?”

“I believe,” he said, “That you’re a very troubled person.”

I pulled the murdered man’s wallet out of my pocket and brandished it. “Look at this,” I said. “It belonged to one of the people I killed. You’ll recognize the photo on his driver’s licence from the news.”

Hanson leaned forward and peered at the tiny picture. Then his eyes met mine and he pulled back in the seat, almost like he was trying to push himself away from me. Without breaking eye contact, he began to root around in one of the pockets of his housecoat. He pulled out his phone and held it in his pale, veiny hand.

“What are you doing?” I asked, confused.

“I’m calling the police.”

“What? Why?”

“You’ve just confessed to murder, and for all I know you’re here to kill me too.”

My jaw dropped. “I don’t want to kill you! Why would I want to do that?”

“I’m not sure. But let’s just stay calm, yes? I’m sure the police can sort all this out.”

“Put the phone down,” I said, trying to keep my voice from raising even as feelings of confusion and betrayal prickled me. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

“Then why come here? What do you want from me?” He asked, his eyes wild with fear.

I shook my head, getting up from the chair and watching as he shrank backwards. Was this tiny, pathetic creature the man I’d idolized? The one who I thought had it all figured out?

“I wanted to tell you what I’ve done. I wanted… well, it seems pretty silly now, but I guess I wanted your approval.”

“My… approval? What on earth made you think I’d approve of your actions? You’re sick!”

Hot tears of anger began to well up in my eyes. I realized that I’d miscalculated. I’d misunderstood Hanson. He didn’t really believe anything he talked about. Wasn’t willing to fight for his ideas, couldn’t even endorse someone else doing so. Everything he’d promoted in his books, his lectures, it was all a lie.

“I’m sick?” I shouted. “Look at you, trembling there in your robe, drunk and high in this empty house. You’re sick. You’ve profited off of people like me, but when the chips are down you aren’t man enough to stand by us.”

“I’m… I’m warning you,” Hanson said, pressing his body back into the chair, seemingly willing himself to slip into it in order to escape me.

“You already did warn me. You warned me about the world, and I listened.”

I advanced towards him, drawing the knife from my pocket.

“The police will know this was you. You’ve gotten away with all of this so far, so why not just let me go? I won’t tell anyone, I promise!” He cowered from me, powerless to escape or change his fate.

I gripped the knife and jerked it towards his chest. He coughed blood onto my sleeve in a strangled, weak sound that made me loathe him even more. I pulled the knife back and stabbed him, again and again. I lost track of how many times. The knife plunged into the meat of his body long after life stopped coursing through it. When I finally stepped back, his torso was nothing but a gory mess.

I looked down at my hands, soaked in a scarlet that stained my shirt. For a moment, I stood there in silence, wondering at the hands that had, in the end, been superior to the will of my hero. Leaving him in his chair, I walked upstairs, my long legs propelling me up the steps two at a time. I wandered down the hall to the bathroom, running the taps and washing my hands under the warm water. The blood swirled down the drain, but my sleeves were still splattered with it and a few stubborn dregs remained under my nails. I stared at my face in the mirror, half-expecting to hear the sounds of approaching sirens. None came.

I ran myself a bath, stripped off my clothes, and stuffed them, the jacket I’d cut up, and the knife into a garbage bag I found under the bathroom sink. I hadn’t meant to kill Hanson, but he was dead nonetheless. Better this way, probably. His true nature had been exposed as hollow and empty. And if even he was corrupt and cowardly, then who could I really trust? Nobody but myself. I rooted around in his medicine cabinet, confirming the rumors online that he’d developed a benzo habit.

As I stretched out in the porcelain tub, I admired the way my legs had to bend to fit into it. I considered the slender white scars which ran down either one, evidence of all I had given up to get here. What had it all been for? Attention from people who would never give it to me? Admiration from a father figure who had proven to be a fraud? I felt like a child, lying there in the hot water and watching the last vestiges of Hanson’s blood swirl off my skin in little eddies. I tried to remember how long it had been since I’d taken a bath. Why didn’t I do it more often? Warm and wet. Comforting. I considered the bottle next to me and closed my eyes.