The Disaffected

PROLOGUE

I know that at one point in my life, I accepted that any number of sins might attach themselves to me - infidelity, bankruptcy, addiction - but never this, never murder.

Now that I am in my older years, my younger ones seem alien, as if they once belonged to a character from a novel whom I think I know, but truly never will no matter how many times I reread her story.

I cannot say that I am regretful about what happened. When I reminisce on the series of events leading up to that fateful night and the subsequent ones after, guilt and remorse never come to me. Instead, I find myself sensing something akin to gratefulness, for how else could I have entered that unknown world? How else would that glittering group of creatures at one time have considered me a friend, their friend were it not for that night?

From what I knew of Morgan's life, if we had not ended it, someone else would have, I am sure of this. Maybe she could have ended up as a statistic; another nineteen year old killed at the hands of her much older, much angrier boyfriend? Or perhaps she would have contributed to the growing pool of young adult overdoses; a misunderstood addict with too much time and not enough willpower? We gave her much more than any of her inevitable options - we sensationalized her.

If I am to feel any notion of regret, then maybe it is that by killing her, we failed to realize that we would immortalize her. You see, her memory persists at the university in a capacity we did not think possible. Mere days after her death was announced, a magnificent, vibrant mural appeared, as if by magic, in the quad. Morgan's eyes were closed, and her lips faintly smiled, as her suspended head floated in a ring of rainbow flowers. It didn't look like her, not the Morgan I knew. The hair was too full, the skin too poreless, and her features too symmetrical. Whoever the artist was had painted her as if he or she loved her, for she was beautiful and young and would always be that beautiful and young. It pains me knowing that she will only ever look like that, but I and the rest of my former friends continue to grow old and ever so slowly lose our beauty that we so deeply relied on for so many years. Our sin is reflected in our increasing age and the difficulties that come with it, but Morgan will never know such pains, and somehow in death, she haunts me even more than in life.