The Outsider

Part 5

I couldn't sleep that night. Not that I was surprised. Nights like these, after parties filled with faces I loathed and moments I feigned interest in, usually left me restless. So instead of fighting the insomnia, I decided to do something else something I'd been doing more frequently lately. 

I started writing.

It was ironic, really. I was an engineering student. My life should've been about numbers, formulas, and equations. But there I was, sitting at my desk, scribbling words in a journal like some pretentious wannabe novelist. Just how messed up was that?

The book wasn't anything special, just a collection of thoughts, fragments of stories, and ideas that had been swirling around in my head. It was a way to process everything I observed, all the chaos, the darkness, and the emptiness that filled the people around me. The same darkness that was inside me.

Most people would have seen it as a waste of time. What could a guy studying engineering possibly know about writing? But that's the thing—I wasn't writing for anyone else. I wasn't trying to impress some professor or fit into some mold. I was writing to understand myself, to make sense of the contradictions in my life.

Engineering was supposed to be logical, practical, and grounded in reality. And yet, here I was, fascinated by the messiness of human emotion, the failures, the fears, and the facades that everyone, including me, put up. Writing was my way of pulling back the curtain, of exposing the raw truth underneath it all.

And tonight, after that party, after seeing Serena fall apart and Samantha cling to me like a lifeline, I had a lot to process.

I glanced at the clock. It was late—too late to be doing anything productive, and definitely too late for this sort of soul-searching. But I kept writing anyway, words spilling out of me faster than I could stop them.

I wondered, as I wrote, if this was just another way to avoid my own reality. To avoid facing the fact that I was just as trapped as they were, no matter how much I liked to think I was above it all. Maybe that's why I couldn't sleep—because deep down, I knew that the darkness I saw in everyone else wasn't so different from the one lurking inside me.

I lost track of time as I kept writing. The hours slipped by unnoticed, the lines on the page filling up with thoughts I didn't even know I had. My hand ached, but I didn't stop. It was almost like the more I wrote, the more I needed to get out. Words bled onto the page, unraveling the tangled mess of my thoughts.

I glanced at the clock again, only to realize that it was already morning. How long had I been at this? The sun was creeping up over the horizon, casting an orange glow through the blinds, and the room felt cold in that early, silent way before the world woke up.

I should've been tired, should've felt the exhaustion after a sleepless night. But instead, there was a strange kind of clarity, like writing had emptied out all the noise in my head, leaving just enough space for a few moments of stillness.

But as the sun climbed higher, reality began to settle in again. Another day. Another round of pretending. Another chance to keep feeding the darkness that wouldn't leave me alone.

I was still stuck, just like the rest of them.

Brunch was an unspoken tradition. Every Monday, the group would gather at the same overpriced café, trying to act like we were above it all while pretending to enjoy the stale routine. I wasn't particularly looking forward to it, but it was easier to show up than explain why I didn't.

Samantha was the first to arrive, as usual. She flashed her usual shallow smile as she plopped into her seat, already complaining about Staten Island before I could even settle in.