Displacement

I’m going to help heroin addicts, she said
And then she railed a line of coke off the kitchen counter
I wanted to believe that maybe she was genuine and she really would help people and it wasn’t one of those situations where you fixate on someone else’s problem to cover up your own
No, maybe she would help. Write articles, educate, volunteer, tumble into obscurity, like the rest of the bad things that we shelve in the back of our brains
A shadowy confessional
Keeping the dark thoughts contained
But acknowledging they’re there and they’re bad and they’re not buried deeply, shallow, digging in, taking root, breaking down
I didn’t do it
I had to do it
I don’t remember doing it
That’s what evil people tell themselves when they want to do evil things.