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I saw the car coming. I didn’t tell anyone when I woke up at the hospital. It was a secret I was willing to keep until death, whenever I managed to kill myself properly.

Trying to kill myself is a little embarrassing. Failing to do so is even worse. Maybe riding my bike out into oncoming traffic wasn’t the brightest idea I’ve ever come up with, but I wanted it to look like an accident. Oops, he had no idea that the light had turned! I really didn’t want others to know that I desperately wanted to die.

Why? Why was I so desperate to die? It was a question that constantly plagued me. I had no answer. Maybe people are just born to be depressed. Born to unhappiness. Born to suffer for absolutely no conceivable reason whatsoever. Why the fuck did it have to be me?

I had a friend. Just one. I was a loner sixty percent of the time. The other 40 percent was spent with my best friend, Josh. He was nice, sociable, athletic – my antithesis. I usually hated people like him. For some reason I just wanted to be around him more.

In a nutshell: Josh was the only person I liked. I hated human beings. All of them. Except Josh. I hated my parents, I hated my three younger brothers, I hated my family. I liked animals, though. Animals had done nothing to disappoint me.

Because I hated my family so very much, I decided I needed to do something with forty percent of the sixty percent of Loner Time that was usually spent at home.

One day, as I was walking to school with Josh, I happened to notice a sign hanging on the window of a sandwich shop. “Now Hiring.” I liked money. I decided to go inside and apply. And that’s the story of how I got a job. Thrilling.

Two years after my failed suicide and one year after beginning my job as a "sandwich artist," nothing much had changed. I was still incredibly depressed and wholeheartedly willing to die. I imagined many scenarios: falling off buildings, drowning in pools, slipping on knives. Despite all that, I had yet to commit another suicide attempt.

“What’s on the Italian sandwich?”

"Pepperoni, salami, and ham."

"Mmm. I'll take the meatball."

Carol's eyebrow twitched. When Carol's eyebrow twitched, it could only mean one thing. Carol was pissed off.

And who wouldn't be? This man had rung the bell without knowing what he wanted. He had stood there looking at the menu like some retard. He stood there and, because he rang the bell, we stood there, too. In silence. Just standing there. We all looked like retards.

After ringing the man up, Carol slumped her shoulders and slowly walked into the backroom. I followed her like some lost puppy who has just found itself a new master.

Carol jumped up on to the prep table and crossed her legs. I did the same. We had already finished everything we needed to do. This was the boring "quiet time." The time after lunch and before dinner when we had no customers and absolutely nothing to do.

I looked over at Carol. This was always awkward. Her silence. Carol was always quiet. To be honest, they were all quiet around me. Carol, Jeff, and Tiffany. I was the type that faded into the background. It was intentional. I didn't like talking.

Carol, though. Carol was smart as hell. She graduated from high school the year before, fourth in her class. She was currently attending college on a full ride scholarship. Because she was human, I hated her. But at least she talked more to me than anyone else at the sandwich shop. She told me all sorts of things. She said she wanted to slit our customers' throats. She said she would love to buy a shotgun and kill her mother. She said she once bought a hammer with the goal of nailing flat heads into our bosses' head. Carol made me nervous.

The silence never seemed to end. I didn't help much. Except around Josh, I never really spoke.

"I wanted to fucking kill that guy," Carol began.

I sometimes enjoyed silence.

“Over here, Leland!” Josh called as he sat at a table in the lunchroom. I hurried over and noticed that Elizabeth was with him. I hated that bitch.

She smiled as she greeted me, “Hey, Leland. How are you?”

”Fine. And you?”

She giggled her response. I hated gigglers. I hated gigglers who stole Josh. And this giggler was definitely trying to steal Josh.

“We’re going to the movies tonight, want to come?” Josh asked.

I could tell that Elizabeth really didn’t want me coming.

”Yeah,” I said with enthusiasm. Two could play that game, bitch.

Josh had become interested in Elizabeth Teeter two months prior. He liked her and I hated that. It was only a matter of time before he’d ask her out. Where would that leave me? Completely alone?

My relationship with Josh was complicated. It was so terribly complicated, that I didn’t want to think about it.

I was lucky enough to get to work on my day off school.

Mornings were awful. I hated mornings. That's when we had to do prep. We had to put our hands in frozen meat, tear them apart and place them into square paper cups. My hands hurt from the cold. My back hurt from bending over. My brain hurt from doing the same meticulous routine over and over again.

Before putting the meat into the cups, we had to weigh it. Steak had to be exactly 3.5 ounces. Chicken had to be exactly 2.75 ounces. Maybe not exactly. But I had to make it exact. It had to be perfect. It usually took me longer to do this than anyone else. Some call it “OCD,” I call it “life.”

Jeff was cutting onions. Jeff was “fun.” He was 20 and going to college to be some sort of designer. He was funny and everyone liked him. He was also gay. Meaning, slutty Tiffany couldn't get at him. Which was bad for her, I guess. Because she was a slut. At least, that's what Carol told me. I tended to believe everything Carol told me, even when I knew she was lying.

I didn’t like Jeff. He called girls “girl” and used his hands frequently when talking. He also wore orange shit on his skin to the point where Oompa Loompas would seem pale.

He didn’t talk to me and I didn’t talk to him. Working with him was more than just awkward. It was torture.

The bell rang. Jeff took a quick peek around the corner while taking off his gloves.

”It’s that cute guy, I’ll get him,” he said with a smile as he rushed to the front of the store.

The “cute guy” was some man who made a habit of coming to the store every Monday and Wednesday for his lunch break. The guy was a freak. Our sandwiches weren’t good enough for one day a week, let alone two.

I could hear Jeff flirting out front as I moved on to slicing up cucumbers. I heard Jeff’s horrid laughter as I imagined my own neck being chopped instead of the cucumber I was holding in my hand.

Jeff made his way into the backroom and returned to his onions.

”He’s so hot.”

How was I supposed to respond? Yes, he is hot. Oh, you like that type?

“So what’s your type, Leland?”

Damn.

”Uh, I don’t know,” I mumbled. I did not want to delve into this conversation. If only I could be that cucumber. Slice.

“You don’t know? Have you ever had a girlfriend? Do you like blue eyes or green eyes or what?”

”Blue. Blonde hair.” Was I pulling shit out of my ass? Anything to make this guy shut up. I was beginning to miss our awkward silence.

“Quiet and shy or fun and social?”

“I don’t know, maybe fun…”

The bell rang. Jeff went up front. By the time he came back, all interest in our previous conversation was lost. That was a good thing because I was blushing as I realized that my fun blue-eyed blonde was Josh.

Coming home was the worst. I hated my parents. I hated them more than life itself. Which I already hated a lot considering my desire to die.

“Leland, it’s your turn to wash the dishes. Make sure you do your homework before going to bed, too.”

My step-mother. Never mind that it was 10 P.M. Never mind that every day was my day to clean dishes. Never mind that I was tired from going to school and to work. As long as I did what she told me, and her kids got to do what they wanted, life was great.

My father had married the woman when I was five. My real mother moved to California, thinking her son was an insignificant piece of her history. My father got full custody. He probably thought he was doing the “right thing.” Then Jessie the Bitch came along. One year later, George came along. Then Joseph. And finally, Mikey. My three brothers. I hated them, too.

I washed the dishes. I pretended to do my homework. And then, I went to bed.

My terribly monotonous life was interrupted only weeks later.