Imaginary Friend

Lots of kids have imaginary friends. I remember being imaginative and coming up with stories for my pretend companions, I grew out of it.

But fast forward to freshman year of college and I am stressed out trying to study while it seems like the world is falling apart. For weeks all the news can talk about is the psychic girl who went on a rampage in New York City and how she tortured and mind raped innocent people in a convoluted and nonsensical attempt to free her sister who was serving a prison sentence for mind rape and psychological torture.

Then everything becomes about this new drug, Mutanex. An intense psychedelic and stimulant that makes the world feel more alive and has the possible side effect of turning users into a mutant with more than a few videos going viral for capturing the moment someone ODs on Mutanex and turns into a puddle of goo.

"Mutant Attacks On The Rise." "Mutants who read minds and walk through walls, is anyone safe?" "Mutant groupies, meet the women that want to give birth to more dangerous freaks." "28th Amendment gaining traction, are mutants about to become slaves?" it was all the News would talk about.

I figured a short break from studying is not going to kill me. One little house party to blow off some steam.

Long story short, I wake up the next morning in a stranger's house with a terrible hangover lying in a pile of naked people.

It takes some effort, but I find my clothes and stuff and decide to walk back to campus before anyone can make things any more awkward.

"We sure did have fun last night, didn't we?" I heard someone say. I looked around for the source of the voice only to see no one around. "It was lucky that I came along when I did, otherwise that Cliff fellow would have turned your face to hamburger. But I was not going to let that happen on my watch."

That was when I saw them, floating in the air with an ephemeral quality that made me know what I was looking at was not in a material sense of the word, real. "That is right, you are a mutant and I..." The hallucination gestured to itself with smug satisfaction. "...am your powers." My imaginary friend laughed as I came to grips with the fact that my life was over.