"I Would Kill for Them, and That's Not a Metaphor"

I'm halfway to Rick's when I see a guy in a smug little bomber jacket and instantly remember him — the walking incel podcast that made us friends by existing.

It was the start-of-term mixer for Sociology and Business Admin. One of those fake-casual events where someone's always aggressively networking and the drinks are warm and watery. I never planned to attend a single one, but felt inclined to at least know to figure out who to avoid outside class. I did not come to be tested.

But then there he was. Aviators inside, V-neck plunging to his navel, posture like he'd just closed a crypto deal. And of course — of course — he was already holding court at the bar.

"Wow," he says, grinning around his drink, "this many women in sociology? It's like Tinder built a think tank for daddy issues."

I don't even turn around yet. I just blink at the bartender, who visibly flinches. My blood pressure spikes. I swivel on my stool.

"You always this original? Or just when your reflection isn't enough company?"

He laughs, like I've proven his point. "You're cute when you're defensive. Let me guess — angry feminist with a minor in being difficult?"

I take one step forward.

That's when someone grabs my elbow. A girl I've never seen before, soft sweater, face going red with anxiety. "Hey, uh, hi — cousin! We've got that thing? The family thing?"

I stare at her. "Cousin?"

"Yep!" she squeaks. "Emergency! Come on."

He snorts. "Cousins, huh? Kinda hot."

Enter Sam. Six feet of spine and disdain, strides over like she's about to shut down a boardroom. She plants herself between us.

"Okay, that's enough," she says sharply. "This isn't a urinal, it's a bar. Don't mistake proximity for invitation."

He just smirks. "Jesus. Do they train you to be this uptight in girlboss school?"

And then, just behind me — Elly.

Razor sharp bob, red lipstick, a drink in one hand. She looks him up and down like she's trying to price him out on eBay. And then she smiles. Not nicely.

"You really just had to keep talking, didn't you?"

He shrugs. "Didn't realize I was auditioning for your approval."

She steps closer. Calm. Controlled. Deadly.

"Right. And I didn't realize I'd walked into a TED Talk for fragile masculinity."

Then she raises her drink — slowly — like it's a toast.

"To you," she says. "For proving that evolution isn't guaranteed."

And dumps the entire thing on his chest.

Everything explodes.

He yells. The bartender screams. Glass shatters. We get shoved out so fast my heels scrape the doorway.

Outside, it's a mess. Kat's pacing. Sam's already composing a complaint email in her head. I'm ready to throw hands. Elly's lighting a cigarette like it's a victory cigar.

"I had it," I snap, still seething. "He was two seconds from learning what a stool to the face feels like."

"You were about to go full WrestleMania," Sam says. "That's not resolution, that's a court date."

"Okay but why did I have to fake a cousin emergency?" Kat blurts. "Why didn't we just... call security?!"

Elly exhales smoke. "Because you were all busy staging a TEDx talk and I was bored."

I point a finger at her. "You threw vodka on a stranger."

"And you were about to go viral on Reddit," she replies. "I just saved you from being a meme."

We all glare at each other. Still panting, still vibrating with fight. Then—

Kat laughs. That high, unhinged laugh of someone teetering on the edge. Sam tries to suppress hers. I snort. Elly grins.

Ten minutes later, we're squashed into a cracked booth at a dive bar with cheaper drinks, trying to pretend we're not already some kind of unit.

We didn't plan on each other. We didn't even like each other that much. But they really were anything but what I thought business school should look like. Chaos introduced us. And chaos, apparently, kept us.

***

I make my way into Rick's diner, two blocks from my apartment. I recognize the faces behind the group chat Mentally out of office although they are completely twisted from deep felt laughs. I'm late, but present for the mandatory no-excuse sunday meet.

We meet before twelve if nobody's hungover, which means we nine out of ten times do late lunch. Rick's menu is the size of the bible and that's usually a sign of quantity over quality in my book. Rick's is somehow different, everything they serve works - Cheesecake, Pizza, Americano, Pasta, Homemade sourdough buns.

At this point we don't order. Rick just gives us a look as we enter, and serves us what he knows we need. Today I'll most likely get decaf americano, pepperoni pizza with a decent amount of veggie pizza hidden below. I know he's going to serve me a caramel sundae when I've eaten all the pepperoni and half the veggies. To him, I might seem like a kid. Not sure if it's because of my eating habits or because I ask him to adopt me every Sunday.

"Well, look what the cat dragged in?" Sam laughs, impersonating an old white dude. She has perfected this impersonation since graduating her Masters. Unwillingly. She gets daily inspiration from all-male colleagues in some kind of future-of-banking-strategy department.

I fake a smile in reply to her fake laugh. I plop down in the last spot in our booth. Softly sighing as my ass is welcomed by a hug in a red-leather version.

"Sorry I'm late. Got caught in a hostage situation. Might've developed Stockholm syndrome. But hey - I survived. Sort of." I explain.

My best friends laugh, part sympathy, part disbelief. It quickly dries off as they detect a seriousness in my expression. I'm not laughing - I'm too exhausted.

Kat put her hand on my arm softly to comfort me. Her voice serious from worry, as she ask me,

"Freddie, what happened? Are you ok?"

Rick puts down a sundae with caramel in front of me. I give him a puzzled look but he's gone before I can voice an actual question. A frown is slightly formed on my face as I don't quite understand what's happening.

"Well,.." I say, and suddenly the tears start running down my face. I try to brush them away, and restart my answer, but that somehow triggers a whole stream of tears.

I only ever get dessert first, when I'm out of it. That bastard somehow knew that I would start crying before I did.

***

In between sobs and tears - and - an unhealthy amount of blowing my nose, I managed to give a play-by-play of the past 72 hours. I stopped crying, Kat stopped sympathy-crying. It felt possible to breathe again, and I cracked a smile when Kat started citing the eleven benefits of crying.

She would know. She cries over anything - cartoons, politics, her boyfriend - but because he's thoughtful and kind. And, everything soft, cuddly or animated she has ever come across.

That's who she is to us - the warmest person alive. She's a something manager at a tech startup, but spends most days playing games. I know she's great at her job, but even if she weren't, I would understand why they would pay her to stick around anyway.

"No need to be a fucking dick about it." I say the line hollowly and my friends grant me a pity-laugh for trying.

Sam slap her mouth shut, while her eyes seem to be lit up by Christmas lights.

"I completely forgot to tell you, he's going to get fired" She announce, a radiant smile on her lips.

The man in question was Sam's assigned 'buddy' when she started in the strategy department. He was two years her senior. Her new boss was gross, wandering eyes, slightly sexual innuendos, but that was expected. He had grabbed her ass one particular night, and she had slapped him. She had gone to her 'buddy' to figure out what to do. She had cried as she retold her experience to him. He scoffed in reply. Said to deal with it and finally remarked - "No need to cry about it".

That's when Sam had enough. She had roared "No need to be a fucking dick about it!" at him. The next day she went to HR, her boss was immediately dismissed and she got herself a new buddy.

"The best thing is, he's walking around with a huge promotion in mind. I'm going to camp outside his office. I can't wait to see him cry." she says, before exhaling a devilish grin.

Kat's eyes widen before she starts laughing, like she can't seem to fathom what she just heard. Elly just laughs wholeheartedly and chimes in "Pictures or it didn't happen - I have to see that ugly face crying!".

My laugh rings of relief. I'm happy for Sam. I instantly recall the pain, the self-doubt, the anxiety she dealt with. She still deals with it actually, even though she's a superstar there now.

"Think I can get his office?" I ask dryly. No one says anything. They just kind of exchange expressions, the laughs have somehow died down.

Elly crinkles her nose, a thing she does right before she calls bullshit on someone, or something.

"Do you really want to quit the progra.." Elly asks, but Kat's voice takes over "Do you want to quit so you can date him?"

"It was a joke, come on." I offer in turn to drop the subject. Looking at my friends, they nod as if to push me to go on.

"I know it might have seemed like I was about to set fire to my life and make a run for it before. But. It's not like that, I'm just overwhelmed by everything" I say and feel lighter somehow.

The looks around the table mirror my relief, before Elly asks for final reassurance,

"You're not trying to make a run for it?"

"No. My job has almost always been this shitty. I can stick it out till I get senior on my resume, I just have to finish the programme and then it'll be better" I say. As I say it out loud it works reassuring to myself as well. Like I'm reminding myself of this for the first time in a while.

Elly seems unconvinced, as she tries asking slightly different,

"You know you're the most important, right? Your headspa-"

I interrupt before she can finish the sentence.

"Yes. I know. I'm good. This weekend has just screwed with my head on so many different levels" I say and exhale as exhausted as I feel.

I know what she's asking. If I'm on my way back into 2015 mode. Take me to the psychiatrist. Feed me. Bathe me. Help me back to life. The reason we started Sunday's at Rick's. Keep an eye on me. She is asking me what step on the ladder I'm on and if I need a hand. I love them all for being what I ever failed to be for myself.

"So, it's the boy?" Sam says, and it snaps me out of my trip down memory lane.

I look at her, she's revealing a slight smirk as she sits back in her seat.

"Yes, he's unbelievingly magnetic, kissing him really just made it worse, but he's just so fucking nosy - that's the problem." I answer, rolling my eyes to emphasize my point.

Elly's intrigued and goes for my phone. Signalling me to find him. I pick up my phone, and find a picture of August from our company intranet. My phone is passed around, so everyone can zoom in and out as they please.

While they inspect, the issue at hand surfaces in my mind - "If I just didn't work with him, I could have fucked him and be done with it, but now..."

"Ok, I get it now" Elly says and exhales as if she finally understands my frustration. Kat and Sam both lift a brow in her direction.

For some reason, we're not attracted to the same thing in partners. Kat's boyfriend of 5 years is a gamer, only jokes with reference to star wars, and doesn't own two matching socks. Sam's boyfriend of 9 years is buff, watches everything-sports with his friends every sunday and dreams of becoming a stay at home dad. Elly's into anyone ten years older than her, somewhat cultured and preferably with grown up-kids. Me, I just love dimples.

Our commonalities are mental disorders (although none share the same), sarcasm, daddy issues (but none of the same either), feminists rants, cheese, identify somewhere within the LQBTQ+ alphabet, dogs, hate of entitlement (especially from mediocre white men) and a Bachelor's degree in business administration and sociology.

"But, if you didn't work with him, would you actually date him?" Sam asks, as she slightly leans over the table. She's trying to put the screws on me.

"No." I say as I look at her, then cross my arms. "You know I don't date. He just has this way of getting under my skin, like he sees right through me, relentlessly pushing my buttons.." I shake my head as I feel my frustration resurface.

"Like what, He figured out you were bipolar?" Sam asks daringly, as if he possibly couldn't have detected that already. Kat and Elly equally in disbelief of my postulation.

"Well, any fucking minute at this point. Like he asked me things about myself, that I don't even know the answer to. I just want to objectify him, but he just keeps poking, talking, clawing. It's just a second before he maps out the bipolar-thing." I say defensively and slightly worked up.

"Being sensitive, empathetic, curious about other people is not a bad quality, you know that right?" Elly says, apparently on nosy's side.

I look at her, my head tilted, eyes narrowed. My expression is giving are-you-serious-energy.

"I mean, if he actually detects it, then he might be a good person to know, right?" She clarifies.

I'm still not buying it. My pulse rises just by the thought of anyone at work knowing it.

"There is no such thing as a secret between two people." I say dryly, firming my arms in their crossed position.

"Don't do that. If he's that sensitive around you. Don't you think he'll know to keep it to himself?" Elly says as she pulls my arms, trying to disarm my arms and the frown living on my forehead.

I take a deep breath, hoping to keep my calm, as I answer,

"Well. Let's say he accidentally spilled the beans. He's sorry bla bla bla. But. It will be out at work. Sure, they would offer help - I'll take the nice words, the adjusted hours, and accept less stressful deadlines. What's not to like? But then, it would come up as a disorder in the next promotion discussion. The sad thing is, that I wouldn't even be able to defend my special treatment and getting promoted over others."

Kat's eyes are sad, it's obvious, even with her gaze fixed on the table. Sam's looking at me. She's part furious on my behalf, part.. something else. Protective maybe. Ready to throw a chair, if I gave her reason.

Elly seems deep in thought, like she's carefully choosing her words. She's holding my hand. "I know. I'm sorry. I just want you to have people in your life who see how wonderful you are." She says in her softest tone.

I scoff and reply "I literally told my manager the other day that I'd set the office on fire, just to get Andy off my back. I don't think he believes I'm a wonderful person, period."

Before anyone could reply, I had a sudden thought that needed to be voiced - "Bipolar doesn't exactly have a rep of calm and collected decision-making. Wouldn't any sane manager of mine just jump to call for an emergency evacuation drill in response?" I ask with a mocking laugh.

Elly continues to hold my hand, there really isn't anything to say.

Rick came with more food, and we moved on to other - better - topics like Elly's latest project - an ad campaign for the red cross, Kat grandma's funeral (that we went to) and the afterparty thereof (which we all now regret we didn't go to).

Everytime we part from Rick's I get this bubbly warm feeling inside. I always think about how weird it is that we are friends. How they are in the center of my pretend life for my parents, and everything I actually am – and still stay.

That even as we met, it was far from love at first sight. But now, more than ten years later, they are mine to always love, and I am always loved by them. I know deep down, that's really the only thing I want in life.

***

Monday rolls around, and the Bering Sea is practically begging for some one-on-one time. Today, the seemingly endless never-urgent-but-somehow-important emails actually feel... appealing. Like a perfectly valid excuse to ignore my messages app. It's been lighting up with texts from August—several of them. All unopened. Not because I'm avoiding him. I just... haven't gotten around to it.

I keep mentally excusing myself from opening the messages—telling myself it's the urgency of emails, the press of work tasks, any piece of small talk I can latch onto. I've been busy. I am busy. Too busy, even, to get back to him.

On my way to the courtyard, I bump into Terry. He's always half-jogging from one back-to-back meeting to the next, always loudly hating when people are late. His stamina is worse than mine—he's always late. But to my surprise, he stops. Just long enough to let me know about the stellar evaluations he's gotten so far. He doesn't need to say who's already submitted theirs. Terry takes it as appreciation of his efforts. I don't challenge him.

By the time lunch rolls around, I already know I need to plan distractions for the evening. I try Felix—maybe a little more desperate than usual. He's usually the one who reaches out first, but today I need him. I need anything that feels normal, distracting, easy. Anything that helps me pretend I'm not 90% mush and 10% legs.

He's busy.

I stay in the office until I can't see straight—until numbers stop making sense and I forget how to do basic math. There's always more to do. Always something I can bury myself in. I figure work fills the same space in my life that exercise does for other people—the kind who run marathons before breakfast. It's not that I love the process. I just always feel better after I've done it.

***

I see Charlotte before work—our standing Tuesday 7:30 a.m. appointment. It wraps just in time for me to make it to the office by nine. Sure, it's early, but it lets me lean into the illusion that I'm someone who does life right.

Therapy, then work. In that order.

"Have you worked on breakfast?" she asks.

Her question lingers longer than it should. I don't answer. She takes my silence as a big, fat no.

I know the spiel that triggers. I can more or less recite it word by word. She tries anyway,

"It's important that you keep your energy up in the morning. It helps with emotional regulation. Better coping overall."

"I know. I just... I'm not hungry. And I don't think toast is going to make or break my mental stability."

"It's vital for someone like you to build consistent, structured routines. That way, you can better detect emotional irregularities and act accordingly."

"Yes." I answer, while suppressing the need to add "Ma'm", although it felt highly appropriate.

"How's your sleep?"

"Stable. Sort of."

"Caffeine?"

"Very stable."

"Partying?"

"A complete shitshow all nights, but one night I was home before 2:00"

She just gives a slightly disapproving look. Maybe because her usual line of inquiry triggers worse replies the longer she gets.

"Exercise?"

"Out of breath several times the past two weeks." I try with an appeasing smile. She's not biting,

"Work hours?"

"A steady fifty-plus"

"Suicidal thoughts?"

"Some days are better than others." I say, as a crooked smile appear. I know it's not funny, but I don't really know how else I should deliver it.

"Frederika" She replies, like she's just caught a 7-year old trying to fly off the roof once again. I know it calls for some sugarcoating in reverse, or at least attempt to,

"I'm only just below neutral, just sprinkles of passive darkness - every other day or so. In a way that's good - stable - functioning"

She just gives me a look. The one that confirms I'll tell her if they turn active. It's a fun little way for therapists to keep their hands clean. If I don't say passive, she has to call someone or drive me to the emergency room. I try to move on, offer her something to award me for,

"I went to the museum."

"Was it a break? A reset?"

"More like a breakdown."

"What happened?"

"I screwed up. So many times I lost count."

"How did that feel?"

"Horrible. Obviously. I know I'm an idiot. I can't seem to get anything right. I should probably stop talking to people outside of work. Or, even people at work actually. Just lock myself up and be done with it."

"What actually happened?"

"I blurted out that I'm wildly attracted to a colleauge—right after I cursed him out. Then I apologized. Later he blackmailed me into a museum date and I kissed him to shut him up."

"That's... a lot."

"Yeah, I know."

"Why did you kiss him to shut him up?"

"He said I had a heart but act like I don't. I didn't know how to respond, so I just... reacted."

"And how did that make you feel?"

"Like that dream where I'm doing a presentation, naked and unable to find my clothes - on replay"

"Do you think you act like you don't have a heart?"

"I mean, I have one. I just don't want people thinking about it. Poking at it. It's mine. It's private."

"Who do you show your heart to?"

"My friends."

"No one else?"

"No. My family treats me like a rescue dog, and my colleagues would just use it against me."

"Why do you think it bothers you that he thinks you have a heart?"

"Because he's my colleague. I don't know. He's extremely pushy, sharp, he'll figure it out—the bipolar—and then everything falls apart."

"If one of your friends went through this, what would you say to them?"

"Charlotte, we've been over this a million times - they'd never be in this mess in the first place."

"And why's that different from you?"

"You know why it's different."

"No, I don't. Tell me why you think it is."

"Because they don't have to regulate their whole lives. They don't have to live like prisoners. They're not broken or dragging everyone into a bipolar pit of misery."

"You're not dragging anyone. People are in your life because they want to be, not because they have to."

"That sounds like it belongs on a Hallmark card."

***

I always leave Charlotte half-relieved, half-annoyed. Pleased I showed up—it gives my parents peace of mind. But mostly pissed. She's an idealist who refuses to accept how things really are.

It always stings a bit when she comes at me like this. Her approach feels identical to my parents' before they realize my ankle was done for good.

It's like, Yes, I have a master's degree. Yes, I have a job. Yes, I have friends. But she still buys into the idea that if I'm just honest about my disorder, the world will shower me with compassion. That I can trust it to hold space for me. That showing anyone my heart won't send me into the flames of hell.

She talks about peace. Balance. Happiness.
Most days, I just think she's delusional.

It always takes a minute for me to shake off her naivety after leaving. But after today's session I need a walk through the park before heading in.

A buffer for when my brain's scrambled. By the time I get to the office, it's nearly lunch. I should make up for the late start, but guilt about skipping breakfast pushes me toward the lunch buffet.

Nick waves me over to a seat next to him, like always. The table's mid-conversation about immunity hacks and fall flu season.

Cal is in his element—our forty-something coworker with a man-bun and a Fitbit, always droning on about bio-hacking.

Today, it's some herbal tincture made from things he grows in his own garden. Supposedly, it boosts white blood cells, clears inflammation, and "realigns your cellular communication."

I try to sound interested, nod in all the right places, but my brain is elsewhere.

The truth is, I could use a cleanse.
Not the kind Cal's selling—
I need something that keeps my hands busy, my head quiet. Something normal. Routine.
Anything that'll stop me from overthinking and spiraling into bad decisions and worse messaging drafts.

Nick, thankfully, has other ideas.

"I've actually been thinking about doing a cleanse," he says, casually.

My eyebrows flick up. Our kind of cleanse is spiritual. Sacred. Reckless.

Cal perks up, of course. "Oh? What kind?"

Nick's mouth quirks at the corners. He doesn't break. "A short one - just two or three days."

"Mostly fluids," I add, playing along.

"Potent ones," he agrees. "You'll feel amazing. Then horrible. Then... reborn."

Annoying Colleague—overly earnest, always eavesdropping—leans in. "What kind of detox is that? Sounds sketchy."

Nick shrugs. "Yeah, probably not for you."

I almost laugh. Not because it's especially clever, but because I love this—how easy it is to fall into our rhythms. Nick treats me like I am neurotypical - not neurodivergent. He doesn't tiptoe around me, doesn't look for signs, doesn't ask the loaded questions.

He doesn't know.

And that makes all the difference.

With Nick, I get to just be someone who drinks too much sometimes, who's tired, who skips breakfast, who maybe needs a two-day "cleanse" to realign herself. Not because she's struggling, but because she's just bad at work-life balance.
That's everything to me.

Somehow, somewhere along the days drifting in the Bering sea and my friends coming through, I feel at ease. The cleanse is set for the coming weekend. Elly's invitation to Wednesday's Drag Bingo. Bo's pestering me to lock in a day for my blind-date.

Even my mom hasn't picked up on any of my lies in our daily chats. Any guilt from lying is suppressed by the implicit praise I pick up from her. She just bugs me about being in the office every night she calls. But that seems normal, okay, typical parent-kid dynamic.