Finally I learned the secret to being my true self. The mask was in a gutter when I found it. So lonely it looked, with its smudged white blankness. When I saw it I knew I had to pick it up, and when I felt it in my hands, I knew I had to wear it. When it touched me, it became a part of me, and when I wore it I was free.

No matter the lengths I went to, I was incapable of scrubbing off the dirty smudges that the mask held, but it didn’t matter to me, I loved it regardless. Not even my children could match the affection I felt for this mask. Although it did seem that the mask returned more of my affections than my kin. Living with their mother, they would never spend the time with me that the mask would. My former wife told me before that she loved me, and I told her the same, but I knew not true love until I beheld myself in the mask.

When I first wore the mask was the first time I felt true power. Approaching a couple walking down an alley, I proceeded to display my power to them, and once I was done I left the bloody mess unscathed. The mask made me invincible.

As time went on, I wore the mask more and more often, and showed more and more people what the power could do. Sometimes, as I used to do with my past wife, I slept holding the mask, or let it hold me by wearing it. When such nights were just quiet enough, and peaceful, I found that I could hear her speaking to me. She told me that she loved me, as I loved her. She told me that I no longer had to pretend to be what the outside world saw me as.

After a discussion with Her, I decided it was time to quit my job. Each moment of repressed silence in that oppressive atmosphere seemed a particular hell in my life, and I desired to leave it in favor of the heavenly feeling I got when wearing Her.

That was the point that I stopped taking Her off. Her stained exterior I now accepted as my own, and made others accept, as well.

Now I sit here with Her on. She and I are watching the news, and my hands fiddle at the sewing needle in my hand. The anchorwoman tells of a series of murders across the city I live in, and they show the face of a believed suspect. This image makes me laugh. They don’t seem to know yet, that the face they have is outdated. Turning off the television, I position the needle for the last stitch.