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David’s Dream: The Seven Deadly Sins

They say we only have one chance. Live it. Grab it in a dark doorway and fuck it for as long as you can. Make babies with it, sling a bride’s veil round its neck and drag it to chapel, then drag it down to the water and drown it. Drown yourself while you’re at it. Go swimming. Gargle with water from the streams, drink it up, be greedy, don’t stop. Flex your muscles. Flex your spine. Buy yourself a spine and pull it up to the sky. Put down roots. Stay mobile, drive fast, faster than the others, stop at nothing. Drive.

Find a faith and stick to it. Make your own rules and flout them. Tell the others to love you. See to it that they love you, that they’re insecure without you—so dependent on you that they whimper when you’re not there.

Everything comes at a price. Let them pay. Pay your bit. Pay with your smile, your charm, a squeeze of your hand. Throw them into handcuffs. Enslave them. Make them pirouette, sit down, leap up. Give them nothing in return. Keep everything. It’s yours. Make them bleed.

Take the loveliest you can. Scan the room with your eyes, pick out the jewel, seduce her boyfriend. Take her upstairs with you, let her watch. Make her jealous.

Don’t allow them to be better. Watch them. Read them, track them, follow them, confront them. Take their souls. You could be better. You could be cleverer. You could have so much more. It isn’t right that they have more than you. Strike your brother dead, if need be. It’s what they did before you.

Be merciless. Don’t let them get away with anything. Hate, if you must. Plot revenge. Do not forgive. Wait till they’re asleep, wait till they’re not looking, attack. Don’t believe in forgiveness. Rage. Rage inside them, in their heads, in their bellies. Leave no trace. Shatter their faith, their desires, their illusions.

Eat well. Eat plenty. Eat up. Taste everything, forget nothing. Not a crumb. It would be a sin to stop.

Lie down to sleep. Sleep through the days, sleep through the nights. Do not move. There is nothing worth opening your eyes for.

Tr. Imogen Taylor