Betrayal

It was late in the day, and I was packing up at the office. As I looked up and let my gaze roam around the mostly empty room, I felt a sudden sense of alienation. What am I doing here?

It's not something I often feel. I remember I felt very at home at my tiny little grey desk in a forgotten cubicle overshadowed by larger-than-life figures next door who were always chatty, always ready with raucous laughter and verbal mischief. I was nobody, I enjoyed that. Then came the swift promotions which I never felt ready for, the well-meaning refusals of my misgivings. And alienation, once unheard of, began to grow like a fever dream.

The fever was over, I thought, one lovely November evening in 2004. I remember it well. I felt free, unchained, unburdened. Some people wondered why. Some knew. Some admired, some expressed regret. Some enjoyed the all-action adventure they hoped would come. Some offered clever plans.

I wondered too. I wondered if I had unwittingly betrayed those who had hopes in me. I wondered if I had betrayed the careless plans of people who never knew me. I wondered if anyone cared if I was betraying my calling or my nature or my self. It was, to me, all about betrayal – and why one is never safe from it, why one should never indulge in it.

The knives were out that day, and in the days before. I had always noticed them. There was a day I longed for the feel of the blades, the final release – a bloodletting. And when it came, I knew I had been true to myself and my calling. The rest? I had also been true to them all, even if they hadn't known it then. I am now an expert in betrayal.