Gloriana

It’s not like I ever liked her. I mean, I knew she was trouble from the moment we met. She pulled my pigtails and ran off laughing. It’s hard not to get the message from something like that. But believe me when I tell you that Gloria Donovan is the most fascinating person I have ever met in my life.

When she was young, she was cruel. Not that she isn’t cruel now, she’s just grown layers of sweetness to hide it; an oyster excreting mucus to turn a harsh grain of sand into a pretty, mucus-covered grain of sand. It’s the same principle, at any rate. In fourth grade, she interrupted the teacher in the middle of a fractions lesson to tell her, “Your husband doesn’t love you.”

“…What?”

“He knows about the affair, but he doesn’t care. You thought you could make him jealous, but he’s just glad because it means his cheating isn’t so bad.”

Classes were canceled for the rest of the day. And as the teacher ran from the room, Gloria sat back, the edges of her mouth quirking into an odd smile, and I watched her. I had finally found something to interest me.

She was a quick learner. By seventh grade, she had already found a way to mask her true nature, becoming the apple of most of the teaching staffs’ eye. She found little ways to control them: offering advice that one time out of ten would fail catastrophically; enough to seem like a mistake on her part but still ruin lives. And they would never, ever blame sweet little Gloria Donovan, who was only trying to help, and was so kind and thoughtful, and listened to them in their times of need. I almost became a ghost during this period. I barely talked in class, displayed hardly any personality, and even dressed in dull, unnoticeable colors. I would blame it on not wanting to be the subject of her machinations, but honestly, I was captivated. I almost considered myself a researcher in the wild, camouflaging myself against detection by my object of study. I could not, under any circumstances, afford to let her know how close I was, or she would destroy me.

High school was… well, it was high school. Nobody likes high school. Not even the people who say they do. Except maybe her. In middle school she had been toying with the teachers, but now she ran the show. Students, janitors, administrative staff… no one was safe from her clutches. She was truly fascinating then; vibrant, even. She was at her most glorious while in the midst of destroying someone’s life. I say I was captivated before – now, I was completely consumed. I scheduled my classes around her, trying to get as much time for my observations without tipping her off. I couldn’t eat without being in the same room as her, and barely slept even with a picture of her close by. I knew that what she was doing was wrong – awful, even – but I didn’t care. The way she could manipulate people, pulling those slender threads that made up the fabric of who they were until that fabric was nothing but a tangled mess, warped and twisted… it was amazing. The artistry alone was inspiring, even if she hadn’t been able to do it with a smile on her brilliantly red lips and the repeated thanks of those she was ruining.

I began to wonder why she did it. Was she just another form of sadist? It couldn’t be that ordinary, that base. I knew why I would do it – to see what would make people break, and to see that I could – but it was abundantly clear that she was so much more than I could ever be. I began to suspect that she was my own personal angel; nothing else could explain her magnificence. It all came crashing down around me freshman year of college.

I had followed her, of course. What else could I do? Where she went, I went. Even if she moved halfway around the world, I would follow. So it was there, in a small, unknown college on the other side of the country from my home, with no one left but the two of us, that my heart broke. It was there that Gloria Donovan fell in love.

Her name was Theo. What kind of a name is Theo, anyway? She had no artistry, no grace, no dazzling beauty. She didn’t dance through people’s lives, saying one word to send the whole thing spiraling out of control, and leave no prints behind. She was brutality, tearing people apart for the joy of it, and trampling upon their remains just to gloat her power over them. Gloria might have been an angel, but Theo wasn’t – not even a fallen one. Theo was nothing more than a common human, trying to win with savagery what she had not been gifted upon birth. How could Gloria love her? It seemed impossible, but they spent more and more time together, giggling like schoolgirls and holding hands. And as I watched, the light within her began to fade, Theo dragging her down and sullying her with mortality. So I acted. I had to.

They tell me I set fire to a sorority house, and it was only through luck that none of the occupants were killed. They’ve used words like “criminally insane” and “psychotic.” All I know is that I went to talk to her, demanding to know why she’d allowed purity to be defiled in this way. And she turned to me, that beautiful smile upon her lips, and told me that she’d seen me, she’d always seen me, she just knew that I was worth the long game. The ghost of those lips upon my cheek lingered long after she’d walked away, and I’d cleansed with fire the place that she’d stood – too holy to let others see.

They tell me that Gloria Donovan doesn’t exist. That she never existed. My own private Tyler Durden. I almost believed them, for a while, so fogged with pills and psychotherapy that I nearly lost the way. But I’ve seen her. I still see her, walking the halls of this place. She’s different, older now, her youthful enthusiasm replaced by a calm certainty, but it’s still her, and I still love her. I always will.

Doctor's Note: Patient remains delusional, and believes herself to have a personal relationship with the Director of Sunny Orchard Retreat for the Mentally Unwell.