I like to think of myself as normal.
Hi, I’m Maury. I’m thirty, single and work middle management. Average enough, right? I bet without telling you the rest, you’ve already an idea of what I look like. What I like to do for fun. What my wardrobe is, my hobbies, my favorite shows. Chances are pretty likely you and me, we’re a lot alike. That’s okay, too.
Because that’s normal.
We like to tell ourselves we’re unique. That we’re all special, we’ve our own personalities and talents. We’re someone’s somebody. But the truth is, most of us are pretty comfortable being mediocre. We’re happy with being “normal”. There’s certainly nothing wrong with it-plenty of us lead our entire lives that way. Being normal, it’s not a crime-but it’s not a sin, either. In being so plain, day in and day out?
Well, sometimes you do things. Small things. Nothing that would endanger you, but enough to feel a little daring. That’s why I started believing. In UFOs, I mean.
See, it’s just like anything else when you’re comfy, normal. You get bored over your microwave dinner, so you pick something on Netflix. For me, it was Ancient Aliens. I couldn’t help but laugh at how much money had been spent to produce it. Chances are you’ve seen the memes-the guy smiling, his hands wide? Yep. It’s that show. I watched it on a whim one night, like I had countless others. I laughed, and went to bed after. I didn’t think about it for a day or two.
But then one night after work, it struck me again. That curiosity. I went on my computer, and started down a rabbit hole of alien theories. I sat there, smirking as I sipped my wine and read nutcases go on and on about Paladians, the Grays and area 51. It was fun, just like the show. Just another way to pass an evening.
Except two turned into three. Then I was buying books, listening to podcasts and more. As soon as I got back from work, it’s how I’d spend the night. Eccentric maybe, but harmless. No more or less normal than anyone else.
That’s what I told myself.
That’s how I came to realize how fucked “normal” actually is.
See, when you’re trying to be normal? You justify a lot of things. For comfort, for rationality sake. Even when you get in too deep, you tell yourself “Oh, it’s okay. Other people do this, they just don’t admit it. I’m alright,”.
It’s the same logic serial killers and nut cases use. The difference is, their “normal” eventually involves others. People they tell, or hurt, or whatever. With me? I finally had that little moment. That open revelation that maybe, just maybe, I wasn’t quite so normal anymore.
Hold on-I’ll be right back. I’ve got to go clutch. It’s why my face is getting so red.
I think it was right after I spent my bonus on a telescope I realized it wasn’t a “hobby” anymore. That I was just a tad more invested than most. But by that point, I didn’t care. I’d rationalized it all, told myself there were others like me. People who did this same thing, who believed this same thing. I was so comfortable in that-it was like a fleece blanket wrapped around me. I’d peer up at the sky, notebook in my hand. Waiting, watching. For what I couldn’t tell you-but the answer I got?
I wish to fuck and back I didn’t get it. I wish I’d never watched that damned show.
They’re wrong. All of them. All the skeptics, all the idiots on TV. Every fat fuck in his mom’s basement talking about the Grays and the men in black. Hell, our own government is wrong too. So fucking wrong. Believe me-they told me.
They don’t want war.
They don’t even care about our planet.
You really want to know just why they visit at all? Do you?
Incubation. To raise their numbers before they fuck off somewhere else. See, they don’t want your brains, your spinal fluids or your stem cells. They just need a warm, walking, living host. That’s it.
They fill you up, and tell you to leave the eggs near an open window. That it’d be empty in the morning, and to keep filling it until you can’t anymore. All in all, it takes seven earth days according to them.
I’m on day nine.
And I’m still shitting out eggs.
So I got to ask you-knowing all this, seeing this bucket of grey-black speckled things here…
Just what do you really think is normal?
Because this, this is my definition. My existence, and I’m never going to be comfortable again.