My Twisted World

by Elliot Rodger

  On my last day working for Karl, I decided to stop by at father’s house to have a drink. I was quite parched from the bicycle ride. I entered the house without knocking because I believed I had the right to. As the eldest son, the house should be my house after my father. Soumaya was surprised to see me, and she got angry that I didn’t knock. To teach me a lesson, she ordered me to go back outside and knock. I refused, telling her that she has no right to order me around anymore. I then helped myself to a glass of water. Soumaya knocked the glass of water out of my hand and it shattered on the floor. Father clamored angrily up the stairs from his office demanding to know what was going on. The three of us had a heated argument, and of course father took Soumaya’s side. They both kicked me out of the house, telling me that I’m not to return. I felt betrayed and humiliated as I furiously made my way back to mother’s house. At that very moment, I hated both of them, and I wouldn’t see either of them for many months. For those months, my father was dead to me. My mother was all I had left in this bleak world.

  During that same week, I had a climactic meeting with Philip and Addison where my noxious feud with Addison Altendorf reached a boiling point. We went on an outing to the Griffith Park Observatory, as we usually did when we got together. This time, my arguments with Addison were very intense. I tried to insult him as much as I could, in a petty attempt to get revenge at him for all the insults and slights he dealt to me. We went back and forth at each other for the whole evening, to the chagrin of poor Philip who had to put up with it. By the end of the night, Addison said something to me that was so offensive it will haunt me forever, and it rang true: “No girl in this whole world will ever want to fuck you.”

  I already felt that no girl in the world wanted to fuck me. I was a kissless virgin after all. That was the sole reason why I was suffering. But to hear it come from someone else, someone like Addison, really caused it to sink into core of my mentality and emotions.

  That whole night made for a very vile and wicked experience. I decided not to see Philip and Addison for a long time.

  Because I was no longer seeing Philip and Addison, James was once again my only friend. I frequently talked to him over Skype. Sometimes I would go over to his house, where the two of us went on our traditional walks around the Palisades town center. James still played WoW, and he was trying to get me back into it. I was quite tempted. After everything I had been through in the last few months, I did feel the urge to delve back into that void. Facing the world was tough, and it took its toll on me, especially since I’ve seen no results. I was still in the same position I had always been: Lonely, unwanted, and miserable.

  I found out that my mother was actually dating Jack, the wealthy man who owned the Malibu beach house. I always thought he was only her friend. My mother never told me or my sister about any men that she dated. She always kept that strictly private. I hadn’t even met Jack yet. He was worth well over $500 million, and he owned other mansions in Bel Air and Beverly Hills.

  When I found out about this, I started to harbor the hope that my mother will get married to this man, and I will be part of a rich family. That will definitely be a way out of my miserable and insignificant life. Money would solve everything. I started to frequently ask my mother to seek marriage with this man, or any wealthy man for that matter. She always adamantly refused, and demanded that I stopped talking about it. She told me that she never wanted to get married again after her experience with my father. I told her that she should sacrifice her well-being for the sake of my happiness, but this only offended her further.

  At the beginning of summer, I finally received my driver’s license. I had to take the driving test twice before I passed it. The first time, I took it at the Winnetka DMV, and I made a few mistakes at the end which caused me to fail it. After taking some lessons that my mother arranged for me, I gave the driving test another try at the Thousand Oaks DMV. This area was much easier to navigate around, so I managed to closely pass the test.

  Once my official driver’s license came in the mail, my mother told me some good news. She received a new car from Jack, which meant she could give her older car to me. I now had a car of my own to drive. To be able to drive to any place I wanted to go provided me with a new sense of freedom that I never felt before. I felt more like an adult rather than a kid. I realized that I could start college again, now that I had the ability to drive there.

  I registered for a summer class at Moorpark College. I read about Moorpark College online and found that it was a much better option than Pierce College. My mother and I drove up there to take a look. The campus was smaller in scale, and more aesthetically pleasing. It was located in the town of Moorpark, in a gorgeous mountain area near Thousand Oaks. I also saw a lot more beautiful girls there than I ever saw at Pierce. Everywhere I looked I saw beautiful blonde girls walking around. This college was just right for me.

  In the days leading up to my first day at Moorpark, I felt a renewed sense of hope. A new college provided a new start, and this college looked perfect in every way. I had the hope that I could make it there; that I could make friends, meet some girls, and eventually find a pretty girl to be my girlfriend. I pictured her in my mind all the time; her cascading blonde hair, her beautiful face, her sensual body…

  Everything. I imagined us walking hand in hand through the college, looking at the magnificent view of the mountains in the distance as the sun sets behind them. That would be heaven. That was what I wanted in life. Every single hate-fueled ideal, worldview, and philosophy I created in the past was a result of not being able to do that.

  I was very optimistic on the first day. When I walked onto the campus I breathed in the fresh mountain air and admired my surroundings. I was in a new environment with lots of new possibilities.

  The class I took was a world history class, and it began on a good note. The class was well-structured and the teacher was entertaining. After the class ended, I walked around the college for an hour to explore and ponder over how I can set my life right. Once again, I dared to hope that there could be a good future for me.

  My renewed hope gave me solace for a few days, but it did not last. Moorpark soon became a place of loneliness and despair, just like any other place I’ve attempted to thrive in. The breaking point was when I saw good looking couples walking along the area where I dreamed of walking with a girlfriend. To watch another boy experience it, with a beautiful girl who should be mine, was a living hell. I constantly asked myself what I did wrong in life, to be unable to have a beautiful girlfriend.

  It was no better inside the classroom. There was this one obnoxious jock with a buzz-cut who was taking the class with his gorgeous girlfriend. They always sat next to each other, talking and touching each other with affection. Every day I had to see this, and my envy grew and grew. I constantly glared at them with raw hatred. What did I do wrong that he did right? I yelled out to the universe on the way home. Why does he deserve the love of a beautiful girl, and not me? Why do girls hate me so? Questions and questions. All I could do was question why I was suffering so much injustice in life.

  My mother one day told me that I should become a writer, because I had some talent in writing. That was strange to hear. For my whole life I was never talented at anything I tried. I was too physically weak to play sports with other boys when I was little; I never became professional at skateboarding no matter how much I practiced; and I was never that skilled at any video games I played… even World of Warcraft.

  Steve and Mark were able to play their characters more skillfully that I ever did, and they started the game much later than me. Deep down, I’ve always known that I had no talents, and I’ve always tried not to think about it.

  Indeed, it was strange to hear my mother say that I could become a talented writer, but it did give me an idea. I started to wonder if I actually could become a writer. I could write an epic fantasy story that will be made into a movie, and I will become rich from it. Being rich will definitely make me at
tractive enough to have a beautiful girlfriend. It was not impossible, and working towards it would give me something to live for. I mulled it over in my mind for a while.

  We went to Jack’s beach house in Malibu to spend a couple of nights again. My mother called me on the phone to tell me the plan while I was at college. It was a lonely and depressing day at school, and I was glad to be able to have some respite at the lovely beach house. I immediately drove there from Moorpark after my class was finished.

  Mother had a few of her friends over, and she bought a lot of delicious food. After stuffing myself with portions from every dish and drinking multiple glasses of wine, I went on a long and peaceful walk on the beach, wishing that I had a girlfriend to walk beside me. Before I went to bed, I thought a lot more about the possibility of becoming rich. If I was a millionaire and owned a house like the one I was spending that night in, I could have any girl I want. Being in that position would make up for all of the misery I’ve had to go through in the past… and making up for it is my most important goal in life. My one wish is to feel satisfied for the way my life is.

  I seriously started to consider working towards writing an epic story. I was always creating stories in my mind to fuel my fantasies. Usually those stories depicted someone like myself rising to power after a life of being treated unfairly by the world. I mentally examined all of the stories I had developed, and focused on the few that I thought would become bestsellers. If I could get one of them made into a movie, I would definitely be a millionaire. It was the only solution to my problems. I saw myself as a highly intelligent and magnificent person who is meant for great things. This could be one of them.

  I spent the next couple of weeks focusing on writing for myself instead of working on my schoolwork.

  The class didn’t give much homework to do anyway. I wrote summaries for three different stories, and I think I showed two of them to my mother. She seemed to think that they would make good movies, and that increased my confidence. I either wanted to write a novel first, or go straight to making it a screenplay.

  I spent every afternoon for two weeks working on this goal. My time at college was miserable. I often cried on the way home because I was envious of so many couples walking around. I poured all of my energy into coming up with a way to make this goal work.

  My faith that I could write an epic story that would make me rich soon collapsed. I read so many articles online of the chances that a screenplay would be made into a movie. I also saw that most writers of even the highest budget films didn’t make as much as I thought they did… Definitely not enough to live on for the rest of their life. I also thought, with a lot of despair, of the time that it would take to achieve such a goal. Most bestselling authors or screenwriters didn’t become millionaires until they were well into their forties or fifties. I didn’t want to wait until I was forty years old to lose my virginity!

  The thought of spending the next twenty years working hard every day for a chance to make a million or two filled me with revulsion. By the time I’d become a millionaire from doing that, I wouldn’t even be able to get hot young girls because I’d be too old. I decided that writing was not my path to salvation, and I abandoned the idea completely. Of course, I would become tantalized with the idea a few more times in the future, but that would be due to the desperate, false hope that I often create for myself.

  I couldn’t stand seeing that damnable couple in my class anymore. I never understood what that pretty girl saw in her brute of a boyfriend. That guy was able to experience his college life with his beautiful girlfriend by his side, while I was all alone. It made me feel so inferior. I had to watch them together, every single day. The torture was unbearable. When I got home from college one day, I dropped my class in a rage.

  I didn’t think about how my mother would react to me dropping the class. I knew she would be very disappointed, and I couldn’t afford to have her be disappointed in me. I was relying on her for everything. What she gave to me, she could easily take away. I panicked and resolved to get a job in order to placate her.

  After asking Tony, my social skills counsellor, if I could get a job through the regional center, he called me back and told me that there was a job available for me. I didn’t get much information about it, but I decided to sign up for it right there and then. After this was secure, I was comfortable enough to tell my mother that I dropped my class at Moorpark. I could have lied to her and told her that I never dropped the class, but at that time I was too scared to lie to her.

  I started a day of working at this new job. It was located in an office building that was connected to an Airport in Los Angeles. To my horror and humiliation, the job turned out to be a menial custodial job, and I had to clean offices and even the bathrooms. There was no way I would ever degrade myself to such a level. I felt like utter shit from even considering working at such a place. I only worked for a few hours while I thought about how to handle this foul situation… and on the next day I called to announce that I was quitting. That was the second and last “job” I would ever have. I only worked there for less than a day.

  After I quit, I fell into an even worse state of panic than I was in after I dropped my Moorpark class. I rapidly pestered myself with the ultimate question: What am I to do now? I called up Karl Champley to see if he had another job for me at his house, but he told me that his house was almost finished and there was literally no work for me to do there. I was doomed. I thought that if my mother found out that I quit, she would kick me out of her household.

  My mother was taking a vacation in Hawaii with my sister during this time. I had a few days by myself to relax and plot my next move. I concluded that going to college and enduring the sight of couples walking around was better than having to resort to working a low-class job somewhere, and I had to pick one of the two in order to placate my mother. College was also more beneficial because I could learn and educate myself through it.

  I called up my mother and cried to her on the phone, explaining to her why I quit the job that I signed up for, and asked her if she would give me another chance. I told her I will register for more classes at Moorpark and pour all of my energy into studying hard. I also told her that I will continue with working on my writing. To my relief, she was very understanding, and she told me she would continue to support me if I did this.

  The temporary pressure I had to face that summer was eased, but after thinking about it, I supposed it was insignificant compared to the overall pressure that’s been on my shoulders ever since I hit puberty: My struggle against a society that looks down upon me… against the female gender for denying me sex and love. Addison Altendorf’s hurtful words kept haunting me all throughout the summer. I saw my future and I saw only more bleak loneliness. I will never have sex. I will never have love. Girls deem me unworthy of it, I thought to myself over and over again. I cried every day when I imagined how much fun and pleasure other teenagers were having as I languished in despair.

  My 19th birthday passed by sullenly, and it caused me to feel even more defeated. Nineteen and still a virgin, I miserably proclaimed on that day. My father didn’t even deign to give me a phone call. Instead, he sent me a letter wishing me happy birthday and telling me that he wanted me to apologize to Soumaya, which of course I refused to do.

  The laptop I received on my 17th birthday had become infected with viruses, so my mother bought me a new, even better laptop on my 19th birthday. I chose one that can handle video games very well, because I had just made the decision to start playing World of Warcraft again. I just couldn’t handle the anguish in my life anymore, and I needed a break, no matter how unhealthy and time-consuming WoW

  would be for me.

  19 Years Old

  Upon setting up my new laptop, I immediately installed all of my WoW disks. I logged onto my account and took a look at all of my characters that I hadn’t touched for a year and a half. Right when I logged onto my main character, I was contacted by James, and he invited me to
join an online group with him, Steve, and Mark. They all gave me a warm welcome back.

  And there I was, stuck in the void of hopelessness once again; in the exact same position as I had been when I was fourteen, fifteen, sixteen and seventeen. For all the efforts I made to improve my life during my eighteenth year, I had nothing to show for it. No friends, no girls, no life.

  I started going to James’s house a lot more, since I was now able to drive and the two of us could play WoW together again. Seeing James was always pleasant in its own way. He was my comrade in virginity, for he too didn’t get any attention from girls, and I’m sure he suffered from it, but not as much as I did. I was very perplexed as to why he didn’t feel any anger towards girls for denying him sex. He should be just as angry as I am. I supposed he didn’t have a very high sex drive, or he was just a generally weak person.

  To be angry about the injustices one faces is a sign of strength. It is a sign that one has the will to fight back against those injustices, rather than bowing down and accepting it as fate. Both my friends James and Philip seem to be the weak, accepting type; whereas I am the fighter. I will never stand to be insulted, and I will eventually have my revenge against all those who insult me, no matter how long it takes.

  For the rest of the summer, I took it easy and played WoW with James, Steve, and Mark; just like old times. I also started reading a new book series called A Song of Ice and Fire, by George R.R. Martin. This medieval fantasy series was spectacular. The first book of the series was A Game of Thrones, and once I read the first chapter I just couldn’t put it down. It was like nothing I had ever read before, with a huge array of complex characters, a few of whom I could relate to. I found out that it was going to be adapted into an HBO television series, and I became very excited for that.