The Zombie at Manstrat

By early 2013, I had been at Manstrat for over a year. I had changed buildings, I had changed colleagues, but I could not change the fact that I was already dead inside.

The move was supposed to be a fresh start, a way to escape the “Eligible Bachelor” ghost that haunted the corridors of my old job. But at Manstrat, I wasn’t even a bachelor; I was a zombie. I withdrew completely. I would arrive at work, sit at my desk, and stare at the screen, performing the functions of an employee while my spirit had already vacated the premises.

This was institutional erasure in its quietest form. I was a body filling a chair, a unit of labor disconnected from any sense of self or future. The “clean pain” of the gym was gone; the “dirty pain” of dysphoria and the financial ruin from the car crash had calcified into a heavy, suffocating silence. I felt nothing but a low-grade, constant hum of self-hatred.

The Phantom Pregnancy

In the midst of this numbness, my subconscious rebelled.

One night, I had a dream, vivid, high-definition, more real than the gray walls of my office. I was pregnant. I wasn’t just carrying a child; I was the vessel of life. I could feel the weight of it, the distinct, fluttery presence of another soul inside my skin.

In the dream, I gave birth. It wasn’t painful or terrifying; it was transcendent. I held the newborn baby to my naked chest, skin against skin. I looked down and saw my body, but it wasn’t the body of the “Zombie” or the “Soldier.” It was a mother’s body. Soft, capable, and aligned.

I felt our hearts beating in perfect sync, a double rhythm of unconditional love. For a few moments, I wasn’t an error. I was a creator.

Then, I woke up.

The transition from that warm, living connection to the cold, empty reality of my bedroom was a physical blow. I sat up, clutching my flat, empty stomach, and the grief hit me like a tsunami. I sobbed uncontrollably.

I wasn’t just grieving a gender; I was grieving a biology. I was grieving the mother I would never be. The dream showed me the life I was starving for, and waking up confirmed that I was starving.

The Date of Execution

By June 2013, the silence in my head had become deafening. The digital world had betrayed me; the physical world had rejected me through economic violence; the medical world had ghosted me. I decided to check out.

I chose the date carefully: July 1st. My birthday.

There was a grim, circular logic to it. I believed I was a cosmic mistake, a girl trapped in a boy’s body, a sinner in the eyes of the church, a “freak” in the eyes of the world. If I was a mistake, I would correct it on the day I was born. I would close the loop.

I wrote four suicide notes:

One for my mother: “I’m so sorry, Mom. I love you, but I can’t go on.”

One for Anneke, the friend who had used me.

One for the few friends who hadn’t turned on me.

One for the world.

I stockpiled sleeping tablets and painkillers. I sharpened a knife. The plan was clinical: I would go to work at Manstrat on my birthday. During my lunch break, I would walk to the park near the office. I would swallow the pills. I would cut my wrists. I would disappear.

The systems of power had convinced me that my life was expendable. I had finally agreed to do the job for them.

The Walk

On the morning of July 1st, 2013, I woke up without feeling. I greeted my mother and left for work, my mind a blank slate. I wasn’t going to a job; I was going to a staging ground.

I sat at my desk at Manstrat, watching the minutes tick by on the computer clock.

10:00. 11:00.

I had the pills in my pocket. I had the knife. I was ready.

When the clock struck 12:00, I stood up. I walked out of the office building, heading toward the park, toward the end. I felt a strange sense of relief. It was almost over.

The Radical Interruption

“Happy Birthday, Dawie!”

The voice broke the trance. It was Nadia, a colleague I barely knew.

I froze. I tried to brush her off, to keep moving toward the park. I had an appointment with death. I didn’t have time for pleasantries.

But Nadia was persistent. She walked with me to the cars parked behind the post office. She chatted about the weather, about the office, about my birthday. She smiled. She treated me like a person with a future, unaware that I had decided I didn’t have one.

She didn’t know it, but her mundane kindness was an act of radical interruption. She disrupted the script. Because of her presence, I missed my window. I couldn’t do it while she was watching. I couldn’t die in front of someone who was being kind to me.

I stood by my car, trapped by her decency. The lunch hour ticked away.

I went back to the office, the pills still in my pocket, furious that I was still alive. I sat at my desk, shaking with adrenaline and rage. I had failed at living, and now, thanks to a casual conversation in a parking lot, I had failed at dying.

I drove home that night, defeated. But as I lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, a new thought took root.

I couldn’t be Dawie anymore. Dawie was supposed to die in that park.

If Dawie was dead, maybe it was time for Juanita to speak.