Caustic Lie
an excerpt

At the same time, Linnea Randon was wide awake. She sat on her comfortable old couch drinking Coke. She plucked the remote off the soft blue suede and flicked the guide on. She had recently upgraded to high-definition programming, and as a gift from the company had received all the channels for free, temporarily of course. She now had upwards of 200 channels, and, amazingly, there was still nothing on. That was a lie. There was nothing worth watching on. Linnea admired precision. Pronounce something wrong, and she was on you like a hawk. Make a minor mistake that no sane person would notice, or care about, and she was in your face, correcting you in her smug way. Sighing, Linnea selected a re-run of How It's Made. Oh good, she thought. I've only seen this episode twice before. She wondered whether or not that was sarcasm. Linnea barely understood herself. Relating to other people was nearly impossible. She pretended to like everyone, but all her relationships were lies. She laughed drily, and without smiling. She hated liars, but was one. No one's allowed to be a hypocrite - except me.