I want to remove this horrible demo from my Steam library, but my body won’t let me

I just want my old life back

When and where did the Steam demo for horror game New Life first find its way to me? When did its non-descript, black hooded protagonist first wriggle, with the transgressive delight of an unbidden slug between naked toes embarking on a 2am fridge odyssey, into the as yet uncolonised crevices of my ‘demos’ library? The specifics, I fear, are but the fumes of memories, lingering like armies of mice in trenchcoats at supermarket cheese sample platters, at once painfully obvious and immune to detection in their uncanny shroud of stifling human decorum. "For who is madder?!" I shout, in a normal and cool manner. "The mice - so very mad for cheese - or the madmen who screams ‘Mice! Mice!’ in the middle of the cheese aisle?!"

And if I can’t remember how it got here, how can I make it go away?

I no longer wish to play the demo for New Life, if indeed I ever did. I find its presence ugly in ways that transcend how naturally ugly it is, which is the very thing I think made me want to play it in the first place. I find its description deeply unnerving in its unadorned simplicity. "A creepy story about a guy," it begins. Immediately, I am beset by visions of Poe. Of Shelley. Of Lovecraft. Of Chambers. Of scholarly ink spilled in wasteful abandon, of frenzied efforts to elucidate and quantify the terror the dwells in every human heart. "What folly!" I spit between mouthfuls of Tesco brand choco hoops, helplessly watching the murky impostor milk dribble down my juddering chin, coagulating with my tears of enraged bafflement. "What utter madness!".

For what is all horror if not, in some small way, a creepy story about a guy?

"Immerse yourself in the dark adventure of a guy who suffers from depression and feels guilty. He never takes off his hood and always keeps his hands in his pockets," it continues. "Michael became disillusioned with life and decided to try to start his life over. To do this, he left the metropolis and a successful career, sold the house he inherited, and moved to the other side of the country to forget the mistakes made in the past. But is it possible to escape from your past?"

Is it possible indeed? Day after day, I set myself the task of clearing the clutter from my library. A demo I’ve played and do not wish to play again. A demo that has tempted me to buy the full game. A demo I have poured my heart into writing about to extol its virtues, burning with ecstatic fire as words tumble unbidden to the page, only for the sole piece of evidence that I did not imagine the entire affair to be a single RPS comment that says “looks shit M8”. And then, there is the demo for New Life. Haunting me like all unfulfilled aspirations must eventually: relentlessly. Viciously. Eternally.

I move the cursor. I right click and hover over the ‘uninstall’ button. I have no wish to return here, to this place between play and un-play, as long as I live. But still, I cannot leave. "What if?" I ask. "What then?". The demo is too small to concern myself with the space it takes, and yet, too monumental in its shrieking insistence to ignore. And in this place between oblivion and absolution, I scrape out a wretched existence, with no end in sight.

(I will probs just leave it there tbf it’s a very small demo)