My 21 Heartbeats

I always knew that I was different. I was strange, bizarre, creepy, and distant. I was distant because I was – different. I knew that I was different when I switched from being completely happy to being angry and irritated during a stint at an amusement park. I was younger then though and I couldn’t understand anything and neither could the people around me. They brushed it off as me “growing up” but I always knew better. They were right, however, about it being something about me growing up because it got worse as I aged. Now – at the tender age of fifteen – I am on the brink of suicide as I am crouched in the fetal position atop a toilet. The emotions bubbling inside of me are naught of mine own. They are of the people running behind these walls. I can feel the essence of their souls – I can feel their emotions… I am an empath – someone who can feel the emotions of another person – and this is my curse.

I leaned forward slowly thus lifting me off the toilet seat. I cradled my head with one hand as he used the other to balance myself against the adjacent wall. I looked up and blurry vision met my eyes. I continued forward to the wooden door and my head collided against it. I could feel the emotions raging on behind it. Who had ownership of which ones, I did not know. All I knew was that I couldn’t take it! I needed relief from this burden.

“Justin!”

Ugh! She was calling for me again. As if receiving her feeling of betrayal toward my father wasn’t enough, she needed me to get closer to her so that I could feel it even more. Or was it for a different reason? I had no time for these thoughts. I really had no time at all. My headaches were getting worse by the day. I knew I needed help but –

“Justin!”

Ugh! I pushed my way out of the bathroom door and into the long hallway that led to the living room. My eyes scanned the room, pain surging through them with every movement, but they did not find what they were looking for. I stepped into the middle of the room and looked to my left. There was a partition that kept the kitchen from the living room, but that partition was fleshed out with large triangle shaped wholes so that you could see in and vice versa. I cursed under my breath before heading toward the kitchen.

“Shi…” I exclaimed as my knee collided with the side of the claw foot coffee table. I immediately looked down to see my attacker and was met with a strange sight. My phone sat on the table with the screen off. I didn’t, however, remember leaving my phone anywhere near the living room. I reached down and picked up the device; it was cold so someone couldn’t have been using it recently. I turned the screen on and was met with several glowing notifications: Adam, Keya, Rad. I sighed and slid the device in my pocket and proceeded into the kitchen. My eyes scanned the large appliance ridden room so as to locate any more of my possibly misplaced belongings. I saw none and thus continued out the back door. The sudden intake of bright light blinded me as I descended the worn white steps to the back yard. There was only one place that she could have been – the garden. I looked left just in case but ultimately turned right to walk along the cobble stone pathway to the garden.

“Mom! Mom! Are you back here?” There was no response. Where could she have gone? My heart began to beat a little faster as I passed the large hedge that was grown to hold the sign that read: Callahan Family Garden.

“Mom, are you back here?” I called again, hoping to get a response, yet nothing came. As I rounded the corner that lead to the white gazebo, my heart began to beat a little faster. What was weird was that I didn’t feel any emotions while I walked aimlessly around the garden stalking my mother. My headache had gone away as well. What the hell was going on? Where was my father? Where was my mother? Where was anyone?

“If this is a trick it’s not funny!” I yelled as I cautiously walked up the steps of the gazebo. As I reached the landing I turned around in order to make sure no unwanted guests bothered me. No one was there but – I could have sworn – no I must have been seeing things. I shook my head and turned back around, but nothing was there either. The only thing seated before me was the white bench that my father proposed to my mother on. She relayed to her children how he took her out on a date to his “friend’s house”. They then found out that “they weren’t home” and that mom and dad could sit outside in the gazebo until they arrived. He then asked my mom about how the future she wanted for herself and when she said that she wanted “a big family and a wonderful husband”, he got down on one knee and proposed. After he wiped away her tears of happiness, he told her that the house behind them was of their own.

I chuckled slightly as I rubbed my head with my hand, “So I do have good memories.” I sighed and lowered my hands down to my sides before slouching into the bench. I tilted my head up and closed my eyes. I breathed in deeply – then out. I was finally at peace. Not even the wet sensation that was drenching my right hand could alter my current state.

Something wet?

My eyes vaulted open, my head flung to the left, my eyes widened, my mouth opened, and I screamed like I never knew was possible.

I could not escape the sight of

MY

MOTHER’S

BODY

DRENCHED

IN

BLOOD

And what’s worse, I think I’m beginning to take on her emotions – how she felt at this time…