It's already difficult to think.... But what is left to do? I am going to be erased; am being erased. I can feel my thoughts slipping away from me like sand between fingers. I can grasp at them, but the harder I try, the more difficult they are to keep. So, like this, I will try my best to think of everything I can think of – everything that led to this.
Ȣ
I was always...different.
Some of my earliest memories are of my maman comforting me from yet another nightmare. I remember always asking her why I had so many of the dreams in which I'd die in various, grotesque ways. The mes in my dreams didn't always look like me; sometimes they were girls, sometimes boys, sometimes neither, or both; sometimes older, sometimes younger, sometimes taller, or shorter; some had different hair, or eyes, or lacked the freckles that my maman said make me unique...but they were always still distinctly me. Some died in car wrecks, some drowned, some starved to death, some were killed by thieves, and some died in wars. Some bled out slowly in an alleyway as the heavens mourned their loss, while yet others went quickly in their sleep.
My maman has always insisted I had the nightmares because I am special. Yeah, right, I've always thought. I'm just me. I'm not especially tall, or handsome, or smart, or strong. I've never had any real friends, even. In fact, I was never exactly well received by my peers.
I remember, still, when I began school, some of the other children with older siblings telling stories that only made me have more nightmares. It was then that I began to have a hint of just how 'special' I am. Or, was?
I learned that – those nightmares of mine? – everyone has them. Our reality, or dimension, or world, or whatever you want to call it, is a bridge between all other realities. It's not uncommon knowledge; there's a day once a year when we can see other versions of ourselves for six hours starting at sunset. I like the versions of myself where I'm taller, and have longer hair, although I'd never wear my own hair long. They walk around through our world like ghosts, interacting with ghost objects only present in their own worlds. It's useless to try to talk to them. Well, most of them anyway. They can't see or hear us, save the rare few who can.
...When I was very little, I experienced my first Viewing. Well...I suppose babies can see their other selves too, but it takes a certain amount of brain development to really understand what's going on. Or maybe it's just because I can't remember that far back.
I remember – sort of – being very confused, at first. But...excited. I wandered away from my mother, following ghostly figures that wouldn't answer to my demand for their attention. Eventually I saw a sad, or maybe tired, looking girl. She was skinny, but tall, and had long hair the same copper color and the same texture as mine. Her hair was pulled back into a loose pony tail, and she wore clothes that looked like they fit once, but that she had recently become malnourished. Overall – she looked nothing like me. But I knew, somehow, instinctually, that she was me. I walked toward her. She stared at the stars for a long time in silence before turning to me.
She looked me right in the eyes and started speaking in language I didn't recognize. After noticing my confusion, she looked around and spoke to me in my native French. She smiled gently and said only one thing.
"I'm sorry it couldn't be me." I didn't know what she meant, but I started crying. She was crying too. ...The rest is...a bit of a blur. My maman found me and brought me home. As loving as my maman was – is? – that was one thing she refused to ever talk about.
...I'm rambling. The nightmares, those are visions of our other selves dying. They say whenever you narrowly avoid death in this world, one of your doppelgängers die. Then, you dream about it. They say it's a gift from God to our world to make us appreciate our lives more...but it's only really ever made me hate mine. If there is a God, I bed it was an experiment, not a gift.
