See You on the Other Side | ✓

1 | Them's the Breaks, Kid

"I said kill me now, I want to die. I heard there's a chance at an afterlife. I might not get let in, but at least I won't be living." - Kane Strang, My Smile is Extinct

Moodboard by: 90sbabygal

~~~

When I was six, I witnessed a murder.

It was the murder of my innocence.

I saw my dad fucking some girl from his job. That's when I learned that no one was as pure as they seemed. If I couldn't trust my dad to be faithful to my mom, what was I supposed to trust? I then learned that there was a thin line between right and wrong when he told me not to say a word to my mom.

A year later, my dad didn't want to be married to my mom anymore.

That's when I witnessed an actual murder; a murder-suicide.

The day after that, I didn't have a mom and dad. My grandma and grandpa became my guardians. I remember the day I walked up to their front door.

My grandpa with his wide green eyes began approaching me, wanting a hug. I hugged him and then bluntly asked, "so, do you wrestle with other people too?" My monotone voice shocked him.

"Wrestle?" he questioned.

"Ya know. In the bed. With a girl."

He scratched his head, seeming to not know what I was talking about. "I wrestled in college but that was in the past."

I remember overhearing him converse with his wife about how my parents had been raising me.

"That bastard that our daughter was with messed him up," he said.

"They're both heathens. Doesn't surprise me that little Adrian got jacked up in the mix," she responded, raising her glass of water to her lips.

I slept in a bed that felt too cold to be comfortable that night. Over the next nights, I adjusted to the bed and didn't mind it much.

I attended elementary school. I mostly kept to myself but found myself a friend named Nico. He was cool. He sat next to me at the lunch table one day.

We bonded over chicken nuggets. Then fought over what sauce was the best to dip in. I said barbecue, Nico said honey mustard. We didn't talk for an hour and then we decided to agree to disagree.

Our squabbles continued for the remainder of our friendship, except as we aged, we fought about more than just chicken nuggets. He moved away when I was 11.

That's when I learned nothing lasted forever.

He died when I was 11.

That when I learned no-one lasted forever.

I'd experienced this with my parents, but they had already been corrupted in my mind. To hell with them, literally.

Well, not my mom.

Nico barely did anything to anyone. In my mind, my parents' deaths were the result of their collective insanity.

So, what would an 11-year-old do to be deemed worthy of death?

I didn't think about it too much. Death is death. I learned that when I was 11.

I went through middle school without thinking about him. He was in the past and it was impossible to change the past so, I decided to not waste any time on him.

My day-to-day routine was the same. Go to school, do my work, go home, do my chores. I went through this routine mindlessly. It just felt right to do it.

When I was 16, I came home to my grandmother crying which was definitely not routine. She told me that my grandpa had been diagnosed with lung cancer. I don't remember if I felt much.

It was about damn time those cigarettes caught up with him. That's what he gets.

Now, I was 17. Grandpa was in the hospital and so was some of my extended family. He was on his last legs. He was dying.

He died a couple days ago. With him, I learned don't feed yourself poison and then complain when you notice you can't breathe.

With this history of death, you'd think I'd grieve frequently, but that was not the case.

I'd simply learned to mourn my own death.

☠A/N☠

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I'm so excited to be starting a new book! This chapter was short, but I promise the other ones will be longer. This was simply an introductory chapter.