Technically, I Don't Exist

 

I yelped in surprise and my head hit something. I fell through whatever solid object had come in contact with my head, and landed with a slam on the floor. I opened my eyes to see fragments of glossy wood around me. I had dozed off with my head on my hand. When I awoke, I had become so surprised my head fell and crashed through my desk.I looked up and saw my ‘mother’ at the door, staring at me with wide, confused eyes.

            “Uh… I think the desk malfunctioned.” I said. I quickly brushed my hair over the left side of my face. I hurriedly stood up and closed the door. She was too surprised to stop it. I didn’t need any more attention. I exhaled, rubbing the side of my head. I pulled out a piece of wood that was embedded in my arm. Without so much as a wince, it yanked out. No blood leaked out of the wound, for I had none left. I sighed and opened the door and walked to the bathroom. My hair was in a mess, piled up high on my head. Lost in a daze, rather than using my brush, I used my hand to comb out the mess. Pieces of red-brown hair fell around me as I tried to softly straighten out the rat’s nest piled atop my skull. An annoying array of continuous pinging emanating from my cell phone. I looked at the screen. It was flashing ‘CALENDAR APPOINTMENT’. I walked over to it, and clicked the button with my nail. ‘First day of school’. Oh, yeah. The first day of tenth grade high school… for the 28^th time.

            Yeah, there’s something wrong with that sentence. 28 times in tenth grade? I must be crazy or just stupid to be held back that much! Actually, there are other reasons I have been repeating the exact same grade thirty times. Firstly—I am a vampiress. Vapmire. Blood-sucking bat-man. I have been for as long as I remember. I feel like I am the only vampire in this world, and there is no one around like me, which is probably right. With that fact looming over me, I feel much more alone.

Next, I am immortal. That also comes along with being abnormally strong, and having extremely sharp senses. Seeing as I am technically not alive, my body is freezing cold and hard as stone. So, you’d say I’m super human, right? I also have a thirst for human blood, which I seem to have been able to control recently. I also have this annoying touch of insomnia. I don’t fall asleep- I get right in between, where I am dreaming, yet I am aware of my surroundings, and even while ‘sleeping’, I don’t wake up feeling revitalized. In fact, I feel like my energy diminished.

This list goes on forever, but this seems to be the most important component. I… I can’t remember anything. Nothing. I remember up until about thirty years ago. I don’t remember much before that, as if I was born fifteen and have always been. Trust me, that makes absolutely no sense. I know I have a past, but nothing seems to come up. Although, I seem to be having these dreams. Are they just dreams, or are they my past? They seem to fit as my past, but hey, dreams can be kind of weird. It’s not like I am completely blank, though. I remember small things, fragments. And what I don’t know, my body remembers sometimes. I know, it sounds weird, but it’s the truth.

I combed out my hair and put it in place—covering my left eye, which was a bright red color. It was contrasting my other deep brown eye. I didn’t want anyone to see my odd discoloration unique to my body, although I have realized over the years that humans fail to see the discoloration, that only my kind can see it. My kind. Sounds like I’m some kind of wild animal- which isn’t far off.

Due to my poor styling skills, part of my hair still fell to the right onto my shoulder. My hair came almost the length of my midriff. A lot of people said they liked the longevity of my hair, but it only seems to get in the way. Especially since I can never put it up in any way. Having to keep almost all your hair on one side really limits your hairstyles.

“Honey? Are you okay? I think I imagined it, but I saw you in your room, and you were surrounded by splintered wood. Do you know where that came from?” My ‘mother’, Angela, said. She’s really just a single woman who found me on the side of the road (Don’t ask. I don’t remember how).

“Yeah, I’m fine, Angela,” I said. I realized what I had called her, and remembered it was informal to call your parents, adoptive or not, by their first name. “Mom.” I sighed and jumped into the shower. The water was boiling hot. I soon as I jumped in, steam filled the room. The water was barely warm to me, even though it was past boiling for normal humans. I let out an exasperated sigh.

            After my ‘shower’, which is more like sitting in a vat of water, waiting for it to freeze, I threw myself down the stairs, walking right past my breakfast. Angela didn’t even notice, for I don’t eat in the morning. I only eat at dinner to make her feel better. I walked my way to my high school, sighing most of the way. I spotted one friend from high school twenty years ago, holding a small child’s hand as they walked along the sidewalk. I covered my face in case she remembered me. I finally made my way towards the school building, and could see students clumping in social groups until they were called to class. I sat on a bench next to the drop-off lane. A few boys approached me, but I gave them a solid glare and they backed off.

            A few minutes before the bell was to ring, and students were starting to file into the building, something caught my eye. A tall boy with dark brown hair and tired mahogany eyes stepped out of his car. He seemed to be the only boy who wasn’t in a social group. He had pale skin, which surprised me. Although it is a normal feat in cloudy Whispers, South Carolina, he seemed to be paler than usual. A thin cloud of steam invisible to the human eye rose surrounded him. The warm air was freezing as it touched his skin. Intrigued, I started to approach him. Suddenly, he fell flat on his face. I thought he had noticed me, but realized he was turned the other direction. I was about to see if he was okay, when I saw Joshua Willet, a 10^th grader, quickly walk towards him. I was listening to the conversation when I felt a whoosh of air behind my head. I shot around and used my arm to block whatever was approaching me. It was a pencil. I looked ahead of it, and saw a freshman boy with a confused look in his eyes. I was already angry enough. With a flick of my wrist, it was soaring through the air back in the direction it came from. Before he had time to react, it went through the arm of his shirt and jammed itself into a telephone pole. He tugged at it, but only the eraser was visible. The rest of the pencil had embedded into the wood.

I turned away from the pathetic sight to see the boy as he walked away. He disappeared into the crowd of students. I silently muttered something in anger. I ran forward to the spot he was standing, only to have my foot catch onto something on the ground. I fell forward and threw my hand out in front of me in an attempt to stop myself, but only ended up cracking the pavement and slamming my face on the ground. I yanked my hand out of the ground and looked at what I had tripped over, only to see face-shaped hole embedded into the cement.