Mailed

Today, I am in a bad mood. I didn’t realize how bad my mood was until I reached for a rubber band and found that there were none… to which I responded by sweeping everything off the counter and piling everything that doesn’t belong to me in a chair. The owners can either collect them or throw them away, I don’t give a fuck.

It was an instant switch from down but calm, to raging fury of destruction.

I think I’m finally beginning to process his words from yesterday, and I don’t like them.

Not just because he’s kinda right, but because I am tired of all the shit I get. I am tired of dealing with these people that I don’t think I even like anymore. I am tired of dealing with the person they force me to be.

I’m tired of all of it.

Now I’ve just gotta figure out what I’m going to do. As they say, “Should I stay or should I go?” And right now? I’m leaning toward go.

Hogfather at Amazon

The Kid brought home the plague. That’s the only explanation.

Everyone’s been sick, so it should be no surprise that I finally succumbed to the coughing, running nose, fever, chills, and general misery of whatever the Kid brought home from school.

I’m hopeful though, that I’ll throw it off before Monday. My immune system is healthy and this cold doesn’t seem too strong.

Still, my head feels like it’s full of mashed potatoes. Ugh.

Heroes & Villains at Amazon

I can feel that need growing in me again. That climbing, culminating need for change.

Usually I lop off 12-14 inches of hair and pretend that it’s enough. That I’m not practically crawling out of my skin.

I bought a new backpack. It’s coming on Tuesday.

I’m tempted to throw some clothes in the bag and go. To just start walking and see where the world takes me.

It’s not like anyone needs me.

And maybe it’s what I need. To live my life for once and actually experience something real instead of always doing what I’m told.

I’ve been taking care of other people’s kids since I was 15 years old.

I’ve never done anything that I wanted to do. Always just what was needed for someone else’s happiness.

Sometimes I think I’m dying. Folding sheets of paper with the edges torn away a bit at a time, creasing and crumbling with age.

I wonder if they will miss me when I’m gone. Or if they’ll cry for not receiving the dinners I make them.

Let's Make Dumplings at Amazon

The plans are as follows:
1. Paint the Kid’s room.
2. Grow and eat mung bean sprouts.
3. Get him a BMX bike.
4. Buy him clothes for school.
5. Wrap up all old stories.

* * *

OMAKE

Being a retiree wasn’t so bad. Not when he halfway felt as though everyday they lived like normal people was one more day when he’d kept the world safe.

Warrick would never say anything, but checking up on the things Vereint had gotten up to while he was indisposed and reading a few essays floating around the Internet about the minds of supervillains had really freaked him out. It was obvious that Vereint had gone a bit psycho.

It was somewhat flattering to think that he was the only thing protecting the world from Vereint going full scale SUPERVILLAIN Darkstar. He got to have the love of his life and save the world at the same time. Blue Ice was dead, but Warrick felt like more of a superhero than he had in a long time.

Having Nick manifest his first metabilities was a bit worrying. Warrick didn’t quite know how he was supposed to handle things, but he managed to at least look like he wasn’t throwing hysterical fits so he considered it a win. Vereint wasn’t even trying to cover up the fact that he was freaking out. It made Warrick feel a bit superior to be the controlled one for once.

“Remember, no showing off,” Vereint said with a pointed look at Nick.

“It’s fine, Dad.” Nick rolled his eyes, but didn’t try to move away when Vereint tugged his jacket straight. “I got this.”

A quirky smile curved Vereint’s lips as he looked at Nick. “You’re growing up really fast. Just don’t expect to get your own car until you’re twenty-five.”

Warrick moved in when it looked like Vereint was about to spit on his hand to smooth their son’s hair. “We’re going to be late.”

Vereint let himself be tugged away from Nick. Warrick wrapped his left arm around Vereint’s shoulder, less as a comforting gesture and more to hold him back from his fussing.

“I guess we better get out of here,” Vereint said.

Nick looked proud in his suit and tie, his hair styled to look careless and windswept. He had Vereint’s dark hair and Warrick’s blue eyes and was growing up to be a good looking kid. When he grinned, it was to show off Vereint’s dimples in a charm that no one could deny. “I look good, right?” He stuck his hands in his pockets and spread his jacket wide for a moment.

“Don’t get a big head.” Warrick clapped Nick on the back and nudged him toward the door. Vereint stayed curled against his side, their legs almost tangling when they stepped out on the porch. Warrick refused to let him go.

They walked up the sidewalk as a group, meeting up with others making the journey. Boys and girls dressed in their best clothes, excited younger siblings bounding around, and indulgent parents trailing along. It was like something out of a Norman Rockwell painting, this stream of people all headed toward the country school.

Warrick had never imagined that a child’s graduation between grades was such a big deal, yet here they were. Vereint was beaming with pride and fiddling with the camera hanging around his neck. Nick spotted a couple of his friends and ran up ahead. And suddenly they were taking a romantic stroll.

“Are you going to write about this in your diary?” Warrick asked.

Vereint slanted him a confused glance. “Huh?”

“Never mind. It was stupid. Life is good.”

“It is.” Vereint gave Warrick’s shoulder a squeeze.

Warrick smiled contentedly.

He had a husband he loved and a son graduating the fifth grade. He had sixty-one years of life experience and a thirty-one year old body. There wasn’t much more that he could ask for. Life was good.

/EXCERPT

* * *

They gave him the name Gellar Rembrandt when he was decanted. One more Bottle Baby sent off to the creche. And as soon as he had a mouth full of teeth and could walk and talk, he was bundled off to the Learning Center.

It wasn’t a bad life, being the clone of a clone of a clone. For everything he thought and did, there was a precedence. It gave him a sense of peace to know that he was a stereotypical representative of his genotype. One amongst thousands.

Until the Graduation Exams when he was 20. Until his world was ended with the declaration that he was an Aberration, and Unclean.

He was not the perfect copy he’d always known himself to be. He was an anomaly.

Gellar was taken from the Learning Center in the back of a van. His wrists were shackled together and he was treated like a prisoner, an inevitable threat.

He could see the disgust and disquiet in the faces that looked like his own. (His type is used in the police and military.) Every single one of them was forced to wonder what they would have done if they were him. He was the possibility of failure that any one of them could have been.

He was their worst fear brought to life.

Aberration. Discord. Failure.

/EXCERPT