“’ I’m not immune to pain, but my emotions deaden my senses; therefore, I am not quite as susceptible to human weakness.”’ Taylor Petterson blushed as the teacher read the last line. It was the truth; her emotions kept her from pain. Yet that didn’t stop her from feeling embarrassed. The other teens looked at her like she was crazy; and maybe she was, but she wasn’t about to deny she was different.

Taylor had been seven years old when she was raped for the first time. For then on, the man she knew as Jack repeatedly attacked her. When she was ten, her father was murdered in front of her. Then her mother died when Taylor was eleven, intrusting her to the man she had married barely a month before. Two and a half years later, her best friend was killed, followed by several more of her friends. She became pregnant with Jack’s twin babies when she was fifteen. Unfortunately the children were stillborn. Jack claimed to love her but he left her when the babies died. Three days later the body of an unknown man was found hanging in a tree outside of town. After the discovery of Jack’s body, the mutilated body of Taylor’s godfather was found by a hiker. Now she was sixteen, and after all these horrors, it was no wonder she felt little pain. Her mind was probably so numb that she could barely think, let alone feel.

The teacher asked her to come back after class so “they could talk”, but Taylor knew that was just another way of saying “you need a shrink”. She was tired of therapists, of people acting like they understood, and most of all, of teachers. Maybe she could quit school; it’s not like she would be there much longer. Her death was already predicted. The undertaker was a friend, and he had already taken her measurements and put the epitaph on her headstone. Sometimes that thought helped her; Death was like an old friend.

The bell rang, and she ran out the door. Not looking back, Taylor said forget it and left. No one stopped her; if she didn’t want to stay, no one cared. She was unpopular with the students and teachers. Who wants a despondent friend that wants to die but can’t cap herself? The answer is no one.
Taylor brushed her black hair out of her eyes as she ran against the wind. It whipped the autumn leaves around her as she collapsed against the cemetery gate, her body heaving with her sobs. As she cried alone against the fence, she realized there was no one to comfort her, no Mom, Dad, Silas, Jack, Ryan, Chad, Alex, any of them… they were gone. If Silas hadn’t had an allergic reaction to his medicine, if her dad hadn’t been shot, if Roger had been caught earlier on… the ifs haunted her. Taylor knew it wasn’t her fault, but when you’re alone in this world, you have to blame someone.
~To Be Continued….~