Blind minds eye

Morality and Mortality

I wake to the sound of the alarm, blaring into my nightmares like a nuclear bomb, and I try to blink away the tears and memories as I rush to the closet and pull out that little dress with such a haunting meaning. I stare not at myself but through myself in the mirror and it resonates within me that this is how I found her only three days ago.

                    The image of her eyes darting to mine as I entered the desolate room that was temporarily hers takes over my mind. I can practically hear the sharp intake of breath she took, trying to collect the tattered pieces of herself, while letting her shirt fall back over herself ceasing her self-hatred fueled examination. “Don’t pity me” she sneered though I knew it came out less fierce than she was aiming for “I don’t” I simply stated while putting the tray of food on the bed and dragged the hard plastic chair to sit next to it. Her hospital bracelet covering the faded scars lacing her wrist, in which we were made so aware of when she first came to reside with us in the suicide watch unit, the small font that spelled out Lilah Emeryn barely visible as she took a drink from the glass of water. Realizing I had been staring she looked at me seemingly contemplating her next move and suddenly asked if I was like her.

                                          I spent a few seconds wondering what she meant until I took in the sight of her staring down at her pregnant belly and hastily responded no. Confusion muddled her eyes “ so why don’t you wear a skin?” she inquired. This question always comes, filled with so much judgment. The change began twenty two years ago when I was three; the memory of my mother talking with my grandmother about the newly developed systems had come into my mind at that moment. “Did you see the announcement?” My mother had inquired after twenty minutes of nervously scraping a fork along her limp salad that she ordered although what she truly craved was the chicken, “yes” my grandmother lamely stated in return, her brow furrowing. My mother, turning to my stroller and slowly rocking it forward and backward, carried on with the conversation ignoring the downshift in mood and asked how her mother felt about it. “It was ridiculous, such a falsity, and promoted by the president no less, sent me into an outrage.” She had responded.   

                            My mother, who actually quite liked that the president had been willing to demonstrate how these systems, skins they were calling them, worked on live television, she believed it was brave, how passionately he talked about how there was no real pain felt or physical side effects, only pinpricks felt across the body when the skin was put on or taken off. Her eager to please mind was immediately fascinated, she was always attempting to impress and being obsessed with the idea of beauty just like her own mother, the only difference being her own mother was obsessed with beauty you worked for constantly spending hours working out to reach her goals while my own mother was enthralled with beauty at any cost.

                   That lunch meeting between me, my mother and my grandmother ended in a screaming match, my mother insisting the skins weren’t a tragedy and my grandmother consistently disagreeing. A week later the government started selling the skins to the public and soon after countless shops opened up for the purpose of selling them. They helped the economy a bit just like all the politicians said although they didn’t take into account all the downfalls. Although you could differentiate the truth from what was hidden it was difficult, the little white line in the eye being the only external part that looks digital, and people used them to get away with illegal activities. Kidnapping, rape, theft and murder grew more and more prevalent and the ability to hide your face from your victims grew along with it.