My Legacy

Chapter 1: I... Get Another Chance?

A liar. A lazy ass. A jerk. Annoying. 

I'm called many things. Even at the age of eighteen, I still live with my grandparents. Non-biological, of course. Because I'm an American born child in a very strange, weird, and diverse family, and because of my love for everything out of the ordinary like mythologies, anime, light novels, manga, and whatnot, I have a very open mind about people. 

However, I've never had a very strong or close bond with many of my family members. Not for a lack of trying on their part, mind you. But when you're constantly being demeaned by everyone around you and treated as a lesser species as a whole, I decided to just separate myself from my family for the most part. They call me and I likely won't or don't answer or respond. They text me, and I walk away. Sure. I might be a liar, someone with little motivation to work hard at much in life, and be overly sarcastic and make snide or inappropriate jokes at every corner (to cover my insecurities). That's true.

But the stuff they say to me and do to me... I shiver. Drug addicts. Alcohol abusers. Child abusers. Overly touchy uncles and aunts. Cheaters. Thieves. Liars. Abusers. Manipulators. Hypocrites.

There's a lot I have to say about my family. They aren't proud of me and I'm not proud of them. I never fit in and I likely won't ever. 

Regardless, the day had finally come. After having lived for over two years with my non-biological grandparents, I had graduated from high school. But... I was in a small town where big machinery like trucks and semi-trucks were a lot more common they were out in the city. Don't get me wrong. I was a born and raised kid living in the Puget Sound region of Washington state. 

However, the things I heard kids get to talk about growing up always made me envious of them. They got along with their family. They had siblings growing up. They had parents who were still together and loved and cared about not just themselves but their children as well. They had actual friends growing up too! They had sleepovers, hung out with their friends after school and on breaks... they got to places like Disneyland, watch childhood classics, etc. 

The envy I held for my peers was quite high. Over the years, I watched how others around me ran circles around me, looked down on me, and laughed at me. I snapped. Due to my high temper and the fact I bottle my emotions up inside until they spill at the worst possible moment in time. So one day, a kid made fun of me when I declared I liked this girl named Ashley at my Elementary school in second grade. I had the balls to say it because back then I was an ugly, smelly, nasty kid then. I was almost guaranteed a ticket of rejection no matter who I confessed to.

But one kid didn't care. Ian. Now that I look back on it, he wasn't too bad of kid. He was kind of like how I was in high school, actually. Annoying, unintentionally made fun of others, and pretty good looking. However, it seems, Ian had a crush on Ashley too. And he wasn't too happy that the lowest rung on the totem pole had eyes for "his girl". So when he took that first swing, I snapped and all I saw was red.

After my mind had cleared, I had broken some of his bones and blood was caked on my fists and shoes along with the rest of his body. He was sent to the hospital in a critical state. The doctors said that if I'd continued for even fifteen seconds longer, and I probably would've unintentionally murdered him.

It was like getting sucker punched. I... I did that? I had thought then. I was scared. I grew scared of my potential in the art of blood spilling, and mentally put a lock on my psyche to tell myself that no matter what happens, to never fight again. For the safety and health of others, I would never do it again. Never again. 

Time progressed and as I grew older, I grew increasingly more spiteful to the world and its inhabitants but I made sure to keep an open mind. Over the years, I made goals that stuck with me for better or worse: Never use drugs or alcohol, never cheated or harm your lover, never be racist, sexist, or homophobic, and always keep an open mind.