Mad As A Hatter (Completed 2015) [WATTY AWARD WINNER *Featured Story*]

chapter twenty one - eno ytnewt retpahc

++not edited oops++

"A father of Jessie's is no father of mine."

The spot where I stabbed him in the thigh was healing fast, skin growing over the wound. 

Then high pitch screams channelled into my head, and I collapsed in pain, clamping my hands over my ears. 

Rocking forwards on the ground, I slowly rose on two feet, startling back from this man.  I knocked over a plastic chair and a fold-up table, wincing at the sound of its impact.  Everything was ten times louder.  "What did you just do?" I shouted.

As the man blinked, my hearing eased and things got quieter.

"Something that you can do," he responded and reached his hand out.  His eyes held promise, searching my own to meet him halfway. "You've inherited the same power from me and I can teach you how to use and manipulate it." 

I flinched away from his hand and sensed the sharp pocket knife on the desk behind me.  I stepped backwards, his step advancing.  I harshly spoke, "I'm not falling for bullshit." 

The voice in my head boomed again yet this time I could withstand its aggressive screech.  You can only share thoughts with those you are connected to.  Isaac and I.  I am your father.   

His two fingers were pressed against his temple, his look hardening in concentration.  I'm sorry Alice, but I can no longer stand this doubt.  You must see it.  You must believe me.  I'm sorry for what I'm about to do.

In pain, I shook my head like a goddamn madman, covering my ears.  "Stop getting into my head!  Stop!"

I'm sorry. I'm sorry for what I'm about to do.

Profanity on the edge of my tongue, a breathtaking rush of wind knocked me in the head and I screamed, crouching down to the sand.  The screams rushed through my mind, pushing my resistance aside and opening up the deep parts of my thoughts.  I could feel myself exposed to him; naked to the cold bone, memories leaking out of this matter he revealed, and planting them in my vision.  Him.  He captured my visualization.  Him standing beside a bed that had a beautiful woman beneath the covers, a child cradled in her caramel arms. 

A child, baby girl, with big brown eyes that sparkled in wonder.  Tumbling past her pink fluffy lips was a giggle that produced a warm dance of tickles across anyone's skin.  She was an object of purity that the mother thought she could preserve. 

The man held a look of distress, understanding this promise the mother whispered in their daughter's ear was already broken.  It was broken as soon as their child was born.  He knew she would never be safe.  His hands tightly clutched the headboard of the bed, the black dots in his bloodstream haunting him every night. 

The mother unaware of her husband's stress, pinched the tiny toes of her smiling newborn.  The vision zoomed in on the baby's legs, past the layers of skin and into her bloodstream.  Black dots attached themselves to the red blood cells, moving like parasites. 

Suddenly the vision blurred, pieces of faces and bodies piecing together to form another moment.  Pushing a little girl on the swing was the man, his face structure the same as hers.  Whenever she got higher, her feet wiggled in the air and they both shared the same laugh. 

The vision blurred again, and the girl was no longer little; taller with an edgier, darker look across her chiselled face.  She waved goodbye to the same man, his eyes more crinkled than before and left the house in long strides to catch up with the boy running towards her. The vision zoomed in on the boy's face.  Isaac.