181 Days of Madeline Jesty

Chapter 9: The Storyteller

As soon as I entered our house, I already saw Suzie with hands on her waist, probably irritated at Troy for not being able to bring me back earlier than she expected. But then she calmed her tensed shoulders when she saw Mickey enter, making it obvious that she was curious why I brought a visitor with me.

"Hi, Suzie. This is Mickey. We'll be doing a seatwork together, and I invited her over since we didn't finish the work at school," I explained as calmly but as fast as I could, avoiding eye contact to steer clear of her looming questions. And to Mickey, I said, "My room is upstairs. Let's go," as I held her hand and dragged her.

"Do you want snacks?" Suzie loudly asked, her question echoing through the house.

"No, we're fine. I bought cookies at Cornelia's." I shut the door after I answered and threw my bag on the chair as I released a loud exhale. When I looked at Mickey, she seemed awed at the size of my room, which was a response I would often get when I would bring someone into our house.

"How many are you in this house?" Mickey started, ignoring my plea for her to make herself comfortable. "Do you have siblings?"

"You are not here for personal questions, are you?"

"I think my question the other day is considered personal, don't you think?"

I rolled my eyes and sat on the couch. "It's only my mom and me. Suzie, our housemaid, the one you met earlier, and Troy, our driver, live here too. Though sometimes they take days off."

"Wow. All this space for four people? This is the biggest house I've been to."

"Probably the emptiest too. You know what they say? The saddest people are the richest people."

"I beg to differ," she replied, joining me on the coach, her right leg on top off her left thigh. "It doesn't really matter whether you're wealthy or not. You attract negative emotions when you are discontent."

Here she was in front of me, acting cool and being so attractive all of a sudden. It dawned on me that we were alone, and I badly wanted to ask for her to touch me, but why? And at what cost? When we met, we didn't know we were studying at the same school. I was a laid-back, rebellious young woman who intended to have fun, get laid, and get drunk, abusing the fact that I had no idea with everybody's death dates even though I could see the hourglasses.

Now . . . what should I tell her? That I just wanted to feel a little touch after I technically snubbed her?

But wasn't that why she was here?

"I am discontent," I told her, deciding to jump to the reason she was here, and faced her eye to eye. The anxiety was starting to kick in. Would she believe me if I told her about my curse? But what if she'd back out and thought I was some lunatic? Then the chance of feeling something aside from emptiness even before I pass away would be gone.

How desperate am I? I thought. Still, somehow, I had to try, but in ways I could turn back if it failed.

"You see, I am a storyteller, and I often get too attached to my characters . . . like what happened. S-so . . . I want you to let me know what you think about that idea."

"What idea?"

"The one I told you. A woman who can feel people's death and see hourglasses over their heads when she tastes just a bit of alcohol. There was a time I—she, I mean. See! I get too attached to my characters."

I laughed nervously before continuing, clearing my throat every now and then. I hoped it didn't sound fake. "So the thing is when there are a lot of people, the information becomes too much to bear and she'll faint. Mind you, it isn't a good feeling. So she avoids it as much as she can. D-do you have any questions so far?"

"A lot, but continue."

"She sometimes uses it intentionally when . . . she's curious to know the life span of her potential partner." But as soon as I said that, Mickey knitted her brows, so I stopped. "Do you have any questions now?"

"So how many times have this woman used this power or whatever?"

"I think I indicated less than ten, both intentionally and accidentally."

"Couldn't you just change that? That's weird. If I had that power, I'll abuse that and check people's life spans over and over. Maybe I'll become an alcoholic."

Her idea was funny, but I had to stick with my storyline. "No, I . . . I have submitted this idea already. The blurb, but not the entire story, so I couldn't just change that."

"Hmm. It just happens when she gets drunk?"

"Not really drunk. As long as what she intakes has alcohol."

"But why? Why alcohol?"

I shrugged. "Good point. I don't have an answer for that. It just happened."

"What? But you're the writer. You could think why alcohol is the trigger because it's weird that it's too specific."

"Some things do not need a reason," I argued. "They just happen, and all we can do is accept. Like, you know, death."

"Fair point. Does she see hers? Her own life span, I mean? And—wait, sorry, I'll reserve my questions for later."

"No, it's okay." Because for the first time in my life, someone was willing to listen and was actually interested to what I was experiencing. It was a surprise—or a gift—I didn't expect. "Here's the thing. I—she never did. But like, last Monday, I accidentally ate a cake with alcohol. With the number of people inside the bar, I knew I—I mean, if my character were in my shoes, she was doomed. So I closed my eyes and tried to find the exit, thinking I was my own character."

"So as long as she closes her eyes before she sees the hourglasses, she'll not know people's deaths?"

"The answer to that is yes. She must able to make eye contact with the hourglass before she is informed of the death date. Hourglasses don't have eyes, but you know what I mean."

"So when you bumped into me, the idea is, you'll know when I'll die?"

"No. That's what I was talking about—I mean, an idea popped in. I imagined the grains of sand in yours were just stuck on top. And when she looks around, everybody else's is moving, but she could no longer feel their death, you know what I mean? It was like . . . you were magic. An exception. And even though the curse wasn't entirely gone, at least I could keep on drinking and I wouldn't know other's death dates—"

"Okay, okay," she interrupted, her hands waving in the air to stop me. "I see what you mean that you get too much into character because you're already mixing your pronouns."

"Sorry." I smiled before I continued. "And then I got this idea that after the character, you know, becomes intimate with an abnormal case, when she wakes up, she finally sees an hourglass on herself alone even when she hasn't taken any alcohol and gets an idea of when she'll die. That is, after a hundred and eighty-one days. Now the situation has been turned around—"

"Pause. I have a lot questions, first being why the fuck are you torturing your character so much? She just wanted to get laid and be drunk and be a wild young woman!"

My question too, I thought. "It's storytelling, Mickey."

"Why a hundred eighty-one?"

Because it is what it is. "A random number is more realistic."

I thought she was done asking, so I readied myself for my proposal. But as soon as I opened my mouth, she asked her last question—I had no answer I could make up quickly.

"And why me? Why did you change the flow of the story when you met me?"