The Typical Insanity

don't be a spaz

I wanted to ask more, to clear up the cloud of confusion leaking out of my head but before I could ask Ms. Lauren Han anything, I was pushed out of consciousness.

That's a good way to describe it actually, it's like someone shoving your thought process to a far corner and taking full control. Sometimes i can see what happens, like I'm watching a movie and sometimes I black out. I blacked out this time. But this time I wasn't completely... gone. This time I was dreaming.

I knew it was a dream because I was standing in front of a cabin in what appears to be some woods. What makes it a dream is that this cabin burned down twenty years ago. It was where I went with my family ever winter, I never really liked this place. It smelled like mildew and air freshener but my mother always insisted it was just how nature was supposed to smell. The only reason I ever willingly came was because winter vacations with us meant you'd have to spend the time with the whole clan of Carters. I love my brother and my mother but something about having a whole clan was off-putting, I only suffered through it because mom always managed to drag Aunt Quinn to the cabin.

The door opens and I watch my brother age nine bound out the door holding a large sled followed by an eight year old me. This is a memory, isn't it? I'm not imaginative enough to create little scenarios in my head so it must be a dream. Then why don't I recognise it?

"Hey Fish, c'mon! Mom said we only have half an hour before dinner which means we only have half an hour to use the sled! Let's go, you gotta be a bit faster if we want to do anything other than walking!"

Ah, that's right, Grandpa Al gave Nick a hand-me-down sled for Christmas. I got a mug that said Neil but Nick always let me play on his sled with, probably out of pity.

"Don't call me Fish, I'm not a Fish. Why can't we just play after dinner?"

Believe it or not, the nickname of Fish had utterly nothing to do with the movie Finding Nemo, this was a full 20 years before it was even released. He only called me that because we had an argument about who could hold their breath underwater the longest and he called me a fish because I could hold it for more than 20 seconds.

"Whatever, Fish. And the reason we can't play after dinner is because Aunt Cass told us that mom's new boyfriend, Peter whatshisface, is coming over for the weekend and she wants everyone there."

"She didn't tell me." I didn't realise how sulky of a kid I was, like man, I really perfected a pout that no one saw. Nick leads us further into the woods until little me (a perfectly adequate nickname for this situation) gets distracted by some noise.

"Nick? Nick, I think someone's at the lake."

"It's probably just a squirrel, c'mon Nemo."

"No, no, squirrels wouldn't come out here, please Nick can we go check it out?" What a terrible bowl cut the two of us had. I mean, yeah we looked okay for that particular time in history but if I had a kid I would never make him have to wear that. Mom was always surrounded by hippies, I think she made one called Blue Moon cut our hair.

"Ugh, fine but only because I can't play without you and mom would kill me if I leave you alone."

The two little kids venture into a detour path and carefully trek around the frozen lake. I try walking away from them, like one would usually do within a dream but beyond wherever the boys had walked was just plain white, like an unfinished world. Maybe that's how visiting memories work, you can only see what you've already seen. I turn back and follow little me who's following the sound of someone crying.

"Hello? Is anyone there?" Little Nick calls out. The sobbing stops for a moment and a lady steps out from behind a tree in front of them.

"Aunt Quinn? What're you doing over there?"