The House

Chapter 7 Just Leave

My heart's beating out of my chest and it's painful to breath. I'm dizzy and sweaty and my head hurts; I could easily have a tachycardia attack now and pass out.

"Isabelle! Are you alright?!" I hear the voice of my mother at the other side of the door.

I can't exactly tell when my parents and Valerye with her own parents entered the room, but just in the blink of an eye I was being checked by my mom and dad and, when I realized that, I started to shake them off. It still felt like it were my classmates grasping my arms to punch me some more and that made me panic.

"GET OFF OF ME! GET OFF OF ME!"
"Isabelle, calm down!" says my dad trying to hold me down.

"GET OFF!!!" I push my parents away with all my might and they step back a few steps.

With my heart still racing, I get off the chair and tear off all the wires I had stuck in my body. I feel weak and with my shaking knees it's hard to stand. Both my parents and Valerye feel the need to help me stand up but I don't let them; I push their arms away and grab the chair behind me to keep my balance.

Even though I'm not paying much attention to reality and my surroundings, I'm able to glimpse a flashing light at the corner of my right eye. It obviously catches my attention I can't see what is making that light because, unlike the chair and the tiny table, there's not a single bulb that can show me what I want to see. However, the light is shining right at me and its almost blinding, so it comes to my mind that this light is maybe shining at something that is at my left side.

When I turn to my left, I see a big screen reflected on what appears to be one of the walls of the room. I focus more on it and I can see the same countdown used in movies going over and over again from 5 to 1 as if the recording got stuck.

The flashing light is a projector; he was watching everything like this.

"Oh, I'm sorry." I say. "WERE YOU ENJOYING THE SHOW?!"

I look out for the camera hiding in the room to yell at it; it takes me a couple of minutes to find the round-glass object that is masking itself in the darkness of the room. I found it atop of the projected screen on the wall in a place where the projector's light can't reach.

"YoU fAiLeD." The speaker that is also hiding makes a sound and I react to the sudden noise.

"'I FAILED'?!" I say looking at the camera and pointing myself at my chest. "YOU CHEATED! TELL ME, WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?! YOU SAID YOU WERE GOING TO SHOW ME MY MEMORIES AND THAT YOU WOULD GIVE ME A TEST! BUT THE ONLY THING YOU DID WAS TO LET ME GO THROUGH THAT HELL AGAIN! WHAT WAS I SUPPOSED TO DO?! CHANGE WHAT ALREADY HAPPENED?! WELL, GUESS WHAT! MEMORIES CAN'T BE CHANGED! IF THEY COULD, I WOULD'VE CHANGED ALL OF MY MEMORIES BY NOW!"

"WhO sAyS yOu CaN't?" his cold and sharp answer almost interrupts me.

The way he answered made me hesitate; of course you can't change a memory, that's why they are called memories! Because they are what is left after something that already happened, something that you can't change no matter what. 

"I say so!"

The room goes quiet and there's nothing else to do. I myself am a mass of emotions right now; I'm angry because he's mocking me, but I'm also traumatized from the memory and I still feel alone because I remembered how lonely I was when nobody believed in me. You could say those are the top three emotions I'm feeling right now but, of course, I'm feeling many others too.

I must get out of this room if I don't want to explode so, after a deep sigh, I start walking towards the exit. However, something makes me stop right when I'm at one step of leaving the room.