Apple Core

Eleven: Grass

The following years of my life were undoubtedly the worst. My mother became grumpier and angrier and sadder. My hate for the Redd's increased magnificently. The world became constantly grayer. My contact lenses stayed on.

I lived for my mother. I knew that if I killed myself, she wouldn't be able to cope. When my father was murdered, she had me. But if she didn't have anybody left, she would either become the grumpy old woman across the street who died alone, or kill herself as well.

Every time suicidal thoughts came my way, trying to persuade me, I thought of her, finding my dead body. It motivated me, the fact that someone depended on me despite the fact that I couldn't depend on myself. It made me stronger. Every time I hid among the branches or behind the trees, watching Ralph and his family, I knew what I wanted in life: revenge. To kill them all, and make my mother proud.

The thought of killing them occupied my very existence. I couldn't concentrate much during lessons. I thought of it day and night. I had to kill them, it was my destiny.

Meanwhile, my weight became a problem. My mother yelled at me for it, not that she didn't yell about anything and everything. I began to exercise. It didn't help with forgetting things, and that was much better. I didn't want to forget, because forgetting meant forgiving. As I lifted and ran and stood on my hands, I felt better. I needed to be fit if I was going to commit murder.

I didn't live in the past anymore. I lived in the future, a future where the world was rid of Ralph and his family, thanks to me. I thought of it before bed, at meals, during exercise, in lessons. I thought of it, breathed in it, lived in it, wanted it. It was my dream, my only dream, to rid the world of them.

As I became fitter, my mother became thinner. I could soon see her cheekbones and wrist bones clearly. Her back became curved, and she turned considerably shorter, so short I had to look downwards to meet her eyes.

When I entered high school, my mother stopped giving me lessons. I took courses on the internet instead. The lessons were difficult, and took murder off my mind for a bit. But they annoyed me. How would solving absolute value inequalities help me kill three people without a trace? And if I wasn't going to kill them with a sword, why did I need to study history?

But I still studied, on and on. My mother didn't want me to go to college, but take courses online. I would do that. I wanted to study criminology, to gain experience. I wanted to make her proud in every way possible.

It happened one day, a very unexpected event. I was in the front yard, exercising, almost a sixteen year old. It was late spring, the ugly flowers around me starting to bloom, the trees regaining their green leaves.

I hated nature. It always died, and so did people. I hated people who wanted to change the world. What was there to change? It was already dying. We were killing it. They didn't care. Caring wasn't the reason they wanted to change the world, They just wanted to be remembered. That was absolutely ridiculous. My father was remembered, not because he made an effort to, but because my mother wanted to remember him. I thought that that was the stupidest thing my mother had ever done. People die. We forget them. I don't even know the names of my great great grandparents. People die, and we cry for a few days if we must, then that's it. It ends. The memory of them is buried with them, and even if we make an effort to remember, we will forget. And it will end up hurting us even more. In a year, or two, or ten, we will forget how their voices sounded. We will forget how they looked. And those who make an effort, who want to be remembered, will also be forgotten.

I was so stupid back then.

And I was so busy with my pessimistic thoughts and my push-ups, that I didn't realize that a tall, muscular teenager entered our front yard.