Live Forever

One.

People have this big misconception about immortal beings. They find out you're immortal and they assume you can speak 48 languages and playing ancient instruments. The truth is, some of us can. Some of us have mastered the art of playing Chopin's Nocturne in full. Some of us have learnt dead languages just to seem more intellectual.

But then there's immortals like me. I don't care for the intellectual, omniscient-style life; I learnt French to try and get girls and I learnt Wonderwall on the guitar purely to piss people at parties off. I don't see the point in trying to extend my knowledge to impress people; they are not like me; they are not immortal.

I don't feel the need to boast or brag about my unusually amazing talents. I may not be able to play a symphony by ear but I can rack some pretty fucking good lines, practically an artist. I can roll a spliff any which way you want, come rain or fucking shine. You've never smoked a joint until you've smoked one of mine. Give me a pack of green skins and I'll make spliffs to smoke out the whole of England. One thing I do miss from the good old days is the fucking weed. It's practically like pure heroin compared to the skunky sprayed shit you get nowadays.
Hell, I might be an immortal but I'm definitely the youngest I've ever met. Born in the mid 70s, stuck as a 23 year old Madchester lad. I'll tell you what though, they do say everything makes a comeback and it's true. 2019 has seen the comeback of 90s big time, and I don't just mean the fashion. This, for me, makes life so much easier. My dad, Gabriel, is an immortal from the fucking Victorian era and I just can't help but laugh when I hear him slip into his old lingo, talking about "harlots" he shagged at the bar he's frequented for more than a couple of decades. I, on the other hand, find it piss-easy to fit in, everyone's trying to live the life I was living back in the 90s- fucked out my head, smoking spliffs with mates of fag-burnt sofas and taking polaroids of us off our nut.

Truth is, I try to avoid having friends, or at least good ones. I have people I'll invite over for a couple of joints, maybe a few bumps of ketamine, but I don't tend to form real connections with them. It's just easier that way. Not because I don't want to- although I do feel it's better to keep yourself to yourself- but because, well, think about it. Born in the mid 70s, all of my secondary school friends are mid-40s, going of 50s. And me? Fresh as lamb. Luckily, I don't have the mindset of a middle aged man, the immortality stops that. When I stopped aging, so did my mind. This isn't to say I can't grow mentally, but it does mean I avoid going through a midlife crisis and buying an expensive motorbike I definitely can't afford.

My family, by which I mean, my dad and I, aren't rich by any standard, but he's got all the necessary qualifications to keep himself, and with a bit of begging, me, alive. I have a job, but it's nothing high profile. It can't be- every ten or so years we have to move otherwise people start getting suspicious as to why I am still a skinny, drugged up 23 year old and not beginning to "settle down" per say. I have no reason to settle down- my dad taught me that.
He made the mistake that I've promised, I've sworn I will never make. He fell in love. You'd assume it was with my mum, but it wasn't. My mum was simply another junkie so called harlot he met in a different bar a few towns back. No, he fell in love with a woman way before that, and I sort of blame my existence on her. Back in the 40s, in the height of the war (the second big one), when my dad was sporting beautiful slicked back greasy-looking hair, he met a girl. I can't remember where, and I don't really care. But she broke his heart, led him on a path of self destruction, without even knowing it. Being immortal, there are rules you don't break. You never tell anyone you're immortal, that's basically like buying yourself a one way ticket to the loony bin. It's more than that though. Telling someone you're immortal is dangerous. There are some fucked up people out there who would kill to get their hands on someone who, as far as they're aware, can't die. But that's not the main reason you can't tell anyone. Now, I'm not a fan or anything, but Twilight? As soon as Bella knows that Edward is a vampire, she's sold. Basically obsessed. Women are all like this, from my knowledge. I don't blame them though, living mundane lives in a 9-5 office job, if you meet anyone remotely interesting you're bound to become infatuated. This is what happened with my dad. He met her when he came home for Christmas, and pissed out his head he told her everything the very same day. Sure, he could've blamed it on the drink, but my dad isn't too smart. Instead, he just hung out with her more, thinking she understood what she was taking on. One big difference between us and the sparkling fucking vampires on the big screens is that there is no... turning process. You can't make someone else immortal. You see where I'm going with this, right?
My dad loved Alice in the purest way, but as he remained stylish and hip, she began to grow old and frail; as my dad retained his head of hair, hers turned grey. And it tortured him. Eventually, people began assuming he was her son. That's when he realised that he had to let her go. So, as he tells me, one night he just packed his bags and left, left her sleeping in their bed they once shared. He tells me he's never seen her again, and I know he regrets it everyday. I mean, it's pretty obvious with the copius amounts of alcohol that man drinks, Jesus fucking Christ. He left, and he moved far away. Began drowning himself in the hard liquors he could gather and all the coochie he could get his hands on. And that's where I come in.

My dad assumed that a mortal-immortal child would age slower, maybe, but nothing like this. I am just, well, immortal. He hoped I wouldn't be, hoped that I was capable of living a normal life, and every year that passed for the first twenty he was happy that I'd been growing. I knew my dad looked good for his "age" because girls at school would always point out that he was definitely a dad they'd like to fuck, but I never really thought about it when his drinking friends grew grey and he didn't. I started questioning it at around my 20th, but he'd always quickly dismiss it as lucky genes or something else. Then, it got to my 28th birthday, and he realised that I looked the same as I did when I was considering university. So he explained it to me. I thought it was the weed keeping me young but turns out, that's not really how it works. Couldn't blame it on face cream either. I know Nivea is good, but it's not completely anti-aging like I am. How did I react to finding out I'm basically invincible? I did as many fucking drugs as I could possibly do in a night without becoming a nitty. Coke, speed, ecstacy, the whole of the main uppers gang.
How the fuck else am I supposed to react? Have a cup of tea? I'm fucking immortal. You think I'm not gonna test it? I've tested it in other ways too- think Groundhog Day when Bill Murray gets bored of being alive. Like I will, eventually. That's what's so fucking scary. I didn't sign up for this shit man, I didn't sign a deal with the devil. I make it sound like it's a bad thing, don't get me wrong, being able to drink whole bars full of people under the table is helpful when there are bets on it. I know, gambling, right? Not the best way to use my [ability] but have you ever seen four big burly men scream their little hearts out after a few seconds after you pick out a bullet from your head after an underground game of Russian roulette, fully conscious and have no evidence of it, except the blood stains on your shirt? No? Didn't think so.
Pain is a weird thing when it's paired with the art of not dying. You feel it, in it's full bearings, but only for a couple of seconds and then it's just a mild ache. It makes doing drugs almost boring; there's no stinging nose after doing uncrushed mdma crystals that my friends have described, there's no burning throat after downing a shot of cheap foreign vodka from the local corner shop run by some guy who you don't really understand but he's harmless and always fucking chipper. It takes away from the experience, in my opinion. Looking at the bright side though, I can consume enough drugs to get a T-Rex going, so I manage to be fucked enough to forget about the experience altogether. The drum n bass all the fucked up young adults listen to is nothing on the trance of the raving 90s equally fucked-up young adults; it's too... aggressive. Like the happy hardcore style music the rare few listened to as the nineties drew to a close and the 21st century began.

I stopped celebrating my birthdays pretty quickly; why celebrate something you can't invite anyone to? Most years it ends up just being me on my own, probably k-holing in my bedroom. Sometimes I'll go out clubbing and pretend it's my 23rd to make mildly attractive people buy me drinks. If they're on the higher end of mildly attractive, I'll probably shag them. Sometimes I don't even bother taking them home and the toilets suffice. Banned from a couple clubs for that. It's not like I don't want them to see my house or anything but I definitely don't want them to see my house.
My house is what some describe as a den. Okay, only I describe it as a den. Most people describe it as a shit tip. You can't really see the floor underneath my clothes that I've flung off. There are probably a couple of plates underneath there waiting to be broken by falling off the path you have to take to get to my bed from the small sofa I have in my room. And there's writing, everywhere. Mostly lyrics, not even cool ones. I started off writing cool ones, but then I got really stoned and had the urge to write dumb shit like the lyrics to Blur's Parklife. Something called to me about the line "it's not about you joggers who go round and round and round" really called to me apparently. My kitchen is probably the most well kept, and that's saying something because I have half eaten toast sitting on my oven top right now with a knife covered with butter laying next to it. The washing up hasn't been done in a while to be honest, and I'm considering switching to paper but I heard that's bad for the rainforests, or the turtles, or something.

That's me, then. Good old living-in-a-shithole drug-filled me.