Iris

I Can See Clearly Now

I woke up, keeping my eyes closed and felt my way to my bathroom. I like to sometimes pretend that I still have my eye sight and that I'm extremely good at getting around without it. All the fun is drained out of my little charade when I open my eyes to see nothing.

It's scary to see nothing. Especially when you used to see everything.

If you're born blind, the truth is... you're kind of lucky. You don't know what you're missing.

I do. And it sucks.

I don't want to go into my "how I became blind" story, I still haven't come to terms with it. I try not to think about the incident. But, when I first went blind I thought it was the end of the world. Which is partially true. It was the end of my world.

I've gotten used to it. I'm surviving. It's been 17 years. I've been blind for 13. I'd say I'm doing pretty good. Great actually. Especially since miraculously, I've regained my eye sight on my birthday.

The school day rushed by in a blur and before I knew it, I was home at the dinnertable with my family about to blow out my candles.

I closed my eyes, wishing for the only thing I have been wishing for, for the past 13 years... A sense of purpose. I've been feeling pretty useless during my recent years as people start to ask the annoying question "What do you want to be when you grow up?"

The question has a heavier meaning when you're older than 10 because now, you have to seriously think about it. Now you are close to having to act on it.

I haven't been able to think about it. Being blind and all, I didn't think I could do anything. But I was wrong. There are plenty things I can do and live a very fulfilling life. But none of the things sounded appealing to me.

Besides, the Universe has another purpose for me.

As soon as I blew out my candles and opened my eyes, I was bombarded with so many colors and objects, and things were blurring and coming back into focus so fast that I immediately got a headache.

The headache felt like my whole head would explode. I pressed my temples while tears flowed. My family thought I was having a mental break down.

I was having a mental breakdown all right. Something inside me broke, and I could see again. I started to shout for joy when the pain in my head lightened up, but then I felt like my ears were underwater and all the sounds around me became distorted.

Then silence.

A voice floated through my head, it sounded distant but I knew it didn't belong to any of my family who sat around me at the dining table. I'm sure they're just as freaked out as me. I saw them talking but I couldn't entirely tell what they were saying.

My eyes focused on each of my family members. My mom, dad, and two older brothers. They all recognized the recognition I had in my eyes.

I could barely read my mom's lips as tears fell down her face.

"She can see!" I read.

"But I can't hear anymore." I said. It's weird to not be able to hear myself. But I felt the words resonate within me.

My mom got up to run around the table to hug me. Her tears soaked my shoulder and I shrugged her off to get a really good look at her. She has definitely aged over the past 13 years. Gray hairs are scattered through her hair but she still looks like the graceful mom I haven't been able to look at for a long time.

What I didn't notice at first became very noticeable when my ears sounded like they were tuning into something. Like my ears are a radio and right now they're are turning on and tuning into a station.

Appariations floated just beside each of my family members.

I opened my mouth to scream but a hand floated to my mouth and covered it. A face grew in front of my face and two hollow eyes stared right into mine.

"Shh." I heard it speak clearly.

At this time, I screamed internally.