OSAD – Untitled Introduction

This is going to be the start of a longer work, for which I cannot find a meaningful title.  It will steadily be posted, chapter by chapter, as I work it out.

Words: 973

Posted: 6:58PM

(c) Me and nobody else.

Introduction: Letter

Throughout my life, I always made mistakes.  Mistakes, mind you, that haunted me even well into adulthood.  Memories of spilled iced tea, arguments, saying the wrong thing to friends, and losing people I knew I could have saved haunted my dreams, my thoughts, my very existence.  No matter what I tried, deep in my heart, I always hated myself.

My childhood was the worst of it.  When I was little, I was constantly ridiculed, and I used to look back and think it was just the cruelty of children, the dastardly attitudes of mankind emerging out of my peers.  But now, I see myself deserving it.  I was stupid.  I did stupid things.  I was smarter than that, so why did I do so many things that merited my torture?  Why did I say and do so many idiotic things?  Why did I trust people I knew I shouldn’t?  Why didn’t I keep my mouth shut because whenever I opened it, bad things happened?  Why did I let my mom feed me junk?  Why did I get fat?

Even when I got older, why did I slack off?  Why did I give up my dreams halfway through college, just to have more time to feed my addictions to pointless games?  Why did I let my bad health continue until it cost me over fifty years with the only person who saw a shred of beauty in me?  Why didn’t I take more time to be brilliant?  I could have been brilliant.  I could have been one of those names everyone knows.  I could have been published so much earlier, and my name could have been known across America.  I could have been so much smarter, so much wiser had I paid more attention, had I not slacked…

The one game I didn’t mind being addicted to was the one game I screwed up in the most.  If only I’d known how to spend my first few months, things could have been different.  I messed up relationships with so many people because I was so bad at managing my time.  I got so angry so easily.  It cost me.

So it probably doesn’t come as a surprise when I say I spent every night until my death wishing for another chance to walk through my life.  I wished to be reborn, not in the religious sense, but in the physical sense.  I wanted to re-emerge into the world, begin my life over from the very beginning.

And the day I died was the day I met Au.

Au was a strange man.  As my soul dissolved into the planet, he halted my progress and asked me about my experiences.  He was a funny looking guy.  His skin was blood red, like a devil, but his hair was tied into a ponytail and cascaded down his back like an avalanche, the purest of white.  He wore a tuxedo, complete with bowtie, and his eyes were two snake-like slits, venom green, shining over a smug grin plastered with black lipstick.

I won’t lie.  I thought he was a demon at first, and I thought I was going to Hell.  I’ve heard of us regretful people going down there, but he assured me that I wasn’t.  He told me he could offer me a second chance, but it came with a steep cost.

He could start my life over from the age of three, and he would let me change a few things about myself.  He would make me healthier, speed up my metabolism, and destroy my affinity for sweets.  He offered to correct my eyesight, but I wore glasses all my life and opted against that.  He shrunk my frame, told me that was all he could do as far as my weight was concerned, and I would have to take care of myself from there.

He would let me keep all of my knowledge.  However, I wasn’t allowed to use this to blatant advantage.  I couldn’t explain how or why I knew things.  I had to either play life like a genius, or hide what I knew.  Failure to do this would result in instant death.  I agreed.

He also told me that I was, under no circumstances, allowed to tell my husband who I was, what our life was like, or anything of the sort.  If I wanted him back, I had to earn him back the same way I did all those years ago.  So that was my cost.  All of this to, ultimately, save my time and life with him, and I wasn’t guaranteed to re-establish a relationship with him.

But I was confident.  I remembered every detail regarding how we met.  I remembered what I did, how I did it, and why I loved him so.  I knew that, deep down, I would always be the girl he loved, and I didn’t plan to change the beauty HE saw.  So, even with those odds, I felt I could win.  I agreed to Au’s conditions.

He told me I would be immediately struck down and forgotten if I messed up.  If I spoke of his existence, if I blatantly used my knowledge as an exploitation, if I told the love of my life  anything about this, it would all be for nothing.

What did I have to lose?

Regret.  Sorrow.  A life full of unnecessary challenges and fighting.  The tortures I bestowed upon my husband.  The hatred I harbored for mankind, for my parents, for myself…

And what did I have to gain?

Everything.

This is a tale about life, about living, and about finding the will to live.  This is a story that may result in my failure, but also my success.  This is a novel that explores my one and only purpose: to find my way in the world.

-Your Narrator