Chapter One

My 17 year old body lied in bed as I thought about all I had been through in life.

Reviewing the collection of garbage I call memories.

I did not have many friends growing up, nobody close to me except for my Mother and my Father; nobody to listen to my problems.

I stopped going to the doctor when I was six, but none of my doctors asked "Where does it hurt?," in the right ways.

I could not share my problems with my Mom: she had her own problems which I felt miserable for not being able to solve.

I could not share my problems with my "Father": he was a low life, who probably raped his way to make me and beat any sort of birth control out of my Mom's system.

Fortunately for all of us my Mom finally gathered the courage to kick his ass out.

Especially fortunate for him because I would have killed the bastard.

I wasn't like the other kids. Santa forgot to leave presents. Either that or he just didn't like me for some reason. The Easter Bunny forgot to leave around eggs. And the Tooth Fairy must have been broke as hell everytime that I had lost a tooth.

While they went on vacation, bragging about how they would hop on the internet or record videos of themselves on their awesome game consoles, I would dread coming home, wishing school would last just an hour longer at the least.

Pretty ironic, huh? Get the idea? Well, if not, I'll summarize it for you: life sucked.

And it still does suck.

This boy, Anthony Cullen, lied in bed as tears started streaming down my face as I thought about how poisonous and toxic the Nyquil in the bathroom's medicine cabinet would taste as I downed the bottle like an imitation of my Dad and his cheap booze.

Where does it hurt? Good question. It hurts everywhere.

I began to sob, the sounds echoing through the halls of my plain house that me and my Mom cleaned every Saturday. The empty house in which my Mom wasn't there to help me because I knew she had her own problems as she currently worked another long night-shift at the Good Shop, located about three blocks away.

She had her own problems and yet… and yet she still tended to me until I was able to slowly develop the skills to take care of myself because I had nobody to teach me how to be a man.

Was that all I was? A burden?

Tears streamed down my face as I yanked the medicine cabinet open, my feet cold against the bathroom tile despite the socks I was wearing.

I scanned the contents of the cabinet. Choose your poison.

I seemed to notice everything. The way the radiator groaned like a dying man trying to pull oxygen into his lungs. The way there was rust infecting the hinges of the door to the medicine cabinet. The way droplets of water dropped into the sink from the faucet making 'plink' noises like someone dropping a hint.

The way the tears tickled my cheeks the way sweat used to do in Gym class.

Used to do.

It was like some weird phenomena. But it wasn't. I seemed to have no choice but to notice everything.

Because it was going to be my last night on Earth.