• The world is a complicated thing. I don’t know why but I never noticed till my brother fell into a coma. I think It’s our fault. We don’t mean to, we just make things complicated. “The world doesn’t owe you anything, it was here first.” Mark Twain said that. I think he meant that you need to work for the things that you want because the world won’t give you what you want all the time.
    I had been going through a rough patch. I was overly depressed about Freddy and how it was all my fault that he was there. A demon snapped his neck and disconnected his brain from most of the rest of his body. That was five and a half months ago. My sister Jessy wasn’t dealing with it very well either.
    She had resorted to locking herself in a room and only coming out to eat. But at least I had Rose. She was the girl next door who I made a terrible first impression on but I kinda made up for it. She would come over and help me cook food for Jessy and every so often keep me from committing suicide via sidewalk diving. She was really nice to us.
    I got a call from the doctors that day saying that they were going to let Freddy go in a week. I was even more depressed then. “The world hates me.” I would say it over and over like I was reciting a speech. Then Rose rang the doorbell so I got up for a second to let her in. “Hi Timmy. How’s your sister?” She would always say that when she came through the door. I let her in and went back to bed.
    I was asleep for the rest of the day. Rose would sometimes stay there and sleep on the couch just in case. I woke up and there was Rose standing over me. “Were gonna do something today Timmy.” “I just wanna sleep Rose.” “You’ve been asleep for hours. Come on there’s gotta be something you wanna do.” “Yes, sleep.” “Come on get up.”
    So I got up and we went for a walk. I think she tricked me somehow into getting up. I don’t know. So we went to the park and the whole time I just kept saying “The world hates me. The world hates me.” “Timmy the world doesn’t hate you. You gotta stop saying that just because things don’t go your way. You gotta work for things. Did you know I almost became a doctor? I could have been a doctor but I quit because it was to hard and now I live in a small apartment with a crummy job.” “Just then something clicked when she said doctor. “Do you still have any medical books?” “Yeah why.” “ I got an idea.”
    I spent days reading about the human brain and I had Rose explain parts of it to me. Then I figured it out. I ran to the hospital full speed. “I gotta see Freddy, Freddy Bobagnoosh.” “Down the hall.” I ran through the door and yelled “You gotta operate on his spine. Three vertebra down from the skull. It broke in a discreet area so you couldn’t see it on an x-ray.”
    They checked and I was right. They operated immediately. I then heard someone go through the door and for the first time in months I saw Jessy out of her room. She stared at me and very weakly said “This better work bro.” Then I heard the doctors cheering and screaming. “He’s alive.”
    I ran in and Freddy was wide awake oddly enough. They said he shouldn’t be because of the pain killers. But there he was wide awake staring at me. “Heeeeeeey little brother.” We went and got some ice cream all three of us and then we went back to the apartment.
    I went to open the door for Freddy since they put him in a wheel chair. I got about five feet from the door and then I heard something. Tick tick tick. “Oh son of a...” BOOM. A bomb went off and I flew back 20 feet and then I noticed the entire building was gone. “Thank god none of us were in there ... ROSE!!! I ran through the ruble and I saw her lying in her apartment bleeding heavily. “Rose your gonna be fine don’t panic. JESSY GET SOME BANDAGES!!! Your gonna be ok.” “The world doesn’t owe you anything, it was here first. Mark Twain.” And with that she was gone.
    I looked around for who did it. “That was only part of what you did to me assassin.” I looked up and there was the demon who put Freddy in the hospital. “You ... YOU SON OF A ...!!! I charged with all I had, swords shurikens, knives, fists, knees, feet, elbows. But like our first encounter he danced around my attacks. I then noticed something that I didn’t notice last time we fought. There was a missing piece of skin where Freddy had stabbed him. I lunged at him and as he moved to the left so did I. The sword struck true and went through his chest. He laughed. I’ll take the rest of your soul now. And at that point I figured out why I was so depressed all the time. The demon sucked out part of my soul.
    “Take it. I don’t need it anymore.” He then charged at me and grabbed me by the collar and lifted me off the ground. “This is gonna be tasty.” He stood there for a moment. “Why is your soul not mine?” “I took demonology at the windmill. If the victim embraces death the demon can not attack.” I then punched him in the hole that I left in his chest. I pulled out a small round object from his chest. It disappeared in my hand, I had my soul back.
    Then he screamed and charged. I offered a shuriken to the forehead as a rebutle. And with that he fell to the ground. I then grabbed what was salvageable and found any survivors. A month later we were in different apartments. I went to bed and didn’t have any real motivation to get up after that.

    Back where I started.