Delving Into the Past: Death.05.21.2006.

     I killed her. I'm the one responsible for her death. I'm always responsible for their deaths. My mother died while giving birth to me. My father died on the way to the hospital to see me for the first time. All the doctors and nurses who handled me died shortly after my birth.
      Some people have vivid memories of their toddler years, others even have vague memories of their infancy. I remember everything. Like when I was left for dead in a dumpster three weeks after I was born.
      Imagine you're a doctor helping a young woman give birth to a child. Now imagine that after sixteen hours of labor, the mother stops breathing. Despite all your efforts, you can not bring life back to her - then the nurse screams.
      As you walk around the corpse, what you see between its legs is neither a stillborn nor a healthy newborn. No, what you see in the nurse's arms looks sickly, almost skeletal - an infant that appears to be in a late stage of decomposition, but it moves and whimpers as though it were alive.
      Everyone who touched me that night died within forty-eight hours. Three weeks later, a nurse snuck me out of the hospital and left me in the dumpster. She was killed by a car on her way out of the alley.
      That's not to say that I wasn't responsible. It certainly isn't that I do it on purpose, either. I just do it. Like the woman that now lies dead before me; she was stabbed by a mugger in the park. She bumped into me yesterday, so I know it's my fault she's dead.
      I step over her body and make my way out of Central Park. Stray dogs growl and cats hiss. My hooded sweatshirt hides my more dashing features, but my scent is unique. I find myself strolling down a familiar street, one that I've found myself walking every night since Nine-Eleven. I walk for what seems like hours, the silence ringing in my ears so loudly I feel like my head will explode.
      After some twists and turns, I find myself at Ground Zero. So much death that I had nothing to do with. It happened so long ago, but I can still hear their screams. I see their ghosts reenacting their vain attempts to escape. A chill runs down my spine as I realize that I'm not the only one with a gift.
      Absent-mindedly, I cross the street without looking. A car hits me. He has to be going at least fifty. He doesn't even hit the brakes until I roll onto the hood of his car. He screeches to a stop and I slide off the front and roll out a few feet away.
      "Jesus Christ!" the driver cries, in shock from what he's done. He jumps out of the vehicle and rushes to me. I just lie there, knowing that I was going to kill him whether I wanted to or not. He's already got his cell phone out and is dialing Nine-Eleven as he kneels beside me and puts his hand on my shoulder.
      He's done for now.
      I roll onto my back, my hood still hiding my face. He looks shocked that I'm able to move at all. I mutter something about being somewhat of an acrobat, and that I knew how to keep from being seriously injured, but we both know I'm lying. I stand up slowly. Just because I can't die doesn't mean it doesn't hurt like hell.
      I can hear sirens now. I assure him I'm fine, and that I'm not going to sue, and he gets in his car, still dazed from the experience. I start walking in the same direction he's driving, so I immediately see him broadside the ambulance that just turned the corner.
      Too bad he forgot his seatbelt.