Epileptic Adolescence

 

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Introduction

While this story is a thing of fiction, the terrors the character endures are very real and adapted from my personal bedroom demons. It is a difficult thing to channel, the horrors I lived, the crushing fear of looming torture, and the horrible trip it is to lose yourself within your own body. Epilepsy is a pretty preview to Hell, one in which Satan pilots your body when he chooses.

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Chapter 1

    A cool, gentle August night’s breeze rolled through the screen and under Leah’s bedroom window, blowing her soft brown curls and causing them to bob across her freckled cheek. With a twitch of her nose, the small framed sixteen year old girl reached up and pushed the hair from her face. Her light blue bed sheets were still soft from their recent adventure in laundry as she clutched them close to her chest and turned on her side, her rounded chin resting easy against her thin white fingers.

    11:47, her digital clock insisted in bright scarlet, as she blinked several times. Without her glasses or her contacts, it would be difficult for her to read, but her father had gotten her the thoughtful gift of a clock which shines the time in large numbers on the ceiling. She smiled as she saw it, closing her eyes and letting out a happy sigh. Between this new gift from her father and her fantastic time at school, her day had been borderline perfection.

Leah’s thin nostrils flared as she breathed in deeply though her nose, pushing past the scent of the Apple Mango Tango dryer sheets and catching a hint of what the outside held. Riding the breeze to her airways was a hint of fall. When met with this scent, Leah oft thought to memories of Halloween. Trick Or Treating and eating far more candy than her father would allow her, dressing up and having the time of her life with her friends. She thought of those happy memories as the cool wind washed over her and helped her drift to a deep, peaceful sleep; one that had she gotten her way, would have gone interrupted until school the following morning.

Leah soon realized, however, that Halloween, dryer sheets, and gifts from her father would be the furthest things from her mind. She awoke suddenly, in a sweat, despite there being no change in the weather or that her window was still open and blowing the same cool breeze. Her eyes snapped open, so wide that it almost hurt. Her ceiling read 3:21. Her alarm hadn’t gone off, and it wasn’t time for her to wake up, but she could do nothing to stop it. Leah wanted to reach up and wipe the sweat dripping into her brown brows, and although she willed her left arm to move, it refused to comply. She was a prisoner within her own body.

Her head snapped back, threatening to break her neck and pushing it to its ultimate limits while staying intact. Dad! She wished to cry out. In her mind she was screaming for help, but the words refused her the privilege; they offered her no quarter. In fact, the only thing her vocal cords allowed of her was choking. “Kh.. ch…” She wished it were louder, but all she could do was suffer.

Her big brown eyes rolled upwards now, almost full circle into her skull. Tears gushed from them, soaking her bottom lashes and mixing with the sweat that covered her convulsing throat. She felt as though her eyeballs wanted nothing more than to sever themselves from the ocular muscles which tethered them to their homes. Leah was in massive amounts of pain, and she was conscious during the entirety of it, but she was absolutely useless.

All of this was bad enough to ruin any girl’s night, but surely, if it could get worse, it did. When Leah was under the false impression that this would be the extent, she quickly sped into the brick wall of realization, because next came the shaking. Not just her head anymore, now it extended through her body. She felt her limbs flailing, her body heaving up and down as though it were trying to correct itself and failing horribly throughout the entirety of the episode.

If all she had left was her dignity, Leah was soon stripped of that as well. Although she couldn’t see her waist, the feeling of warmth that escaped her and spread down her legs was unmistakable, and she felt her clothes soak with urine. The Apple Mango Tango scent meant nothing anymore. If she hadn’t already been forced to cry by the gates of Hell she was touring, she would be now.

Leah struggled to pull her neck forward, and with each push, she snapped back a little harder against the pillow. She forced her eyeballs downward, trying to get a glimpse of the horror she was enduring, but they rolled right back out of place. The poor child willed herself with everything she had to reach her right arm towards her cell phone, but her body continued to convulse and remind her exactly how powerless she was.

Through all her suffering, and all of her pain, she thought of her friends. She thought of the short life she had lived and the single father who was perfect to her. Leah wondered if the things she had done would mean anything to anyone, and whether or not she had been the best she could be. She wondered if she really mattered at all. The rails of her bed clanged while the paranoia swept over her and she thought of what seemed like every experience she could remember, but what she kept coming back to throughout the entirety of her horrible seizure was one thing. She was certain that she would die tonight.

                Sunlight poured through the windows of a 10th grade classroom, drenching the sixteen year olds within in Vitamin D and putting many of them to sleep. It was rather understandable for a sophomore in Mr. Kessler’s History class to fall asleep in a conveniently placed sunbeam, if not just to drift away to daydreams of the recently dispatched summer vacation in their rearview. For many of the students this was the case, a current lecture on Genghis Khan falling on many more deaf ears than not.

For one student in particular, Leah Connors, this was not the case. Her mind was a sponge that soaked the information she came in contact with, and she more often than not retained a good deal of it. Unlike a number of her peers, Leah genuinely found herself interested in learning about a good deal of the subject matter that was covered in class. She had always been a witty girl and a nerd at heart and although she was becoming more attractive with age, it had no effect on that aspect of her personality, and she was currently finding herself enthralled with the stories of the Mongol’s conquests. Her eyes lit up as she leaned forward in her desk, skinny white fingers clenching the oaken desk as she listened intently to detailed stories of the raids lead by Khan, and the number of things he had accomplished.

Looking at her, one would think that Leah had something of particular importance invested in this subject or passing this class, the way she stared on in awe whilst obtaining new knowledge about thirteenth century China and the way Genghis Khan operated, but this wasn’t the case. It was more often than not that she found herself interested in learning, connecting with the subjects in different ways and it helped her contain all she learned, her thirst shaping her into a fairly intelligent adolescent. She gently bit her bottom lip without realizing, entirely enthralled by the prospect that a single human being could have such an effect on a community, rather, a civilization, stretching far beyond their years; the idea consumed her.

These stories resonated with the adventurous leader inside of Leah. She thought to herself, wondering if she would ever have the opportunity to leave such a mark behind when she was gone. Somehow, against the immeasurable odds, she held onto a shred of hope that it was in fact a possibility within her grasp.

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