The Death Transformation

People always ask me if I can feel it when I transform, it’s not every day someone meets one of me. And yes, I can feel it. Transforming isn’t that much of a problem for me, it’s the bulging, grotesque, chunk of flesh that resides at the back of my head, the swelling, redness, and lack of hair draws wondering eyes, people look at me and can’t stop looking. If I make eye contact (which I strive to deter) thoughts of objectification echo in my mind. That. Thing. It. Creature. Dehumanised. Animal. Beast. Ungodly. Inhuman.

*

I’ve always wanted to become a nurse, when I was young I’d give my parents check-ups and perform an ‘Operation’ like surgery on them, as I grew older I studied, and took extra courses. I wanted this so badly. Of course in the end my peers told me that it wouldn’t happen. I was too: “ugly” and “beastly”, “no one would want to work with you”. I’d like to say I stopped at this point but I didn’t. All I wanted to do was help people and I was too naïve to realise people wouldn’t want ME to help them. Even if they were on their deathbeds. To many I was considered a bad omen, a disease, a monster. There had been incidents in which people of my kind were mauled and killed in freak murders, brutally slaughtered at the whims of people’s religions and beliefs.

Occasionally mum and I go for a bike ride to escape the apartment, this is my favourite time. During my free time I don’t go out, I prefer not to. If I transform no one is there to help me. My mum prefers to keep an eye on me and makes sure that I don’t get hurt. I understand her but I just want some freedom, I don’t want to feel as though I am being held a prisoner in my own house. I feel held back and pinned down. When I’m in the house an unseen pressure pushes down on my chest. I feel as though I can’t breathe, I try and escape but become held down by the powerful, invisible restraints that were placed into my world from the moment I was born.

“Mummy, why can’t I play outside like all the other children”, that’s what I asked when I was younger, usually I’d get no reply but in the evening I would sit in my bed staring at the ceiling, (sleep was an impossible prospect because of the nauseating, throbbing pain residing in the back of my head) and if I listened carefully I could hear my mother crying. Young, selfish little me thought it was because of dad passing away, little did I know.

I don’t know a lot. I started being homeschooled after an ‘accident’ at school when another girl punched me because she thought I was going to bite and infect her. The headteacher, unaffected by the incident announced that it was a misunderstanding. The girl and I both had to apologise for what we had done, I hadn’t done anything but said my sorriest sorry anyway. Her, on the other hand rolled her eyes and said sorry with a smirk on her face and the glisten of revenge that she needed in her eye as a result of me telling on her. My mum pulled me from school after that. I was sad to leave my best friend. Iris has always helped me when I felt down and she was the only person I trusted. My mum tried to teach me the basics of school for a while but gave up when it got too hard. Nowadays I spend most of my time reading and writing, my latest addition is about a young girl that can do anything she wants to do and can be anyone she wants to be. One day the girl goes to these incredible ruins next to her house, high towers surround her and a large lake lies next to the ruins. The lake is home to dozens of bird species, they flit around her and launch themselves into the sky. At this moment in time the girl wishes to fly and her wish is granted. She soars into the sky only focusing on the joys of flight, she joins the swallows as they dance around the lake catching insects in the early evening sun. Geese fly overhead and she rests in the team supported by all the birds around her, she is free. Leaving the team she makes her way back towards the direction of her house landing safely through her balcony next to her mother and father. The adventure is over… At least she gets an adventure.

There’s a ruin next to my house, just like the one I write about in the story, it’s not as grand but I enjoy going there. It’s peace, it’s the only place I’m allowed to go without my mum. That’s probably the only reason I like it. I’m going there now, riding on my bicycle, not going too quickly for fear of transforming, but moving quickly enough to feel the breeze on my face. Riding the bike makes it feel as though I’m gliding, rushing down the hill, nothing else to think about, not even my disease enters my thoughts. When I reach the ruins I think about my mum and how it would be so much better if I wasn’t there, everyone says that, but it’s true. She wouldn’t have to look after me and constantly work, she could find someone she loves and start a new family, a new life. She could be free, like the girl in my story. I know I want to be that girl. I sit by the lake and watch the swallows dancing in the evening sun, the geese fly overhead, and the pigeons coo in the trees across the lake. I’d even drop everything to become a pigeon, I don’t have to be some great big bird. I can be a pigeon… Yeah, I’d be happy with that. I would even be a seagull.

And then I have a thought, maybe if I try hard enough I can fly. The endless wishing, thinking, jumping and silly wishy-washy incantations are to proceed that thought. I jump and jump and jump and jump. And then I don’t, not anymore.

So this is what it feels like to be free.

*

“Maisie Brolls was announced dead on the 31^st of April 2018, age 14 at the ruins of a castle next to her house. She had a severe case of a skull-based cancer tumour outside of her skull that made her head look slightly enlarged and due to treatment she had a lack of hair. We’re talking to her friend Iris about the impact that this disease brought to her life.”

“Hi, ummm, thank you… Maisie would always talk about death as if it was some sort of transformation in life, every time you die you’d have a new outlook on life. She’d been on her death bed so many times she knew what it was like. Maisie didn’t feel as though she belonged in this world, people talked to her as though she was an object, and then she started seeing herself that way. Because she was different she didn’t matter. I thought she did, she loved writing and always talked about being ‘free’, now that she has transformed she is free, she will be forever.”