TA-DA. Short chapter, but only cuz it's the introduction chapter. I will catch up to the proper word count per day with the normal chapters, don't you worry. XD En-juh-hoy, my be-ay-yoo-tiful Rulers! Also, if any of you want to be a writing buddy of mine and vice versa for Nanowrimo, friend me on the site. ^.^

Feel

Chapter One: Feelings

Approximate Reading Time: Three Minutes

I've only been hugged once.

It hurts and I hate it because, what the crap, no one else hurts like this! No one else has to deal with this ridiculousness. Who even invented Feelings in the first place? Some idiot from before Before, probably. Ugh. Curse them.

It was my mother, by the way. She hugged me. Right before she left. I can't remember the date, when it was that she left, and I'll admit I feel horrible for that. I at least know that it was sometime between September and December of 143 A.R., but that doesn't exactly help much. Not that I particularly want to remember that day's specific date. That would make it hurt even more.

She left me in charge of our library, the one that takes up the entirety of our large basement. It's where we keep the Before books and movies and CDs and it's my favorite place in the entire world, mostly because I don't feel quite so different down there.

Ha, that alone is part of what sets me apart, that horrible feeling of "I'm different." Because even if they were different in some way, they wouldn't feel different, they wouldn't feel bad or left out because of it. They wouldn't feel anything.

Doesn't matter. The people Before were able to Feel, and they wrote tons of books chock full of that feeling. Love stories, tales of trust and betrayal, ideas and emotion woven into novels and poems and screenplays and music and all sorts of other things of which there are too many to list within a reasonable amount of time. Because of this, I'm surrounded by all that familiar feeling the moment I enter the library, and it's strengthening, enlightening... it's relieving.

In an earlier time, I would have been normal.

Of course, I won't deny that there are obvious perks to being different, to being something the After Council just can't quite predict. No taxes, don't have to pay for- well, anything, really. Anything to keep me from raising some terrible Feeling rebellion.

Come on, guys. Me and what army? Oh, perhaps the emotionless Blanks will help me. Yes, surely they are simply dying to assist me in the overthrowing of their own lovely nation.

Mm, as if.

The person on the television cries out something about bear hybrids, and I raise an eyebrow. This show is crazy, half in a good way and half in a 'what-the-crap' way. The season I'm watching is actually the last one that was ever released, though- I think it was shut down for some reason after the last episode. Some of the contestants jacked up the set, or something; I'm not entirely sure. I suppose I'll find out when I reach the end.

I love all the Before shows, but I particularly love the kind like this, where such raw emotion is poured out and the actors or contestants or just people don't even realize it's happening. For them, it's normal - it's just a thing that occurs. I wish I could live in their time, be normal with them. I wouldn't mind getting my heart broken or almost dying or anything, really, just so long as I could spit out that much emotion and not be ridiculed for it.

Ah, but I can't. I'm different, after all. I live in the here and now, despite my consistent complaints about it. I do not possess the ability to go back in time.

I do, however, possess the ability to suck it up and move on with life, hoping against all hopes that the next day will be better. It has to be better, right? Can't be any worse.

Someday, I will learn to stop saying that.