{((The Photographer))}i{((Part 1))}

[Another new story. I know, I'm bad. But I couldn't help it. I like the plot for this.]

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Argus Sean Winst.

The name everyone attaches with the phrases "terrible car crash", "gifted child", and of course "freak". My mom used to always tell me as a child that she picked the name Argus because in Greek mythology he was the man with a hundred eyes. And of course as a mother, she could tell there was something different about my eyes besides the complete contrast of their extreme light blue against my father's jet black hair. Well, I guess we all have been underestimating the power of a woman's maternal instinct. Because my mom was right, my eyes were different. They were, and unfortunately still are, a key part in my "photographic memory". At least that's what all the doctor and psychiatrist told my parents when they asked why I could remember what the note atop the refrigerator a month ago read. And that was when the names and mocking began. Parents would either tell their children to "stay away from freaks like me" because they feared it might be the product of a deadly disease or to become friends with me, since I "may become of use". I guess I can't blame people for being a bit frightened by me. When we first discovered this and didn't have much knowledge on the topic, my parents were also frightened. Maybe it's my appearance that also scares away everyone. People say I look like a ghost because of the brightness of my eyes, darkness of my hair, and horrible paleness of my skin. Well, all I can say for it is that I'm not let out much.

I live in the Judius Institute. Basically, it's a mental ward that a man named Judius donated a load of money to. It's nothing like what living at "home", or what used to be home, was like. My bedroom is painted a hideous shade of pale yellow and smells strongly of anti-bacterial shit. I miss my childhood, but that ended when I was seven. And it's been a decade since then.

August 17, 1996. It was my mom and dad's 10 year anniversary. My grandmother was going to take care of me for the night, so they could have a night out. But when it was time for them to leave I said that I didn't want stay home. So my mom and dad took both me and my grandmother out for dinner at the fancy restaurant they were supposed to attend alone. But we never made it to the restaurant together. Halfway there I had spotted black bear stuffed animal and cried until finally we stopped and went inside to buy it. Maybe if I wasn't such a horrible child, they wouldn't have died because of me.

When we emerged from the store, my new bear dangling from my hand and practically dragging on the floor, right as we got in the car there was a shooting. A bullet ploughed through the backseat window into my grandmother, sitting beside me, immediately killing her. I didn't get what was going on. Nothing made sense anymore. Why wasn't Grandma saying anything? My parents began to climb into the back to try and check on her. My dad immediately told me to hide under my mother's chair. I fit perfectly, I've always been quite scrawny for my age. I saw two other bullets one soon rested in my father's head, the other in my mother's chest. The crimson blood flowing out of the open wounds of the three grown-ups; they were supposed to protect me. I couldn't move. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't think. All I did was stay there, hidden under the chair, just staring at their rotting corpses as their nerves twitched for the last time searching for some source of life. I resided under that chair for quite sometime.

When the cops finally arrived, they had to carry me out of the car. I screamed and kicked them. There was no way I would accept the fact that I had lost my family. The facts couldn't even process through my brain. As my sanity began to turn to painkillers and various methods of self-mutilation, I was soon submitted into the intstitute from the orphanage I was put in. Most likely, I'll never be able to get out. Even when I'm 18, I'll still be locked in here. Socializing is hardly even an option, unless you count talking to the other patients that just mutter gibberish under their breath, while you talk. Ever since I began to live at the institute, I'm not even allowed to go to school anymore. Because I "might be dangerous to others".

They all said it was a gift. Being able to remember everything. Every single image that ever passed your eyes. From when I was a baby and didn't understand what I saw to when I'm older and am back to the process of when I was a child. It's not a gift. It was never supposed to happen. This "skill", or whatever you may call it, was just a mistake in the silk of life the angels weaved. I'm like a cat with eleven lives. People say you're better off, but are you? I know that I would certainly pick living a normal nine lives over dying eleven gruesome ways.

But the worst part, I have no vote on this matter. And there's no way I can forget.