Chương 22: Weirder Than A Cat Barking

My parents are acting weird. Even more weirdly than before. There's still this sense of normality, as usual. I get up. Story, eat, train, eat, sleep. Again and again. The usual normality, they work, I grow up. Everything is fine in the best of the world. But I'm pretty sure everyone could figure out the weirdness permeating the entire house if they came inside. It's not like nothing changed though. Most of the talking still resolve around the economy, and from what I'm hearing, it's bad.

I don't think I'm supposed to understand yet. But I think my father is suspecting that I do, I'm not sure yet, but he's acting weird. Even weirder than my mother. He's kind of creeping me out to be honest. A bit like my my biological grandfather in this life, maybe I'm overthinking, yeah, I'm definetly overthinking this stuff. But like, since the whole incident with Kiko, and with me pulling her away to my room. He's been looking at me with an odd glance in his eyes. A weird fucking glint in his eyes.

I can't help but feel a weird sense of dread whenever I see him coming home too late. Once again. Tonight, he comes late. And that's while I'm busy finishing my plate, of... something, I don't really know what it is. But my mom is still teaching me to eat by myself. Doing good progress. My mom is behind me, I'm on her lap like usual. I almost finished eating when my dad comes in. He looks tired. My mom looks at him. He does the same. They don't talk.

If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement. Yikes. I stop eating to look at both of them, and my father looks at the plate that's in front of me with a slight frown that dissapears just a second after. He steps forward and don't say much, he just goes to the bathroom. And as he leaves, my mom rubs my shoulder "Are you done nebe?" I look back at her. And fortunately for her, I can read the room, I nod at her but don't answer.

She pulls me off her lap and I go in my room to... to sleep I guess. I open the door, close it behind me. And look at my crib for a second. Then I look behind me, at the closed door. Usually they put me in the crib, it's not like I can climb inside...... well maybe I can try but..... maybe I should just ask fo-! I hear my father coming out of the bathroom and they start talking, sound muffled out by the walls. You know what? I feel like I can wait a while.

Walking forward, I decide to grab the hand mirror that's on my box to look at myself. I still have the blue flakes in my eyes. Pushing my arm forward, I decide to check something I wanted to check for a long time. It's hard to figure out, really hard because the mirror is pretty small. But when I find the angle, and the good tilt of my head, I manage to see the reflection of my torso and one of my arm in the mirror. I try my best to stand still, just stand normally. And I see what Kiko imitated for months.

I look, weird. I mean, my face isn't weird. My body isn't weird. I'm a kid, a one year old kid standing up. I'm just a kid, everything is fine. If you took a picture of me, you wouldn't see anything wrong. If you took a video of me though? Now that's where the problem starts. I move. A lot. Right now, when I'm standing. I can see my torso coming forward, and then going back. Just like a nervous kid tilting on itself. But I'm not nervous. And this shows because what happens after isn't on the realm of nervousness.

No, I can see it. But I can't feel it. In the mirror, I see myself tilt on the side, stretching almost, then I tilt on the other side, before a weird wave run through my arm. What the fuck? I look down at myself. Not using the mirror, and I see myself for once. I look. Normal, it's normal really, the movements are pretty subtle, but now that I'm focusing on it, I can see the weirdness. My spine, if we advanced the time, put me in a timelapse or something, would look like a serpent.

One that's flying around, twisting and sliding on invisible ground, constantly stretching. My arms move too, in weird waves. Usually, they follow the movements of my spine, the waves of the serpent, but sometimes, they just contract and stop moving. I don't really feel it. And even when I do my best to focus on it and see it happening in the mirror, I don't feel the movement happening. My legs are annoying too.

I go from putting most of my weight on the ball of my feet, to resting on my heels, then sometimes I twist my legs, or take a step without noticing, sometimes I stand on one leg, again, without even noticing. I look mentally deranged. Wha-!

"DON'T YOU FUCKING #&#& SAY THAT EVER AGAIN!" I almost make the mirror fall down. What? I look at my door, where I heard my mother scream so hard the walls didn't muffled shit.... what the fuck just happened? For a while, I stay still, just holding my mirror. After twenty seconds of just hearing muffled arguing, I get closer, tiptoeing toward the door, and put my ear on the door.

"I'm just saying the truth, he's-!"

"Don't""Whatever, I'm too tired for this #&#&# go #5&#&## or something""That's what I thought" The muffling dies down, and the only thing I hear are footsteps. Footsteps, left and right, none close. After ten seconds of waiting. Nothing else happens, so I back off from the door. One hand holding my mirror. Uh... Okay. I... think, I should go to sleep? I turn around to look at my crib. How do you even climb this shit?