Music Listener

Music Listener

E. M. Areson

They don’t get it, I thought as I sat with my friends listening to music. This song was written by someone in genuine pain, not just someone trying to sell albums. Stupid. So, so stupid!

 Everyone was singing along and I pretended to enjoy with them but how could I? Tears pooled in my eyes and I tried to ignore the twisting in my gut. They were normal people, not like me. I was a freak. I was one of the unspoken. I found out after I had been contacted by an underground member. I was a silent contract. An ear for those dead to the world because of their differences.

“So sweet!” Emma said looking joyful.

Yeah right, ‘cause a guy thinking of killing himself is romantic. Man, I hate knowing what someone thought when they wrote a piece of music, I thought to force my smile wider.

“I LOVE THIS SONG!” Kaden said in his deep voice.

“It’s for girls,” Clare said punching his shoulder.

“Says who?”

The guy who wrote it meant for it to be his suicide note. I think it really was meant for his ex-girlfriend. Really how can you like this? My thoughts would have repulsed them, but the knowledge of what the song was weighed down on me.

 A car stopped outside and I looked out, a cable repairman was getting out of a van outside my house. I wanted to vomit, we hadn’t called a repairman. It was Interpol, or at least that's what they claimed to be most of the time. In reality, it was an A.P.P.S. officer. The Agency for Protecting Personal Security or A.P.P.S. hated people like me and was always posing as the United Nations to get to us Freaks. It was time, somehow they found me. Learned my secret. I was going to be confiscated and my parents and friends would be told I was dead. If I wasn’t killed instantly, which was a likely possibility.

“You have to go.” I flipped off my phone and threw it under my bed leading them out of my room. “Don’t tell anyone you were here.” I pushed them to the back door.

“What is it?” Kaden said trying to stop me from pushing them out.

“The less you know the better. Please, if your my friends leave and don’t ask questions. Tell everyone I love them,” We were by the back door and I shoved them out tears in my eyes.

“What’s wrong?” Emma tried to comfort me but someone was already knocking at the front door.

I went white, “Please. Just go. Don’t look back.” Thinking fast I pulled a knife off the rack on the counter and cut the tiny chip out from under my fingernail and handed it to them. It was my communication chip so I could contact the underground. If Interpol got it; possibly hundreds of lives could be lost. “Throw it in the river. GO!”

 I slammed the back door as I heard the front unlock. He’d gotten a key somehow and was walking in. I saw the gun under his shirt. I was dead. He asked if I was Amelia Heart. I nodded and he shut the door. He took out the pistol and a pair of handcuffs. I was under arrest for assisting anarchist. I was dead to all who knew me. All because I’m different. All because I’m a freak.

Photo by: Pete Bellis