I somehow felt even worse the following day. My head hurt like mad, and when I looked at myself in the mirror, I was shocked by how pale my appearance was. My face was more akin to a ghoul than a human. Besides this, I felt dizzy, and every time I walked anywhere, black dots would flood my vision like ink spots.
I brought this hell upon myself. I blame everyone else for my mistakes and then get mad when people call me out for it. I swear I won't live to be eighteen...
As I walked downstairs, I kept getting these horrifically painful electric shocks, nearly making me fall over every time. It took all of my power to stay strong throughout all of this pain, and a part of me wished I would fall down the stairs and snap my neck, putting me out of my misery.
I saw my father sitting at the dining table, and it genuinely surprised me to have seen him. Typically, he would have been at work around this time. He looked over at me, and his eyes widened massively. He appeared horrified at how I looked.
"Son, can I be honest with you?" he asked with a concerned expression.
"Sure," I replied anxiously.
"You look like you're dead," he said with that same look of horror.
"I feel like it too," I replied with a groan, shaking my head.
"What do you think caused it?"
Time travel.
"It's just my medication; it sucks," I lied. I actually got decent benefits from Sertraline; it relieved me from some of my obsessive thoughts and reduced the intensity of my dissociation. The only downside is that it made me hungry as hell all the time. I gained a minimum of thirty pounds because of it. It took me countless months to lose that weight.
"Son, I just want you to know that I'll never look at you differently because of your condition," he said with a supportive smile.
"What condition do I have?" I asked anxiously.
"Well... according to the doctors, you show signs of Bipolar I. You know, my grandmother had it."
"Delilah was bipolar? How do you know?" I asked curiously.
"She told me all about how she went through electroconvulsive therapy. They sent electric currents through her brain in an attempt to cure her. I'm pretty sure it didn't do jack for her, though," he said with a look of disgust. As laughably bad as the psychiatric system is nowadays, it used to be even worse back in the day. Don't even get me started on lobotomies. I remember reading about Rosemary Kennedy once on Wikipedia and genuinely crying because of how tragic her story was.
"That's just cruel. So why are you home, anyway?" I asked, changing the conversation.
"I started my sabbatical, so I don't have to go to work for a solid year," he said lazily, stretching.
"What the hell is a sabbatical?" I asked, confused.
"Surely there's a nicer way of asking me that," he said with an irritating smile.
"What is a sabbatical?" I asked with a deep sigh.
"It's a paid break for a year as a reward for working seven years at my company. Isn't this great?" he asked with a wide smile. I should have been happy for him, but I knew he would just get screwed over in the future. Of course, I lied and said how proud of him I was. What else can you say in such a situation?
"That's excellent, dad. What will you do for a solid year? I mean, that's a long time. I'll be seventeen by the time you go back to work."
"I plan to spend a lot of time with my family; I feel like lately, I haven't been giving you enough attention," he said with a poignant look on his face.
"Oh, Dad, you've given me more than enough," I said, hugging him and fighting back the emotions. I felt so awful at that moment that I honestly thought I was dying.
"I could always do more. I've failed as a father," he said emotionally, putting his head on his lap.
"Y0u haven't failed at anything. If it helps, we can do something together and forget about all of our problems. How does that sound?"
"It sounds great," he replied with a tiny smile.
"Okay, what would be a good place for the two of us to go?" I asked excitedly.
"Who said you had to go out somewhere to have fun?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Nobody, but it's more fun outside," I said, surprised at his comment.
"Not necessarily. You know what's more fun to do inside the house?" he asked with a wide smile.
"I honestly have no idea."
"We can blast music as loud as we want," he said excitedly.
That's ironic because you stopped me from doing that last time... Damn you, time travel for constantly changing my dad's personality.
"I guess yeah. I just wish we had one of those crazy surround sound systems. It makes it sound as if the music is actually being played in front of you. Imagine listening to some Pink Floyd on that," I said excitedly. I'm an audiophile and can do a fair amount of production. I mostly remaster old songs and attempt to modernize them. For example, I did a remaster of The Wanderer by Dion, and it sounded terrific. Not all of them turn out well, however. I tried to remaster Sons of Satan by Venom, and it sounded godawful. (no pun intended)
"I'm sure we could buy one at Goodwill. I can't believe some of the things people give away," he said, shaking his head in disbelief.
"One man's trash is another's treasure. Okay, let's go find this speaker system," I exclaimed excitedly. I wanted so badly to play some trippy music like Infected Mushroom on it and just close my eyes as the music surrounded me in its aura.
"Let's go," he said as he grabbed his flannel coat and put it on.
Life is pretty cool sometimes.