Chapter 1: Unbelievable

This is unbelievable and it's two days before school starts. Why did this have to happen to me? I want to believe this is a dream but I know it isn't. I've already pinched myself enough times to be sure. My life has been turned upside down. I feel as if my life is over and it'll never be the same. I'm a freak. If anyone found out I'll be an outcast, I'll be hunted down or worse. These were thoughts that kept running through my head over and over again. The constant loop was interrupted when my friend Tyrone opened the door and walked into the room.

Tyrone came in and sat on the black rotating chair at the corner of the room. He was thinking, I could tell because when he does he has his fingers on his glasses and the look on his face makes him look frustrated. I don't blame him. I was assuming that he was thinking about me and how we're going to deal with our current situation. He stood up and paced the floor. He stopped then looked at me. He started to speak.

"Look man we're fine, we just can't let anyone know about this" he paused for a second then said "About you."

"Agreed, but what if someone does" I said this in a somewhat concerned tone.

"No one will know, alright. We just can't tell anyone. Better yet just pretend none of this is even real."

"What about our friends at school or your parents. We can trust them with this, right?" I was thinking maybe somehow they knew someone who could help me.

"No, we can't"

I looked at him. He just said we couldn't even trust his own parents or our friends. "I'm serious Ryan we can't tell them" he said this with major importance.

"Why not?"

" If we tell them about you we can just be putting them in danger. Not telling them will keep them safe"

"From who? From me."

"No, there are people out there that might want to use you or hurt you. They might hurt the people closest to you to get to you. The less people know the better."

"Ok, fine. But how am I supposed to hide this. What if I touch someone's clothing and it sets on fire or I electrocute someone by shaking his or her hand. I might even create a blackout. We need a cure. I need to get rid of this."

Tyrone sat down and began to think. He took a breath and said, "We're going to find you a cure, but for now you're just going to have to learn to control it."

"How?"

"Tomorrow we'll find someplace private. Somewhere no one will see us so you can learn how to use your 'ability'. If you know how to use, you'll know how to stop it."

"Alright, makes sense. We can go to the abandoned warehouse on fifth."

"Good, it's settled then. We can leave at 10 am or something."

He stood up and walked towards the door. He looked very relieved. Before he could walk out I called to him " Hey Tyrone, thanks"

"No problem man." He replied as he left the room.

Tyrone Jackson was my best friend. He was like a brother to me. Well technically we're stepbrothers since we've lived under the same roof for six years. Six years ago I became an orphan. My mother died when I was born. My dad blamed me for her death and would beat me for no reason. He was stone cold and he never actually cared about me. If he did he didn't show. But on the outside it looked as if I had a dad because from time to time he would let me stay at Tyrone's house for a day or two. Each time I went it felt like the best day ever. Mr. Jackson was the best father you could have. Tyrone's dad took me to a hockey game, bought me ice cream, and even took me to a skate park. But everything that was right in the world would suddenly burst into flames, as I would sit in Mr. Jackson's car waiting arrive at my so called home.

My dad became a drunk at one point. He had lost his job and it was hard to find a new one. One day he went nuts and robbed a liquor store. He was tying to escape the cops and since he was drunk he didn't know what he was doing. That resulted in a fatal crash. That's basically my dad's story. After that Tyrone's parents took custody of me. Even though my dad was a jerk he was still my dad so I felt an ounce of sorrow over the guy's death. But I felt very happy that I got to move in with my best friend. I really liked how my life was turning out. Since then it's then it's been smooth sailing. Up until two days ago at least.

Two days ago I was literally struck by lightning. I don't mean the metaphorical phrase 'I was struck by lightning'. I mean I was hit with at least 1 billion volts of energy, traveling at the speed of light. I believe that's how a lightning bolt works. Now I also believe that when you get struck by lightning it should either kill you or put you in a serious coma. But this bolt of lightning didn't kill me or put me in a coma. See there was a huge storm that night. I was walking down an alley trying to get home when all of a sudden I felt strange. I can't describe how my whole body felt at that moment. I felt a strange tingling sensation. The thunder in the clouds was noticeably getting louder. I looked up and saw a flash of light. After I was hit I was only out for a few minutes as far as I could tell. Strange thing was I didn't feel anything when the bolt hit me. It just happened. One moment I'm seeing a bright flash, the next I'm waking up on the floor, wet, with my clothes in shreds. The bolt may have had something to do with that. When I woke up I didn't feel any pain. There was not one scratch on me. I got up and then decided to go where I was planning to go. Home.

I went home and I didn't really want to talk about what just happened. It was just too crazy and I didn't think it would matter since I was ok. The next day I woke up thinking that what happened wasn't even what really happened. I started to believe that the bright flash was just some delusion and that I had passed out because of the cold weather. I heard that you could faint due to low temperatures. So I decided to forget about it. But unfortunately that day, which technically was yesterday, was the day I found out I was a human light socket.