Newspaper articles: That's what my job had come to. It was so utterly stupid. Just because our twenty-second candidate hadn't jumped-ship yet, didn't mean he wasn't going to. But still, he had us searching to find the next, a girl.
Funerals are the worst. The absolute worst place to be when you're... like me. I stood back in a corner, trying to stay out of everyone's way; trying not to touch them. Even as I though that, an old wrinkled woman (who looked almost as if she would soon be in a coffin herself) walked up to me and asked me how I was doing, it must be hard to lose your grandmother so suddenly. No, I didn't even know her. Just as I thought I was safe and thst she was finally going to leave me alone, she bent to kiss me on the cheek.
I was standing in a cloudy looking kitchen, I knew in the instant that there was a roast in the crock-pot behind me and that it would burn if I did not leave this funeral as soon as possible.
As the world around me came back into focus, I saw the woman staring at me with a confused expression. Of course she had heard the rumors about why I had been pulled out of school. Evryone had heard about poor little Estrella Gonzales after the parpers had covered the story. Lots of kids had trouble making and keeping friends after the shooting but only a few had actually been tranfered to home school. I just couldn't stand the images I saw when I tried to play with everyone else. Sometimes it was something normal that clouded my vision; sometimes, not so much.
It took me forever to realize that I was not crazy. Especially with my parents doing everything they could to convince me that the things I saw were just dreams. The long line of therapists, doctors, and hypnotists had seemed never-ending. The day that everything changed was when my parents were reaching the end of their ideas. We were at the home of a woman who claimed to be a great psychic and had seen my story in the newspaper.
I remember sitting down in her deceivingly normal-looking living room. She only had to take my hands for a moment. I saw a million people flash before my eyes, a million waiting expressions. She must have done this same ritual many times before. I saw her come into focus and my mother and father looking at me with concern.
She asked my parents to leave the room and they reluctantly complied. She then gazed at me with sympathy. I remember thinking that it was odd, how she spoke to me as if I was an adult.
"My dear, you are in grave danger. I do not know how to change your future; there are forces bigger than I working toward it at this moment. A powerful family will want you one day. Avoid them, watch for them. But tell no one of the pictures you see. The visions are the only thing that can protect you from them."