Carrie

-Carrie-

I used to be normal. That changed last spring.

Number twelve.

I don’t want to die.

I grabbed the sides of my head.

“Carrie?” I heard behind me. I froze.

“Carrie? Carrie, is that you?”

My back went stiff. Oh. Don’t tell me…

I slowly turned around. There she was. Uzuki stood on her tiptoes, grinning. I forced myself to smile.

“Oh, hey!” I said. It hurts to smile. But it’s all I can do. She wouldn’t understand. No one would.

“Did you need something?” I asked.

“Are you okay?” Uzuki asked.

“Yeah,” I lied. It’s all I can do. I can’t say that I am dying next year on the First Festival. She would flip out. For now, I needed to lie.

Naturally, she doesn’t believe me.

“Okay…” Uzuki said. We stood there silent for a moment. It’s hurting to smile again. Come on. Get going already. Sit down! Go away!

“Urameshi!” someone shouted. Uzuki turned her head.

“Yeah?” she asked. I could finally breathe when she ran off.

-----------

At least I’m not alone.

There had to be others. If I was twelve who were the other eleven? How many others were like me? I got my answer in an email.

I was on my computer last night. Not much going on. Just surfing around. Suddenly an email notification popped up on my screen. Hm? What’s this? Curious, I clicked on the popup. I ended up in my inbox. One new message waited for me. I narrowed my eyes. Now usually, I would’ve deleted the message and moved on. But not that night. For some reason, I had to know.

“What is Your Number?”

I stared at the subject line. I couldn’t help myself. With one click, I changed everything.

“My name is Peter. I am number thirty-three. What is your number?”

I stared at my left shoulder.