Now, I am paranoid. I see Death around every corner, cloaked in jet, skeletal claws adorned with rotting flesh reaching for me, for my soul, his bloodstained scythe waiting, waiting for its time to come, for the time at which my life will come to an end. Truth be told, that's being a bit overly dramatic. (I've always had that problem.) But the fact remains that often when I walk my dog late at night, I expect someone to leap out at me: a sociopath, a common hoodlum, a serial killer. I just wait for the muzzle flash that dimly illuminates the image of a killer, the report of the automatic pistol echoing off cold concrete walls, the searing pain that is a bullet wound. I wonder occasionally what it really feels like to be shot. Every car that passes slowly enough is filled to the brim with gangsters, merciless killers with tattooed tears under their eyes, itching to off me in a drive-by. Every suspicious person who walks past carries a gun, a knife, a piano wire, something with which he may put an end to me.

Even worse than envisioning my own death, however, is seeing in my mind's eye the death of my family. And it comes to me occasionally, as I walk the dog, as I abandon them when they needed me the most. When embarking on dog walks, I don't regularly lock the gate around the front of our house; it seems pointless, really. You can't actually tell that the gate is unlocked. Unless someone were watching my every movement, simply waiting until I left, coldly calculating how long I would be gone, how long he would have to do his work, knew that I didn't lock the gate. That's what I worry about.

Sometimes, as I turn back into my cul-de-sac, I imagine coming upon the house, and sensing something is wrong, that something, somehow, is amiss. The gate is slightly open. I imagine my heart racing as I plunge through the fenced-off front yard and see that the front door (never actually used to receive visitors - we use the garage) is ajar. Something is dripping over the threshold, creating a puddle on the doormat. I open the door, terrified about what I'm going to see, and, of course, always imagine the worst. As the front door swings open with a creak, I see a body lying on the floor, bruised, bloody, obviously dead. It is my stepmother. Crimson claw marks are on the inside of the door: she had been trying to escape when she died. Her eyes were open, forever open wide from terror. I look around the living room. Furniture is strewn everywhere, disheveled. There had been a struggle, apparently. Blood bespatters the walls and ceiling. (Dimly, I wonder how blood could possibly have gotten on the ceiling, twelve feet up.)

My father is who I see next. He appears to be simply sitting in his chair, in front of his computer as always, until I notice that his throat has been slit, that his lifeforce had spurted out onto his desk (always so messy) and computer monitor. His eyes, once so full of fire, now seemed as if they were glass, so dim, so lifeless. I could have saved him. But I had walked the dog, had turned my back on my family when their lives depended on it. Just to confirm what I already dread, I look for my little sister, age five. I find her on the couch, covered in blood. I don't even want to know how she was killed, how she was probably the last to die after seeing both of her parents brutally murdered, how her last few seconds were most likely full of terror, confusion. She had been so happy, and now she is gone forever. They all are.

Now, it was just my dog, Zeus, and I. Alone. Deserters. Traitors. Sometimes I imagine, when out and about, that Zeus is killed, too. If he were home, he surely wouldn't allow anyone to harm my family. He may seem like a big wimp, but in his heart he is brave, loyal, as any dog should be. I would find him in the front yard, his tail unwagging, his nose dry, his eyes glossed over. Then, I would be completely alone. I would live with my mother up north or with some other relative, but I would never forgive myself for, as I see it, just letting them die. For not knowing that something was wrong and dashing back to the house halfway into the walk. I would carry that guilt with me until I died, would wonder why life had been so cruel to me. Nothing would be stolen, of course. It was just pleasure killing, that sick bastard. Why us? Why did he have to slaughter my family? I would ask myself every day of my life. Why wasn't I there to save them, or at least to die with them and prevent this suffering?

To be perfectly honest, in my imagination no details had ever been clear. I had never allowed myself to imagine anything distinct. Actually writing down what could never be quantified or described has really affected me. I am now openly crying, should never have written this, am regretting the decision already, am wondering if I should even post this. I don't want people to be concerned, I really don't. I'm usually fine, have pushed the images out of my mind, have assured myself that a mass murderer is not after my family.

I'm convinced that I will need therapy in the future, if not for this twisted and morbid imagination of mine, then for some other fatal flaw in my head. Why am I like this? Why do I imagine my family being massacred? I love them all, even my stepmother, who has always seemed to be a thorn in my side. Why do I always think my parents have died in a horrible car crash any time they're late coming home from a party? Why must I be surrounded by visions of death and decay? These and others are questions I ask myself constantly. My mind is really fucked up. Pardon my Portuguese, but it really is the most appropriate phrase to use in this situation. I think I need help, truly, madly, deeply do.

[Exit Orpheum.]