The Life and Death of a Disbeliever.

[elena_grace]

In death, as in life, there are groups. Those groups are not 'clicks' - people divided because of their "stereotype". In death Goths and preps are family, nerds and jocks are friends, in death the groups are divided by who your soul knows. Families are connected everyone because you know this soul, your sister knows this one. In death ALL souls are family, but within this giant community are close-knit families. Loved ones from lives before who you connected with on an intimate level.
In death, I stare at those around me, names I had forgotten coming back to me. There's Louisa over there - my closest friend from a life about four lives back. My first mother I ever had. Sean - the brother that betrayed me when I needed him the most. And, I pause, as my eyes meet Nathaniel's. My first true love. My Soul Mate.

Let me start at the beginning. I was born to wonderful parents in the year 1989, before that I'd been born three other times that I could remember, but in the year 1989 I was born for the last time. The fates had long ago decreed that I should never be with Nathaniel, but every life I fell in love with him again. It couldn't be helped, and it was a vicious cycle that we went through. This time I was determined to be with him.
What they don't tell you about birth is that you spend years in each life trying to correct the mistakes you made in the past, and each life you're born to correct your mistakes and learn the lessons you need, but when you're born you forget. You forget your past lives, everything's erased and you have to start all over again. When they say that history repeats itself, it's true. If you don't know and learn from your mistakes it's in your genetic makeup to repeat them. I wish someone had told me that. Even more, I wish someone would've been there to tell me about my past.
Growing up I had a special gift. I could see the dead, sometimes I could even talk to them. I guess in some ways I was luckier than most in that I could do this. One ghost in particular attached himself to me. Johnny. He told me I reminded him so much of Emily, his little sister that had died. She had died because he'd failed to protect her. He insisted that he wouldn't make the same mistake with me. I was his redemption.
My parents raised me penecostal. For the first ten years I didn't question it. I believed without a single doubt in everything they taught me. Then when I turned eleven the dreams started. First they were vague, horrible nightmares in which I would wake up crying. I couldn't remember them most of the time, but when I did I always wondered what it was about the dreams that makde me so uneasy. By the time I was fourteen I no longer believed in any of the things my church taught and I was desperate to figure out what was going on. I wouldn't get that answer until I was sixteen.

[elena_grace]

When I turned sixteen I met Amy and Jeremy. She was quiet, angry, and very much "goth". He was funny, outgoing, and a pastor's son. The two most unlikely people would become my best friends. Amy hated me at first, and to be quite honest, I hated her as well, but Jeremy united us. Then came the day when we realized that we weren't alone with our "gift". Amy and Jeremy could see the dead as well as I could - Amy probably could see them even better than myself.
After that the three of us were inseperable, only leaving each other to go to classes.
The dreams became more vivid than before, faces became recognizable and the sense of unease became justified as the nightmares grew worse. Dead loved ones floated around me, homes burned before my eyes, friends and family slaughtered like pigs. I started trying to stay awak all night; I was only getting three hours of sleep before school, but I didn't mind. Finally Amy asked me what was wrong and I confessed to the nightmares.
She listened in silence, chewing on her lower lip.
"I just don't want to sleep anymore," I finished, exhausted.
"Have you ever thought that maybe these aren't just dreams?" She asked.
I shook my head, "Like they're visions?"
She paused, thinking about it, "Something close. Maybe they're memories."
"Memories?"
"From the spirit world."
I looked at her confused, trying to grasp what she was trying to tell me.
"The spirit world. Where all spirits live."
That night I went to the library and borrowed every book I could find on the paranormal and spiritual. Nothing really explained what she was trying to say. When I asked her about it the next day she said she didn't really know. It was almost as vague to her as it was to me, but now I was really beginning to doubt, not only my parents beliefs, but my sanity. I would spend the next four years in that doubt.