A/N: Thanks so much to those who reviewed. I really appreciate it. )

First off, I think you must be retarded, Dr. Lancaster. I mean, seriously. "Tell me about your childhood?" What the hell makes you think I'm going to tell you about my childhood? I have a hard enough time thinking about it, reliving it inside my head, so what on earth would compel me to write it all down? Writing it down would make it too real, give it too much weight. Now that I think about it, that's probably why you want me to do it.

I give up. Okay? You win. I'll write it all down if it'll make you shut the hell up and let me leave. I'll spill my guts all over the fucking page, even though I know it won't help. It won't make me feel better. Do you realize that? It's not going to fix anything. You're not going to fix anything.

"Tell me about your childhood." That's so vague. I mean, what is "my childhood," exactly? Is it a feeling, a state of mind, or is it a set amount of time? I'm only eighteen, barely a legal adult. Does my childhood include every moment that I was not considered a legal adult, or does it only last up until the time when I no longer felt like a child?

You'd probably tell me to start at the beginning, to tell you where all the trouble started. The problem is, I can't remember the beginning. I don't know precisely where the trouble started. My guess is that the trouble had already begun before I was even born, and it just snowballed from there.

My parents were, to put it as kindly as I possibly can, two very fucked up individuals. My father was bipolar and schizophrenic (I know you're going to ask, so I'll just answer you in advance-- no, Dr. Lancaster, I do not hear voices in my head. I did not inherit that particular mental disorder). He was impulsive and unpredictable. He wanted to be a rock star and go around the world, performing in a new city every night. He never wanted children; he wasn't fit to be a father, and he knew it.

My mother... I'm not sure how to describe her. I'm sure there must be a name for whatever mental issue she has; probably something like Crazy Bitch Disorder. She's beautiful, I can't deny that. I could never bear to cut her out of our family photos, as much as I wanted to. I would stare at that family-- my family-- all of us smiling, her face beaming, and I would think, "who the hell are they? Who is she? Where did she disappear to when we put the camera away?"

They met at a concert when they were sixteen; she was drunk; he was naïve and thought it was love at first sight. Just a few weeks later, she discovered that she was pregnant. And just a week after that, their parents forced them into a loveless marriage. Several months afterward, my twin sister and I were born.

Years later, my father described to me how small and delicate we looked; how afraid he was to hold us out of fear that he might hurt us; how he fell in love with us instantly. Maybe he was never meant to be a father, but as soon as we were born, he wanted us more than anything.

My mother didn't feel the same way; she refused to even touch either of her children. She held a special contempt for me from the beginning, simply because of my gender. She couldn't stand men. I can picture her, cold and silent, face drawn, eyes narrowed, arms folded tight across her chest. The same way she used to look whenever we were alone in a room together. Blocking me out. Pretending I didn't exist.

For the first three years of my life, that was how things were. My mother carefully ignored me, giving what little affection she had to my sister, while my father spoiled both of us, took us everywhere with him, did everything he could to make us happy.

Despite my mother's refusal to acknowledge my existence, I never felt unloved. How could I, with my father constantly telling me how sweet, how adorable, how smart I was? He taught me to read as soon as I could speak in complete sentences. He tried to teach me to play the guitar. He tacked up all my childish drawings on the walls of his study. He checked for monsters in my closet and under my bed. I lacked nothing. I felt secure; I felt safe; I was happy.

After a while, I forgot about my mother. I knew she was there somewhere, always nearby, but not quite within reach. Every time I saw her, it was like an electric jolt, a quick dose of reality-- oh, yes, she lives here, too. I remember, now. And then she would leave, and I would promptly forget her again. In her efforts to block me out of her world, she had erased herself completely.

I know you probably want to hear about every event of my childhood in excruciating detail, but I'm afraid you're going to be disappointed. The last thing I remember clearly is moving from Utah to New Mexico just a few weeks after my sister and I turned four. Then things became blurry. I remember some things, but they seem vague, twisted, with no sense of chronological order.

I got sick. Beyond that, I can't give you many details. I remember hospitals, and pain everywhere, and receiving lots of pain medication, which I like to think is where my addiction got started. I remember my sister telling me to get better fast, because she wanted to play with me, and I remember my father sitting by my bedside. Always by my bedside, always holding my hand and asking me if I felt any better, if anything hurt.

I remember my mother, coming to visit me at odd hours of the night when my father had fallen asleep. She would bring me water and sit beside me, stroking my hair and begging me to drink more. "You have to stay hydrated," she told me, her voice hushed. "Otherwise, you'll never get any better."

For three years, I was in and out of the hospital. To my disoriented mind, it didn't seem like three years; I barely noticed time passing. Everything felt like some strange dream, something unreal, something I couldn't wake up from. There was pain, but it was dull. People came to visit, but they seemed far away, unreachable. I was in a constant state of sleep. "Not much longer," I heard the doctors say. "He won't last much longer."

I woke up. I don't know exactly when, because time was such a jumbled mess for me by then. But suddenly, the world was in sharp focus, bright lights assaulting me, voices on every side, searing pain in my chest. I turned my head and saw my father, holding my hand as always, biting his lip, tears trailing silently down his face. There was so much pain in his eyes, so much I could barely stand it.

"Stop," I breathed softly.

He was surprised to hear my voice. I must have been silent a long time. "Stop what?" he asked.

"Stop crying."

He reached up to brush my hair away from my face. "Don't worry about that," he said, his voice shaking slightly. "I'm okay. Just rest."

"No, dad. Stop crying," I insisted. It hurt to talk, made the ache in my chest even worse, but I wasn't about to tell him that. "I'm not going to die, so stop it."

A small smile crossed his face. "You'd better not."

I was glad to see him smile, although I knew it was purely for my benefit. I didn't want to see the smile slip away, so I closed my eyes, holding his image in my head as I fell asleep.

A doctor later explained to me about the pain in my chest. There had been something wrong with my heart, he told me, and so they had taken my heart out and put in a new one. I didn't like this. I didn't want someone else's heart inside me. Actually, I still don't like to think about it. It's fucking creepy. Sometimes I lay awake at night, wondering whose heart it was, how old they were, how they died.

I remained in the hospital for observation, since the doctors were unsure if my body would accept this new heart. Besides the sore feeling in my chest, I was amazed by how much better I felt. My mind was clear, no longer foggy and distant. I was ready to go home, to get out of this prison. I was optimistic. Things would get better. I was so sure of it.

It didn't take long for everything to come crashing down. The night before I was scheduled to go home, I awoke to the sound of hushed, frantic arguing. My parents, my father holding a paper cup of water, my mother trying to take it from him.

"What is this?" he was asking, over and over again. "What is this? What is this?"

"Water," she insisted. "It's just water, Tristan. Give it back."

He sniffed the contents of the cup, then took a small sip. Abruptly, he spit it out in the sink. "What the fuck is this?" he demanded, spinning around to face her again.

"It's nothing. Give it back to me."

"You were going to give this to him."

"It's only water."

With a sound I can only describe as a growl, he threw the paper cup into the trash and grabbed my mother by the shoulders, backing her into the wall. "Don't lie to me."

She didn't struggle. The light in the room was dim, so I couldn't see her face. I wondered if she was afraid.

"You did this," he said, his voice a threatening whisper. "What have you been giving him?"

"Nothing." Her voice was calm, cold; there was no fear in it. "Let me go."

He slammed her against the wall. I heard her sharp intake of breath. "What the fuck did you do to him?"

There was a long silence. The tension grew thicker, choking me. I didn't move, didn't dare to bring attention to myself. The incision over my heart burned; I was desperate for painkillers, but I couldn't speak.

"You shouldn't have brought him here," she hissed, breaking the silence. "Why couldn't you just let him die? This could have been over so much sooner."

My father smacked her hard across the face, the sound loud and clear in the small room. "What the fucking hell is wrong with you?!" he demanded, not bothering to lower his voice.

Although I still couldn't see my mother's face clearly, I knew she was looking at me; I could sense her eyes searching for mine. I wanted to close my eyes, to hide under the blankets, but I was frozen. "You never wanted him anyway," she said. "Neither of us did. You just didn't have the courage to get rid of him."

To get rid of me. I remembered once, when we went to visit my grandparents, I saw my grandfather take a small kitten no one had wanted into the backyard. I'd watched him twist its neck, strangling the life from it until it was still and limp. To my mother, I was the same as that kitten; just an unwanted pet, something to be thrown away at will.

My father leaned in close to her, his voice low. I had to strain my ears to hear him."If you ever fucking touch him again, I will kill you."

The pain was unbearable now, but it was not from the incision. My new heart pounded hard and fast, my breathing turning into uneven gasps for air, my entire body shaking uncontrollably. I could hear the heart monitor above me going insane, making a shrill warning sound.

I heard my father shouting my name, felt his hands on my face. I caught a brief glimpse of his panicked face before the world went black.

That, I think, is where my childhood ended.