Ever since I was a kid, I’ve seen people commenting on how terrifying darkness can be; talking about the unknown hiding within, like a monster wanting to get you. The thing is, I’ve lived in the darkness my whole life, since I was born with it: I’m blind.
Now, even though I’m blind, it doesn’t mean that I can’t see anything at all; my vision isn’t just a black void, devoid of color. I can see to some extent, even though to me everything is a blurry blob of moving colors and shadows.
Mostly because of this, I’m probably destined to live with my mom for most of my life; my dad left when he was told that I was born blind, and no one’s seen him ever since.
Now, you know those rumors about people born without one of their senses developing the other ones to be better than average? That doesn’t always happen, but, lucky or not, it did for me.
I sometimes hear things no one else can. Tapping on the walls, whispers inside the room I’m in, and even strange breathing. I know the brain sometimes tries to fill in sounds or things that aren’t there, but I really don’t know if it’s really that.
Every night ever since I was a child, I’ve heard my mom crying in her bedroom. She’d lock her door after putting me to bed and throw herself on the floor, muttering something I have still yet to understand.
I live in a two-floor house inside a small neighborhood and an even smaller city. I’m homeschooled, mostly because of the lack of affordable schools available for the blind, and I’ve never had more than one friend at a time. Because of this, I was never really connected to the outside world other than through what my mom told me.
Only now, I can finally understand the complete nonsensical lies that she said to my face. About her not actually crying at night and the sounds just being some rats crawling around the house. Lies about me needing to listen to music before sleeping or closing my eyes when walking into her room in the dark even though I was blind.
The thing is, since this morning, I think I now know why she cries at night. My mother also has bad vision, although not nearly as bad as mine. One day, I managed to get her to talk, when she’d drunk more beer than anticipated; she told me about the shadows of her once kind husband. About her parents also not wanting her at first because of her bad vision. Stories of all the people she knew had hated her for something that was hers.
My mother saw their shadows taunting her, threatening in her mind about me hating her too. Me creating relationships could mean that I’d see those same shadows too, and that’s why she kept me at home most of the time.
And now I know that, as years move on, I am going to develop those things too. These noises I’ve hearing have been getting louder lately, and I’m scared of not talking to anyone now. What if they start hating me?
Does anyone know of a case like mine? Some way to get help?