It's finals time, I'm stressed to high hell...but at the center of it, I feel just fine. Strange things disturbed me, jilted my sense of reality, but they bounced off harmlessly enough.

Many around me, though, seems to be feeling the exact opposite. A broken heart here, disillusioned madness there. Suicidal ideations bloom like jasmine in spring. The smell drives me to distraction. It's the smell of iron, the stench of fresh blood mingled with tears. Their anguish, the way they word things bring back more memories: surreal moments, people, places.

I close my eyes and remember holding someone, feeling their heartbeat slow. I can't even recognize the face or the glazed eyes. I thought I remember everything, everyone, but he has no identity to me. Wheezing, my name, someone's head in my lap.

I hear someone shrieking as sobs wrack their lungs, torn and crouched in the fetal position. My hands...they have less wrinkles in them, smooth, not scarred. What was the connection..what service did I offer to this young girl? She called someone an angel. The smell was rampant on her: thick, pouting, congealed.

It's strange, the little things you remember.

I used to go through the same thing the person was experiencing. I followed people into their personal hells for their sake. Now they are merely someone else's problems. I feel sympathy, give advice, but that's it.

Maybe I have really changed. I like this feeling of freedom from the pain of others.

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