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Irrational Fears

For those of you that know me, you will know I am afraid of a lot of things. Many of which are highly irrational.

We all have something silly we are afraid of, even if we wont admit it. What i wonder about though, is how do these irrational fears start? With many of us they start from childhood for example a fear of balloons may be linked to having one burst unexpectedly in your hands as a child.

What about those irrational fears that have developed from no where you can pinpoint? Do they come from instinct for example fear of the dark (a common yet somehow irrational fear) stems from the basic fear of not be able to see whats in front of you. Instinctively your mind tells you to be scared because you are unable to foresee danger.

In my own personal experience, many of my irrational fears actually stem from horror movies. At 11 years old a teacher showed us the film 'IT' in an English class. Growing up, I never liked horror films and still don't, but being a popular sleep over activity, I was always watching films that terrified me.

In that perspective, is there really such thing as an Irrational fear? or are all fears rationalised to some extent?

#phobias #irrational #irrational fears #horror movies #insinct

instinct chapter 1

It was a average day in an average town, with an average school and an average student, who had average grades and average friends. I awoke that morning the same as every morning before. A loud interruption to my dreams jolted my mind out of its unconscious state and forced me to find the snooze button. When I finally managed to reach it in my half-conscious state, I had already woken enough to get out of my cluttered bed and stumble over to my bathroom. I washed myself up and began getting dressed for school. I wore my usual plain sweatshirt and plain jeans and brushed my long, light brown hair. Then I grabbed together my schoolbooks before heading out the door towards the bus stop. I took my usual route walking to the bus stop, taking shortcuts through the woods frequently while half staring into space. When I finally reached the bus stop, my friend Zoey was waiting for me and she turned to greet me. “Hey, did you finish the science project?” I asked before she could say anything. “Yeah, you don’t have to worry about that. I’ll finish it in first period.” I rolled my eyes. “Okay, whatever. As long as it gets done. That project is like half of our grade!” This time her eyes rolled. “Don’t sweat it, Lizzy. I’ll get it done, I promise.” She smiled at me with assurance. I chuckled. “Of course you will, you could complete the entire year’s work in first period!” I joked. We laughed until the bus pulled into the bus stop. When we boarded I muttered my usual greeting to the bus driver out of courtesy and Zoey and I walked over to our usual seat together and sat down for the long ride. We both spent the ride switching between spacing out, looking out the window, and small chit-chat about homework or classes. Approximately half an hour later we arrived at the school and we each ran to our separate groups of friends waiting outside its entrance. I walked over to my small group standing by a bench. “Hey, Lizzy! What’s up?” my friend Meghan asked the same way she did every morning. “Nothing, you?” I answered the same as well. “Ditto,” she said before returning to her previous conversation, and I joined in with her.

“I still think a gun would be best!” Charlie yelled. Liam instantly rebutted.

“But you would run out of bullets! A melee weapon is the best!”

“Yeah! With that, you’d last about as long as with no weapon!” Charlie scoffed. Meghan interrupted them.

“Are you guys still arguing about this? It’s a bunch of B.S.!” Liam and Charlie laughed as if she was a child unable to understand the context.

“Listen,” Charlie began, “there are two types of people in this world- the people with a plan for when the zombies attack, and a the people without a plan for when the zombies attack. We like to call the latter ones ‘Dinner’.”

“I’d just nuke ‘em,” I broke in. Charlie looked at me incredulously.

“Oh, yeah? And where do you plan on obtaining a nuke?” he began once again, “Even if you could, how would you survive the radiation? This is a “real life” hypothetical question; think before you come up with an answer-they have to be practical solutions.”

The bell rang.

“Practical?!?” Meghan burst in.

“Because zombies are practical,” I informed her sarcastically before we walked inside.

I absentmindedly walked to my locker and then to first period. I walked into my English class and sat down next to Liam.

“Hey,” I greeted. He smiled.

“Hey,” he returned the greeting, “Sorry ‘bout this morning. Charlie gets too serious about that stuff. You’d think he actually believes zombies will suddenly appear and try to take over the world.” he laughed. After a moment, I began laughing with him.

“It’s okay,” I chuckled some more, “Charlie’s always like that. We need to put a sign on him about that so that people aren’t as offended.” We laughed together some more until the teacher came in and told everyone to get out their homework

We spent the next 45 minutes learning about great American literature and why it was important to our lives. I was less than relieved when the bell rang signaling the transfer of classes. The succeeding class was my worst nightmare- gym.

I was less than “physically active” and didn’t really like physical education. Every day that it was available, I would choose to walk around the track field rather than participate in any sports. If it wasn't, I would choose to “lift weights” in the weight room, meaning that I would sit on a weight lifting bench and watch other people lift weights. Today I walked around the track field for the thirty minutes we had before we had to change back into our regular school clothes.

The next period was science class. Zoey had, not surprisingly, finished the project we had been working on together by the beginning of class. When the teacher told us to hand our project in, Zoey practically strutted with confidence up to the teacher before giving him the project.

“Perfect score,” she boasted in my ear as she passed by on her way back to her seat. “He didn’t even grade it yet...” I retorted, but she kept up with her confidence in the grade. As we sat down, Mr. Ame handed us some worksheets on how ionic bonds form and told us to read through it and answer the questions on the back for the rest of the period. This, however, took Zoey and me half an hour to finish, resulting in fifteen minutes of chit-chat. “So, are you ready for the hours of fun we’re gonna have at your house this weekend?” she asked. “Of course!” I smiled. “My mom is gonna be gone tonight, but she said you can come over anyway.” We discussed some of the plans together for a few minutes before the bell rang once more. I walked over to my lovely linguistic Spanish 4 class. I greeted Señor Rondine and skipped over to my seat. I sat in my seat for a few minutes expectantly, but was slightly disappointed when he didn’t come in and take his seat behind me. It wasn't until halfway through relearning the subjunctive forms that Kenny walked into the room and took his seat. He handed his pass to the teacher once he put his books down and then turned to me. “Hey, Kenny,” I said, slightly blushing. “Why were you late?” “I slept in,” he said nonchalantly. “But it’s fourth period already.” When he just shrugged in response, I left it as it was. “So, did you get last night’s math homework?” His eyes opened wide in shock. “We had math homework?!?” I couldn't help but chuckle at his usual unpreparedness. “Wanna copy mine?” He smiled politely at me. “...Yes.” We laughed together for a minute and then I returned to the lesson while he copied my homework answers.

As the bell rang we got up together and walked together to math; however, I stopped to pick up Zoey along the way, and Kenny kept walking. When Zoey and I reached the classroom, each of us regretfully walked to our seats that were across the room from each other. Kenny was also seated far away from me, so, without anyone to talk to, the class was extremely uneventful. The hour slowly passed by until the bell for lunch rang, freeing all the school’s prisoners to socialize in the cafeteria. I got my lunch and walked over to my table. Liam, Meghan, and Charlie were all waiting for me there.

“Hey, Lizzy, what’s new?” Meghan asked nonchalantly.

“Nothin’ you?”

“Ditto,” she responded before taking another bite of her food.

“So, Liam,” I began, “did you practice your music?” he simply nodded in response, having his mouth full. Charlie then began chatting with him about the “Zombie-apocalypse” and how to avoid it. I zoned out and just ate my food in silence until it was time for sixth period.

After lunch, I ran to my locker to grab my chorus folder before walking to the music room, where I met up with Liam.

“Hi,” he said in a near monotone voice before walking over to his seat. Mr. Rain yelled at the few remaining chatting students to sit down and be quiet, and practice began. We sang for three quarters of an hour before the bell rang causing a mass migration out the classroom door.

I worked my way to the last class of the day, history, in which I sat relatively near Zoey. Mr. Lluvia showed us the different ways the Mongolians pulled together the entire known world in trade and peace. I snuck in my usual random comments on the lesson to Zoey.

“I wanna go to Mongolia to learn how to ride their horses. Apparently they’re just as awesome with them now as they were back then.” We both laughed.

“And I wanna learn to use their bows and arrows,” she added. We continued like this for a half hour until the bell rang, after which we ran to our lockers and to our bus together.

“I’ve got the video games in my bag, so we’re all set,” Zoey confirmed as the bus drove on.

“Sweetness,” I cheered, smiling. Then I remembered something. “Oh yeah! Because my mom’s not gonna be here till tomorrow night, we don’t have a ride, so we gotta walk.”

“Gosh darn it!” she yelled sarcastically, snapping her fingers to prove the point, then she laughed. “I really don’t give a shit whether we gotta walk or not, I'm not as athletically challenged as you.” She then messed up my hair and stuck her tongue out mockingly.

The bus pulled into the bus stop slowly, letting all of its passengers off, and Zoey and I began our voyage toward my house.

“Wanna take the shortcut?” she asked, noticing my lack of breath after a short distance.

“Sure...” I rolled my eyes. She always picked on me like that. We turned off the road into the woods surrounding us. We had only been walking for another minute when my shoelace got caught on a branch coming out from the ground. I groaned in annoyance and bent down to unhook my shoe. As I was unhooking it, a small glint of red caught my attention from the corner of my eye. I looked over to the source and there was a minuscule ruby at the base of a tree. I walked over to it and reached to grab it, but when my hand touched its surface, it was no longer there.

“What is it?” Zoey called from many yards ahead, having just realized that I stopped.

“Uh, nothing...” I responded confusedly. I must have just imagined it. I thought before catching up with Zoey and continuing to my house. “My shoe just got caught on a branch.”

We walked for a few more minutes before emerging from the woods and continuing our walk on pavement. I took no more than three steps before a sudden migraine hit my head. I gripped my head from the pain and quickly lowered myself to the ground. When I uncovered my eyes, for the sudden headache had nearly subsided, everything seemed to be in a red tint, like when you get hurt in a first person shooter game. It lasted for the half second it took before Zoey was down at my level before it returned to normal sight and the headache was completely gone.

“Are you okay?” she asked, concerned.

“Th-that was weird...” I mumbled more to myself than to her, but she responded to it nonetheless.

“What was weird?” I figured that the red tint thing was probably just from my imagination or from too many video games.

“Uh, I just got a horrible headache that lasted for only a second, but it hurt like hell.” She looked worried for a second, but her worry turned to shock.

“Holy crap! What happened to your eyes?!?” For a second I thought she was screwing with me.

“What?” I said incredulously.

“They’re red, and I mean blood red!” she said in shock. “I mean, they’re practically glowing red!” She was definitely screwing with me now.

“Yeah, okay.” I said unbelieving, before beginning my walk again.

“No! I’m serious! They’re blood red!” she said, trying to get me to believe her. When she realized that her current tactics weren’t working, she started going through her book bag while walking at the same pace as me easily. After a minute or two, she pulled out her cellphone.

“See? Just use the mirror option!” she said, handing me the phone. I looked through the menus on the phone until i found the mirror option and turned it on.

In the screen of the phone was an image of my face, though slightly dark. I looked closer to see my eyes up close, but the darkness of the phone’s camera was too much, making it impossible to see my eye color.

“I don’t see it...” I stated. “The phone’s too dark.” Zoey sighed and grabbed the phone back.

“Whatever! You’ll see when we get there!” she yelled before picking up the pace stubbornly.

It was only a few more minutes before we got to my house, and the second we entered, Zoey dragged me to the bathroom and to its mirror.

“Now look!” she said exasperatedly. I followed her order and looked closely into the mirror; however, I didn’t need to look that close to see that she was right- my eyes were an incredulous bright red, like the kind of eyes you get in pictures taken by old cameras. I didn’t know what to say.

“See? It’s pretty creepy...” she said worriedly. “What do you think happened?” I just shook my head and looked closer at my eyes. They weren’t even a fake red, somehow they looked like they were natural, or at least as natural as red could be. As I looked at them for what seemed like minutes, my pupils suddenly and extremely dilated, to the point where i drew back in surprise. However, not even a second later the headache came back. I fell to the ground and gripped my head. Zoey immediately crouched down to where I was on the bathroom floor and grabbed me.

“Are you okay? Lizzy?” she said, trying to get my attention. as soon as the headache calmed down enough for me to think, I looked at her, only she was in the same red tint as before. The millisecond my eyes met hers, she jumped back in surprise.

“Your eyes- th-they’re glowing!” she managed to stutter out in her state of shock. I tried to stumble up to the mirror to see what was going on, but by the time I could see myself, the tint had gone, and my eyes were no longer glowing. However, I did see another thing that caused me to fall one step closer to fainting; My eyes had slits for pupils. SLITS! As in the same kind of eyes a snake or a cat has! I couldn’t believe it. When i looked down at Zoey, she had the same reaction I did.

“This is REALLY getting strange! What the hell is going on?!?” she asked to no one in particular.

“That’s what I’d like to know!” I yelled back at her.

A headache hit me, though just a normal headache, as i realized how much brighter the room seemed now. I immediately turned off the lights without thinking, and i was able to see perfectly.

“This is weird,” I said, confusing Zoey.

“What’s so weird?” she asked, realizing I was talking about something other than the eyes.

“I can see in the dark...” I mumbled incredulously at my new ability.

“Okay, so you're apparently turning into Riddick- all you have to do is shave your head and you be awesome.” she said jokingly. I laughed.

“Yeah, and get a six pack and a sex change,” I added. “And then, all I’ll have to do is move to another galaxy!” We laughed for a second before it died out awkwardly at the severity of the situation. The room took on a darker aura.

“So what do we do?” I asked quietly.

“Well, we can't tell anybody, ‘cause the government will wanna experiment on you and shit like that.” she stated. For a second I thought she was joking, until I saw her oh-so-serious face.

“It’s not like I’m turning into a superhero or something! I don’t know what’s going on, but something is telling me it’s not good. Since when have evil looking red eyes been good, in ANY video game or show? NEVER! That’s when!” I yelled at her, terrifying her though not solely by my rant, but also, as the red tint returned, I could have assumed that my eyes were glowing as well. The headache had returned, but it was nowhere near as bad as when it had first come.

“What’s happening to me?” I nearly cried into my hands as I slid down the wall to the floor. Zoey turned on the light so she could see me and walked over to me. She hugged me in an attempt to cheer me up as I cried. When I looked up at her in thanks, she had inhaled sharply at seeing my red snake-eyes so close, but her face immediately turned sympathetic again.

“It’s okay, we’ll find some way to fix it...” she assured in my ear. I yawned in my crying and Zoey froze for a few seconds.

“What?” I asked as clearly through my tears as I could.

“I, uh, I think I found out what that weird transforming session thing gave you this time...” she said uneasily. I froze myself just in the fear of finding out what it was.

“... What?” I said regretfully, not really wanting to know the answer, but having no choice.

“You, um, you look like Jaws...” she whispered awkwardly with a hint of fear in her voice.

“I what?!?” I asked desperately as I scrambled up to the mirror again. As soon as I was close enough to see, I opened my mouth wide, only to nearly faint from the shock of it.

My teeth looked a bit like a cat’s or dog’s, with each and every tooth pointed sharply, and the canines slightly longer, looking like fangs. With the new additions to my face I looked like a demonic vampire thing. Feeling light headed, I gripped Zoey for some support.

“Please help me...” I started to cry into her shoulder. She hugged me and held me for a while listening to my pains. I don’t know how long it lasted, but somewhere along the line, I fell into the peaceful darkness of my dream world.

* * *

When my eyes fluttered open, pulling me from my heavenly nightmare, I walked drowsily to the bathroom, not yet remembering the day before’s unique events. I walked slowly up to the mirror and looked into it, starting to remember the weird transformations that had happened to me yesterday. However, when I looked into the mirror, I saw my face, normal as could be.

“It must have been a dream...” I hoped out loud, taking an extra hard look at my now normal eyes and normal teeth. I heard Zoey coming from her night’s rest in the same state of half-consciousness that I had been in only seconds before. She turned to me and yawned before greeting me.

“Hey,” she said drowsily before her eyes widened. “You’re back to normal!” she yelled, proving that the strange events had actually happened, and hugged me.

“Yeah,” I whispered, “I wonder how...” We walked to the kitchen and got ourselves some breakfast, both of us pondering the possibility of any of this really happening. We sat for a minute or two, eating our cereal in silence. Once I finished eating, I slowly got up.

“I’m gonna go take a shower,” I nearly whispered before walking back to the bathroom and turning on the shower. After getting undressed, I slowly stepped into the shower and just stood in the current of water for a few more minutes before deciding to actually wash myself.

Right as I was reaching for the soap, the headache and red tint returned. I bent over in pain and my whole body began tingling. The headache subsided along with the red tint, but the lighting blinded me once more. Realizing what the night vision meant, I immediately felt my teeth once more, confirming that they had changed back into fangs. I used the wall to pull myself up and got out of the shower.

After getting dried and dressed, I walked back into the kitchen, dimming the lights as I entered. Zoey immediately turned around to look at me, jumping back in surprise when she saw my eyes and teeth.

“What happened?” she said, walking up to comfort me. I took my hands off the side of the doorway that I had been leaning on to hug her, but she flinched back, eyes wide.

“What?” I asked in confusion. Had I done something?

“How-?” she stuttered, pointing to where my hand had been seconds before on the doorway. “How did you do that?” I looked to where she had been pointing at. My hand had imprinted in the wood, causing the wood to warp around the general area my hand had been. I looked at my hand and the imprint interchangeably for a few seconds.

“How-?” I repeated, turning around and walking back to the bathroom. The wall I had used to pull myself up had a large dent in it. “What-?” I couldn’t come up with a valid question. I reached for the doorknob, but when I grabbed it, it felt like I was grabbing a lump of clay, and my grip crushed it. Zoey and I gasped in unison when I realised what I had done. I ran back to my bedroom and sat on my bed.

“Wow...” It was all Zoey could say.

“I’m turning into a monster...” I groaned, placing my face into my hands. However, my face didn’t feel as soft as the metal doorknob did. Testing to see what other laws of physics this magic broke, I walked back to the bathroom and stepped on the scale. 316; my normal weight had been 120. Apparently I actually obtained the muscle, it wasn’t just magically monstrous strength, it was just that the muscle was extremely dense. I lifted up my shirt. There was a tiny six pack on my stomach, not the huge ones that made a girl look hideously buff, but a barely visible one, hidden in the center of my stomach. In curiosity, I also flexed my arms, which revealed that they also carried extremely dense but small muscles.

I walked back to Zoey, slightly confident of my own discovery, and sat on my bed again, which I realised this time had sunk much farther than usual at my added weight. I closed my eyes, wishing for an end to this pain and suffering. It was then that the same headache came back, and though my eyes were closed, I could have guessed it was the red tint again. However, when I opened my eyes to see my surroundings, I couldn’t see anything at all.

“What’s going on?” I asked desperately, trying to figure out where Zoey was. When I looked in a certain direction, I heard her gasp, so I faced that way. “Zoey, what’s going on?” I asked again, just as desperate.

“How should I know? Your eyes are dead white, like a zombie!” She yelled back, obvious fear in her voice. The headache got worse by the second, until I gripped my head in pain and actually started groaning from the ferocity of it. It was only seconds from then that I lost consciousness.

#insinct #writing