How to Save a Life

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My name is Hayden Maxwell and I was born around 1857, in England under the rule of Queen Victory. So that makes me about 152 year’s old give or take. I am not a vampire as many would think; my heart beats, my blood flows, I breathe, eat, sleep, feel pain, and even sustain injuries from time to time. But no, I can not die. You see when I was 19 years old I was sort of a lousy excuse for a human being. And there was this girl, Jillian Reemison. She was beautiful, wild, and rich. She would always flirt with the boys around the village, teasing them. Then one night after having a few to many drinks with some friends and being teased all night by Jillian my best pal Clark decided he had had enough of it. While Jillian walked home that night Clark and his gang (me included) cornered Jillian. I won’t go into details about what had happened but I will say that I had no part of it! But I did nothing to stop it; Jillian died that night. Unfortunately Jillian’s grandmother dabbled in the dark arts and put a curse on all those who had touched her that night; Clark and the 3 others that had been with us that night all mysteriously died that year. I however had not touched Jillian but her grandmother still knew I had been there and done nothing to help. She came to me one night in a dream and informed me of the curse she had put over my head.

“You Hayden Maxwell are just as bad as thee others!” she had yelled at me in the dream. “You will not entire the gates of heaven until you have repaid your sin! 200 lives! You must save 200 lives before you can move on and take you place in heaven; 200 no more, no less.”

Now when I had woken from my dream I had thought I just that, a dream. But as my years passed the guilt of what I had done, or hadn’t done, stayed with me as did my youth. When I had turned 25 and still had not aged a single year only then did I take the dream seriously. That old hag of a witch had cursed me! At first I rebelled against the curse and tried to kill myself; numerous times and in numerous ways. I had put a gun to my head but every time I pulled the trigger nothing would happen; every time I tried to hang myself the rope snapped and I landed on my ass. I had even used a guillotine once and as the blade crashed down on my neck it cracked into a million pieces. When I tried starving myself it only made me weak but I would never actually die. After two years of suicide attempts I finally decided that there was only one way out of this life and I have been working towards that goal ever since. 191 lives I have saved now and only 9 more to go!