[ WP ] You have developed and ability to see how people will die when you look at them . Your entire life you avoided pictures of yourself , but today you forgot , and , brushing your teeth in the morning , looked in the mirror ...

It ’ s surprisingly easy to fake a disability. Fake might not be the best word, though. My eyes work fine, but sometimes I walk around with a stick and a dog. Artificially self-imposed blindness. Imagine the mutilation I have to see every time I want a sandwich, or a beer at the pub. Anyways, people are nicer to you when they think you're blind. I *wish* I was actually blind, or better yet, that people walked around with bags over their head to spare me the horror. A sea of ancient faces, blue asphyxiated faces, sometimes no faces at all. Lifeless eyes, colorless lips speaking to me as if everything was okay. Everything is okay, really, but I see the inevitable end every time some asks me for the time, or tells me to have a nice day. 
 
 I got very good at avoiding mirrors. No reason to go down that path with myself. Not much I could do about it even if I did realize my own fate. 
 
 Sometimes I just saw people the way they looked at their eventual moment of death. Sometimes it came with a flash, a bit of story. All in all depressing crap. It ’ s hard to make life fun. I would be a real buzz kill if I had to deal with that for my own demise. I suppose I could just accept it. Maybe after a while I would become numb to the concept of death, seeing it in every face all the time, but at that point I might as well be a sociopath. I had decided that self-imposed blindness is better a long time ago. I just do n't have the heart for it. 
 
 There ’ s even support groups for blind people. What few friends I have, I ’ ve found there. 
 
 I knew it would eventually happen, seeing my own reflection. Somewhere in the back of my mind. It was amazing that I went as long as I did without encountering it even once. Years and years. When it finally happened, I rolled out of bed and came face to face with myself in the reflection of a big, potted plant. I did n't own a mirror, but someone had dropped off the pot and i had never thought about the implications of its reflective surface. There I was, staring into my own soul, caught off guard, mostly asleep, and it ruined everything. 
 
 A bullet-hole just above my right eye. 
 
 Once I encountered it, there was no point in shying away. I studied it for a long time. A goddamned bullet hole. Judging by the angle, it came from behind, a pistol shot at close range. 
 
 For the first time in a long time, I felt a surge of please. A gunshot to the head. Not such a bad way to go at all. It occurred to me that there was no way I could even attempt to prevent this particular for of death. If I saw myself choking, it would ruin every meal for the rest of my life. I ’ d have to chew every bite with excruciating care and I would still choke to death. I wouldn ’ t be able to eat another pretzel for as long as I lived. If I saw myself in a car accident, every trip anywhere would come along with an anxiety attack. A bullet to the back of the head. It come at any time, in any place. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe that the ripe old age of eighty. A victim of a brutal home invasion. Maybe I would get involved with the mob and they would bury me in a swamp. It woulnd ’ t matter. Relief washed over me. 
 
 I decided to for a walk. I paused at the door. I took the sunglasses off. I decided to take my chances.
