Daisy Robins was born to be a mother, just as David Parker was born to be a father. Of course everyone thought it was a smart match when they were married after David finished his business degree and Daisy finished beauty school.

It was two years before they started trying for children and another year before the doctor suggested fertility drugs. Ten months later, Daisy gave birth to four boys; Esben, Elston, Edan, and Ephram.

They were good boys that liked to watch Flying House and Super Book, except for Edan who never liked watching TV. They all loved to play catch outside in the yard with their Daddy, except for Edan who always refused after he’d been hit in the face with the ball. They would all pile on the couch with their dad and watch sports; hockey, soccer, football, basketball, and others, except for Edan who would be in the kitchen with his mother.

Daisy and David never understood why Edan acted the way he did so they just attributed it to the fact that he was just unique.

Edan would spend hours staring in the mirror, trying to pick out differences between himself and his brothers, but in a rare anomaly, they all looked exactly alike despite being fraternal.

At age eight, Edan was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. He was put on medication, too many pills that were switched too many times with side affects that were worse than his actual symptoms. He began having stress fits at age ten so they tried to give him an outlet, but that didn’t work very well. Sport after sport was rejected, as was writing or art. Music, however, he fell in love with. He started on the violin and excelled quickly, then started to play the piano as well. It was guitar that stole his heart.

He would listen to anything, Nirvana, the Sex Pistols, Smashing Pumpkins, Black Sabbath and anything else he could get his hands on. Hours would be spent working on fingerings, learning cords and stretching his limits. He would learn entire albums and move onto to the next. His grades were instantly mediocre, caring more about his guitar than math or reading.

The guitar was taken away.

He started eating too much and gaining weight, putting it on quickly. They didn’t notice when he started losing weight because of bulimia. That was when the cutting started.

His first suicide attempt was the day before his first day of eighth grade. He tried to hang himself in the closet with a belt. The second was a little before Thanksgiving. He sliced his wrist so baldy his hand needed to be rehabilitated. The third and final attempt was New Year’s Eve his freshman year in high school. He had a stomach full of aspirin. He was sent to away to the Saint Catherine Asylum for Mentally Unstable Youth.

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