
yawning I spinthe dial of my metal cabinet three times in oppositedirections the click of the handle vibrates in myears students filing down the crowded passage talking andlaughing they pass me by the people I grew up with something snapsin my mind only one more year? can that be all that's left ofthis first era in my life? I try to shake the idea from myhead willing myself to deny the simple truth as persistentmemories flood my mind childhood games: capture the flag, TV tagand make-believe hundreds of hour-long bus rides churchsleepovers: toilet-papering houses and Chinese firedrills someone's voice brings me back to reality green eyesstaring up at me young and naive to the world she asks fordirections and I smile ready to instill in her the answers to theweb everything I've learned in four brief years I want to warn herto cherish the time she has because it will fly by not to rushlove because it will find her nothing's as it seems and it's notmeant to be make the best of things because they won'tchange don't chase popularity but don't be afraid to try somethingnew be yourself and HAVE FUN but that isn't even thebeginning so I shake my head and direct her to class concludingthere's no way to avoid the inevitable reliving my childhood only inmy memories how can it already be gone? so short was the life Ilived as a teenager soon I will be hurled into the adult world tolive on my own, and deal with hardships forced to grow up toofast the destiny of childhood awaits
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