It was a cold September morning when I woke up. It was time for school to start again. I got all of my things packed and headed off to school. The bus was on time and ready to pick me up. I had absolutely no idea would what happen to me this year. And boy was I in for a surprise.

So when I arrived at school I saw my friends from last year. We hung out for a while and went to our classes. By the time lunch came around I was getting bored and missed summer. But I finished the school day and came home later that afternoon. At home my parents ask how school was, I replied “boring like always”. So I watch TV and went to sleep later that night.

Well about three months into the school year something strange happened. I started to notice that everyone was suddenly getting sick. So I figured it was probably just a little flue going around. I mean it was December and it was kind of cold so I thought some people had the cold. Until I noticed a month later everybody that was disappearing wasn’t coming back to school. So I thought that I would do a little research in on this.

Later in the week I went to the computer lab to check and see what might have happened. Did everyone move at the same time? Did they have a field trip I didn’t know about? All of these questions were popping into my head and I had no idea what to think. So I went to the school website and typed in all of the names of the people who were disappearing. The school had no record of them currently attending the school. At first I thought that it might just be the school website messing up, but then I tried my name. Everything seemed to come up and be working fine.

So I started asking around. I asked the teachers and they did not reply. Then I asked my friends (who had not left the school). “Hey guys what has been happening to everyone lately”. They did not know what was going on either, but they did not seem to care. So I continued my research to find out what was going on. I checked local police stations to see what happened. Then I was watching the news late Saturday night. They said that a disease had started to spread. They have not yet exactly determined where the disease came from, but they say that it has started to spread in the Portland metro area. People said to stay away from bacteria and to be careful about where their families go. I didn’t know what to do.

That following Monday the school bus was not there to pick me up. I figured it was late so I asked my mom if I could get a ride. Just as we were about to leave the school called informing us that the school would be canceled until the spreading disease is under control. I thought YES! Early summer break for us. But then I thought about it. What if my family is infected with this disease? What if I get it? I was very worried about the millions of possible outcomes to my situation.

So I immediately went to my parents. I begged them to move across the country. I did not want to take any chances on anything happening to us. They insisted that we stay and said everything would be fine. I didn’t believe that. I instinctively thought about leaving to go to a new place but I couldn’t leave my family. So instead I stayed, and I learned the hard way that you should follow your instinct.