In what used to be desolate hallways, kids swarm and jostle about as their classroom doors open like floodgates. I walk forward, feet dragging like a fly swimming through honey, toward my narrow locker as my mind recounts the events. My stomach churns and my eyes are a cloudy day waiting to rain. Face flushed, yet seemingly cool, I slowly wedge through the crowd. I clutch my binders closely to my chest, as they are the only stable objects I can rely on.

It’s the end of the day and I can’t wait to somewhere safe with someone holding me close while lulling in my ear, “You will be okay.” But I know that will never happen. Peers careen around me like the winds of hurricanes, but with flaming attitudes of volcanoes. They were all rushing to get to the same place, the airport. But not me. I know who I am and this is not my place. Only one child was selected to stay behind. Stay to live and grow or to stay and die cold and alone. No one knows.

The last person fleets the hallway, and I am alone with my echoing thoughts. There were no goodbyes, good lucks, or I’ll miss you’s.

“Cowards!” I yell, my voice reverberating off the marble walls and floors. They are horrified of me, the monster who stayed. My eyes start to rain and I slam my books at my feet as I undo my lock. To my right, an old poster falls to the ground as if to signify the fall of my school. As it falls dust flitters up and poufs out in a way that only can be described as a miniature explosion.

Finally, I pull my cracked lock out of its jam and lay it to rest next to my binders. When I look up, a small folded paper is teetering on the edge of my shelf. My arm stretches out and I pull it down.


I love you, I always have. ~K



Thrill rushes through my veins but immediately reverts back to a sullen choked scream. K. The only person who made me forget my horrible past. K. The person who kept me as a back-pocket friend. K. The one who didn’t have the chance to say goodbye. K.

I shove the note in my pocket like a pelican shoves a fish down its throat. I feel the eyes. I put my binders to rest forever in my locker. They’re burning holes.

Funny how people enforce children to go to school when in the end they end up not needing the knowledge because they are alone in a concrete jungle fighting for their life. I chuckle a little, my once tight lips let loose. Then it’s a full on hysterical outbreak. The eyes probably think I’m delirious. Oh and I am, until the gunshot. It collides into my arm like an unstable skateboarder crashes into the black top.

Crimson blood seeps through my favorite shirt. The eyes. The eyes. Watching, smiling, laughing at my pain. The eyes. The eyes. I tumble backward, and slam my head into something soft and cold. I spin my body to find K behind me with a blank stare. Behind him are Leila, Jane, Mom, Dad, Ky and everyone I know. Gone, perished into a hopefully kind yellow light at the end of a tunnel. Each of their shirts has a note that is meant for me to find. On K’s shirt is a note that says, love is no more. Leila and Jane have notes on their shirts that say, forever gone. Mom and Dad have notes that read, we failed.

What was going on? Tears prick my eyes. I run up and down reading each persons shirt sniffing their scent one last time.

The eyes are following me, but they are not really there. Soon I am sucked up into their icy shallowness into an inescapable world of misery and secrecy where I feel nothing but confidant.