Black. Pitch-black. Darkness. It doesn’t matter what you call it; it is all you have ever known. You understand opposites, that there must be light to the darkness, but to you it is just like the fairy tales you once got told; the stories that you heard when you were actually loved by someone. But that was long ago. You might even say years ago, but you can never be sure because time doesn’t exist to you. Things like a clock or a watch are foreign, even a calendar is something you can’t comprehend. You were born into a life that was horrendous to the population, but it was normal for you. You always hoped for something better; you always knew that something lied outside of the realm of the constricting walls you were destined to live inside. You just never were aware how beautiful things were inches from where you lay every night.

You have no name, nothing to identify you as a human being. Perhaps after all you are nothing more than a shell; you have never felt anything but emptiness inside, or for the most part at least. There was a time you could faintly recall when someone made you feel something. When someone sparked emotion inside you and made you believe that you actually contained a soul, something more than the physical being you had. However, she left you long ago. It was your curse; no one could stay around for long. No one could love you. It didn’t matter who they were, even if it was your grandmother, who used to take care of you when you were a child. Your grandmother was the only reason for your existence. You did not know much, but this was apparent.

There was a door in the room where you had resided your whole life. It provided no escape, though. Mutterings held outside of the boundaries of your room were the only outside interaction you had, but it was no more than the drunken blabbering of the people who threw you into the room seven days after your birth. You recall the days when you would howl and weep, the too many times that you felt the warm, salty water fall down your face onto the dirt floor. The sound of the drops hitting the floor and echoing off the cement walls was your nightmare, if you can even say they are nightmares. You eventually learned your calls would be unanswered, and even still you could do nothing more to make known that you needed attention, to be cared for because you had no sense of taking care of yourself. This is why you felt so much solitude in your grandmother. She kept you from the shadows penetrating your mind incessantly telling you that you weren’t a human, that you need to just be gone of this world. The shadows that told you you didn’t deserve to live and never could escape another way.

“Why are you so quiet? This isn’t like you. What are you thinking about?”

You are startled by the voice that suddenly appears. Heart-racing to the point where you think it might explode and the shadows will have won, you realize that it is just your friend. You know he is just a figment of your imagination, but you have known him so long that he is real to you. He is the only thing you can depend on, the only one that you can communicate with because he is the only one left to listen.

“It’s nothing,” you reply, “just remembering that I had a life once. I know that there is something outside of these walls. I just never realized how badly I want to escape.”

“Well, how can you do that? This is your world, the world you have always known and always will. There is nothing outside these walls for you but hurt. I can’t be there for you out there; you will be defenseless. And, besides, that is just a dream. There is no way to escape, you know that. This is your reality.”

Distractedly, after a few moments, you respond. “I dream about it you know, the world outside. Just as I know there is light to this darkness there has to be a good to this bad. I don’t know what these things look like; I just know that they exist. I never really thought about it before. I had just accepted that this was the life that I had. I gave up when I lost that something inside that gave me meaning. But it’s like the barrier I put up in my mind to forget what I had lost is beginning to fade away. It’s like the walls are cracking and I need to get out or become victim to its crashing walls.”

“You make no sense. Why would you want to leave after all I have told you? You will get hurt out there without me. You don’t know anything but this room. You will die out there! Do you want to die? Is that your wish? Are you finally giving up to the shadows? After all you have been through? Leave me behind after I have been there for you at your darkest time? Of course, this is what I get in return for my kindness. You have no sense! I’m leaving until you retain some sense.”

In the blink of an eye, your friend disappears. You are alone once again. Disheartened by your argument, you push your back to the corner of the cold, damp wall and slide down, feeling the friction tear away at the back of your thread-like shirt as you go to sit. You think you might cry again, you want to. But you know that you haven’t been able to cry in a long time, that you weren’t able to produce tears anymore. As you sit there, you hear scuffling outside the door. Even though your parents are neglectful, at least they remember to feed you every few days.

“What are you waiting for? Come here! I don’t care if you eat, you can die really. It would be easier on all of us. I don’t understand why you are still living. No one loves you. Come here! The only reason we feed you is because we don’t want to go to jail again.”

This is your father, otherwise known as one of the shadows. His silhouette is all you know since the blinding light striking him from behind blocks your non-adjusting eyes. You barely have the energy to breathe after the dispute with your friend so you fall to the floor and slap your hands upon the dirt and urine soaked floor. There is no cleanliness here. Your loving parents forgot to install a toilet or at the very least a bucket. Then again they didn’t care, so why would they think of something like that? But it didn’t really matter; you had no sense of smell just like you had no sense of time. You slowly and agonizingly pull yourself to the door. You feel the burn of your would-be muscles from the strain of even moving. The searing pain is enough for one to want to die, but you have been through worse and endure through it.

Frustrated with your feeble and pity attempts, your father flings the tray to the floor and slams the door, disturbing the dirt particles mixed with your own wastes. You are forced to eat your food from the floor now, not that it makes any difference. You could barely call it food in the first place. Discouraged at your lack of strength, you see the shadows again. You couldn’t even manage to get yourself to the door for sustenance; how can you possibly let yourself live. It’s a never-ending battle. One you can’t hope to win, but are determined to postpone as long as you can. You still have your will to survive even for a life so tragic.

With hardship, you extend your hand out as your entire body parallels the floor until you feel your fingertips brush the soft and rotting peel of a banana. Or something that was once called a banana. You peel it with little ease and shove a quarter of it into your mouth, knowing that the only taste that remains is that of pure rot. A normal banana to you is all brown with freckles of black, something that attracts little flying creatures who want to share. You can tell from their ceaseless buzzing around you. But you have little to share with them and decide to investigate what other food you have been left.

A pizza crust with flecks of mold, a puddle of milk which appears to be moving, the peel of an orange, a piece of burnt toast so black it becomes invisible in the room, and some other scraps of items you deem as unknown. A rather gracious meal considering you heard your parents outside the door yelling at each other over who drank the last bottle of alcohol when even you knew it was the both of them a few minutes before your father arrived at the door.

You stash some food by the wall and crawl back to your favorite corner in the room, the one with a slight crack through it that allows you to see part of what awaits you on the other side and gives you hope that there is hope. It is your only way of knowing there is truly an escape for you. Then reality brings you back and you realize how empty the room has become without your friend. You’ve never argued before, and you worry that you may not see your friend for quite some time.

“Hello…” you call out helplessly, aware that there is the slimmest chance of a response. And there was none. Just the silence beating on you like a drum until the shadows came back.
Give up. There is no reason to live. Is this what you call life? Just end it already. You will save the world from such a poor excuse of a human being. You aren’t even a person. Kill yourself already. What are you waiting for?

The words come ceaselessly. Your head is pounding and throbbing. Cold sweat runs down your entire body. Your heart is thudding in your chest, your ribcage searing with pain. Your blood runs scorching through your veins. The words become your own; they no longer are on the outside but internally you begin to question why you live. It isn’t God’s choice. He doesn’t exist to you. If he did, then he wouldn’t have left you in a situation to die. Really, you knew it was going to end sometime, but you never knew that it could be like this.

You begin to tap your head against the wall to get rid of the voices invading your mind. Gradually the tapping gets more intense because the voices are relentless in their attacks. The wall in your mind and the solid form behind you start to crack.

Come back to me. I forgive you. You were right. I can’t do this without you. I can’t face the shadows alone. I’m sorry.

You continue to bang your head, desperate for your friend. You can’t do this alone. You never could. But now he is gone just like everyone else in your life. The shadows can sense your desperate feelings and fear and begin to more violently enact their assault upon your psyche.

You will lose. You can’t win. You always knew that you wouldn’t win. Kill yourself. Be gone of this world. Do it. Just do it. Now. Now. NOW! NOW! YOU LOSE!

“Go away!” you frantically scream out loud. “I don’t have to deal with you. I will survive. There is something out there for me. I will escape. I will. I will. I WILL!”

Covering your ears to block the sound, you persist in striking your head against the walls to lessen the reverberation of the shadows’ shrieks. You feel warm liquid slide down the nape of your neck and just as you feel the burning inside your veins, you are aware the blood is now on the outside like the voices. You continue to slam your head against the wall. The pain prevents you from succumbing to the shadows’ will. Although your eyes are closed tight, you begin to see something unusual to you. It is light. After a moment of confusion, you realize it is true light; light that comes from outside the room. Not the artificial light you were exposed to when your father opened the door to give you food, no, this was daylight. Wondrously, you open your eyes and the world is reveled to you. You are mesmerized. Everything glows, but your room remains dark, almost personifying your home as an evil entity. The shadows halt in their activities, almost stunned by the light. The light was their enemy, but for you it was your savior.

All of a sudden, you fall back and lay on foreign ground. So this is what grass is. You revel in the plush, green lawn and inhale the freshness. You finally discovered what time is and have your sense of smell back. Maybe there is hope for you yet, you begin to believe. You forget that your entire backside is stained with your own blood. More than stained, drenched.

“You proved me wrong, old friend.” You recognize your friend’s voice. “You didn’t need me after all.”

“I escaped,” you utter in disbelief. “I’m finally free. My dream has come true.”

“Well…” your friend replies. But you don’t hear the rest of his response. You slip into unconsciousness on the lawn of your backyard. The battle with the shadows has taken everything that you had left from you. The battle is over, you won. What happens now is on your terms, not the shadows’. You have succeeded. Against all odds, you are now free.

“You don’t need me anymore. You have found your serenity. I will miss you, but you are better off now. You were right; everything turns out well in the end. Goodbye, old friend.” With that, he walked away and you parted ways with everything you had ever encountered. No longer controlled by destiny, you now continue on the journey to your new life.