Lost

• Nathan Boyce, Grade 11, Francis Greenway High School
• Short Story
• 2014

Excellence Award in the 'The Text Generation 2014' competition

It’s funny how everyone seems to hate not being able to sleep at night. As they all toss and turn and groan and mutter, I lay here dreading the day that is to come, praying that it will never arrive. The terrors that it will bring are almost too much to bear. As I lay, I calculate and hypothesise what my every move will be, hoping without faith that everything will go to plan. Every night I face the same torturous journey, battling my way through my thoughts in order to find peace.

The full moon’s light fights its way through my dust covered window and casts shadows all around the room. I picture those shadows coming to life and grabbing me, pulling me into their two dimensional world. A world with no emotions, no commitment and especially, no expectations. A world I want to be mine.

I turn to my side causing numerous textbooks to cascade down my blanket and fall to the floor below. History, Maths, Science- every one of them compiled of up to 1000 pages. I find it amusing that we are taught how to use Pythagoras’ Theorem to find the unknown length of a side or how to determine the percentage composition of a Copper Sulphate/Copper Oxide mixture and yet there is not one single class to teach us how to survive out in the real world.
I guess it’s because no one can help you with that.

I sit up, convinced that sleep will never find me, and grab the notepad and pen that sits on my bedside table. I find a page that isn’t filled with ink and begin to write:

Alone I sit yet once again
With nothing but my pad and pen
As the night turns into day
Alone I sit, alone I pray

I watch the ink flow from my pen as I empty my brain onto the paper and it calms me. It paralyses my thoughts which gives me a chance to breathe, if only for a second. I lie back down and close my eyes, trying to find a comfortable position. All I can think to myself as I fall into darkness is that I really don’t want tomorrow to come.