You Only Have So Long

• Parthena Fanous, Grade 9
• Short Story
• 2015

One single room holds hundreds, possibly thousands of different memories. Those filled with joy and laughter, and those with sobering truths. A room that has been filled to the brim with tears. Tears of complete and utter joy, and tears of the utmost sadness and heartbreak. A room that has survived many tantrums some of which were so severe, that others jokingly mistake them for a zombie apocalypse. A room where the greatest amounts of suspense and pure shock humanly possible has been felt.

The harsh tiles make you bounce back and forth from foot to foot, forcing you to stand on the tips of your toes. But for those smart enough to wear shoes, the annoying clacking of heels against the snow white tiles irritates you to no end, leaving you with the worst headache imaginable within the time span of sixty seconds.

I remember sitting in that very room when I received a simple text message, one that changed hundreds of lives. All I really remember is sitting with my best friend, alone in that room, laughing at the stupidest of things, watching as she flicked her ridiculously frizzy hair out of her face and clipped it up in a bun, only for it to fall out seconds later. Our phones rang simultaneously, and I chuckled as her head snapped to the door at the sound of my ringtone.

Together we pulled out our phones, ready to ignore the generic message that had been sent out until we realised what it said. I slumped into an uncomfortable chair, a chair so cramped that it could of been used as a medieval torture device, but in that moment, the pain was comforting, a distraction. For a brief second, it was silent, as though the world had stopped moving just because she stopped breathing, but that was just the calm before the storm. A loud heartbreaking scream pierced the silent night.

I jumped to my feet, running towards the door. In a flash, I yanked the door open and pulled her into my arms. Letting the silent tears roll down my face as she sobbed into my arms, sobbing because it wasn't her time to go. But sadly, that wasn't our choice to make. As we stood there in the middle of the hallway, leaning onto each other for support, others came and wrapped their arms around us.

I soon began to feel like the arms around me were no longer comforting me, but that they were trapping me, suffocating me. Looking around frantically, I searched for an escape, scratching my arms and neck until I finally calculated my escape route and ran to the door, but never actually leaving the room. As the clock in the top right corner of the room kept ticking, I realised that life will never wait for you to catch up. Life keeps on moving on, it's your job to make sure that you keep up. You only have so long to live.