Fear

• Evan Galilee, Grade 4
• Short Story
• 2016

The wave of power came upon me. Fear racked my body. I shook with rage, brought on with realisation. Fury was replaced with anxiety. Worry curdled my stomach like sour milk. I had that feeling that something bad was going to happen… and it did.

I walked through the jungle. I adored the emerald green leaves brushing softly against my skin. Sap seeped out of the leaves onto my arm. The sap that smelt like poison. THWACK! I chopped at another branch.

I was trudging through the dense jungle, straining my eyes to make out the small figure in the distance. I saw a glimmer of light through the bushland. I needed to make it to that place. I needed to get there quickly. I needed to stop the chase. I needed to stop the chase for the young boy that walks the streets unknown.

I ran towards the temple. When I arrived I saw a plaque. It read ‘Your parents are dead.’ Tears streamed down my face as flashbacks flew through my head. The day. The crash. The call. The death. I knew something was going to happen. Something crazy. Unbearable. And most of all... Dangerous.

The last thing I remembered was getting pulled up by a fishing net, waking up, spluttering and rubbing my eyes. I was in some strange place. I got up, then stumbled back. Dizzy, I walked to a rusty old cabin and cautiously opened the half-fallen-off door. My vision was slowly coming back to me. What before looked like a cabin now was a long corridor. I strained my eyes to see if anything was behind the darkness. There wasn’t.

Click! What was that? I was locked in darkness. Black. That's all I could see. Fear went through my brain. Then my throat was scratchy. I lifted my hand up and shook the dust away. My eyes adjusted to the darkness. I shuffled over to the door, realising that it wasn’t locked at all. I opened it up and saw the dark corridor. I screamed for help. I saw a silhouette of feet. The door opened. I saw myself with my family. I wanted to go there so I jumped. I jumped into... darkness.

I felt the whoosh of the air on my face as I fell into the deep darkness below. I couldn't see where it led to. I wanted something to give myself a name. A name that people would recognise but surely I couldn't survive this fall. It was at least two hundred storeys. How would I do it?

Crack! I felt excruciating pain in my left leg as it hit the hard, concrete ground. I looked around for help. What’s going to happen? Will my time be gone? I pushed the thought out of my head. I needed someone. Someone like my parents. And there it was. My mother. Surely it was a ghost? Then mother started to wrap up my leg in thick bandages that she used to use for me at school.