Paralysed

• Lyla Perkin, Grade 8
• Short Story
• 2018

I’m on edge. Perpetual beeping echoes in my ears, beginning to get on my nerves. A young man wearing a pale blue uniform treads cautiously over to me. I rise hastily from the hospital waiting seat. Collapsing from exhaustion in a huddle on the floor, I start to sob. Hot, salty tears run down my face and I let what remains of my composure disappear. I haul my body off the floor, back into the scratchy seat and sit there, paralysed with melancholy hopelessness. His intense look of anguish says it all. “I’m sorry, Madam, your son has passed away.”