We Aren't Really Strangers

• Emily Krah, Grade 8, Karabar High School
• Short Story
• 2021

Excellence Award in the 'The Write Note 2021' competition

“I don’t need you” the girl said to the boy, “yes you do, just wait and see” the boy replied. I will always remember that conversation, we were 5 years old. As time passed over the years I finally came to terms with you and I decided to reach out. Only problem was, I didn’t know you. Nobody did. As I remembered that memory of us I still couldn’t figure out who you were, or most importantly, who I was. The sad truth was, I did need you, but you left too early. Reality hit at 10 years old. I went back to the park we were at that day, there was nothing but a faded memory.

At 12 years old it was more than a memory, it was a puzzle. Trying to figure out where you went and why you cared so much at 5 years old. Through yearbooks of searching and class photos I finally found you. Nothing was familiar about you, except the shirt you wore. I didn’t care about your name, age or friends, that shirt was special. As I went back to school I never realized you were in my class. I never realized you were there. Acting like strangers everyday but, we’re not really strangers.

As I asked my classmates about you, no one seemed to know who you were. I asked my mum and she looked at me in a sad way. That next day I was taken out of school and to a hospital where they did tests on me. After four days of tests and questions they told me he didn’t exist. He was imaginary. The person I loved the most wasn’t real. But he was. The day after being released from the hospital my mum took me to a place. It was dark with stones coming out of the ground. She led me to a stone. There was a shirt on the ground. It was his shirt. It was his name. I look down on the grave and realise something. As tears fall down my face I say one last sentence before letting go, “I need you”.