A Desperate Billionaire

• Sophie Reece, Grade 7
• Short Story
• 2022

“Are you ready?”
Quentin takes a deep breath, and then presses his monstrous helmet into place.
“More than I’ll ever be.” He says through his radio, trusting the faulty, crackling reception to hide the tremor in his voice.
The countdown begins, and the enormity of his decision hits Quentin. This is his chance to escape the melancholy lifestyle that has trapped him for so many years! His choice had been painful, painstaking, final. Would this really save him from the tangled web that had been his life? It is too late to ask questions.
The rocket gives a gargantuan shudder, and is engulfed in clouds of billowing smoke as it propels itself into the air. All noise is dulled to the intrepid astronaut, so small inside his puffy white space suit, so small as he says goodbye to his planet, eyes closed, fists clenched. So small in everyone’s mind but his own.
Bits of shrapnel ricochet off the outside of the spaceship, and a cacophony of metallic notes reverberates around the cavern that encloses Quentin. He stares stoically out the window, watching the asteroids flash past, bits of light on a gloomy, dark, background.
‘This is what I wanted,’ He reminds himself, ‘I chose this.’
Chose to escape the polite, fanciful company of conspiring colleagues. Chose to free himself from the sinful feeling of failure. Many would shake their heads at the successful businessman sending himself to space, abroad on the most exotic vacation that money could buy. An extraordinary billionaire, encased in gold and jewels and left to rot on the inside.
Quentin, who had been blinded by his own ideals and deaf to everyone’s thoughts but his own, quickly became a social pariah.
Romantic and platonic relationships alike left him quivering with rejection, and nights ended with Quentin red faced and laughing at his own joke to an audience of awkward, unwilling bystanders. Even his most pragmatic friends refused to be clement when he began his long soliloquies about immortality and extraterrestrial life, and every time he voiced his premonitions he was accused of being a clairvoyant. He had been intoxicated; drunk on his power, and was forced to accept that his status was why people spoke to him.
This realisation provoked an instantaneous decision: Quentin Wiles would go to space. He couldn’t live here any longer, couldn’t face the people that despised him and his money.
And now, strapped into his metal seat, leaning against the cold window of the rocket, Quentin couldn’t help but smile. This was a gift.
But gifts never last long, and Quentin’s smile turns sad as he remembers his request to the scientists back on Earth. His desire was to end it all, and he knows that he will never see Earth again.