Personal Narrative: Counting Sake: Rude Awakening

As my fifteen-year-old roommate falls to pieces, panic rises in my chest like a leaping flame. She lets out muffled screams and chilling sobs as she buries her face against the pillow. I kneel beside her and whisper reassurances. “You’ll be okay.” “No one will hurt you.” I pray she hears me but I know she doesn’t. She is trapped somewhere else - somewhere she revisits every day, like a bad song stuck in her head for life.

Selene looks around the dark Badr, the place she’s always called home. With it’s dark purple grass, navy blue circle buildings, and the glowing yellow wall surrounding Badr, the setting made Selene shiver. But sometimes, well most of the time, she’s wondered was there a place with sunlight, was there a place where it’s wasn’t always night? She would ask her two friends Molly and Marry the twins, but they would call her crazy. So Selene would just stargaze and think, wonder, and hope. Without any siblings and since her parents were divorced Selene did that a lot … just lay on the soft grass and stargaze, feeling a cool breeze come through. Alone by herself just the way she liked it, with no one around with in miles. To Selene it was perfect. ZZZZZZZ

The soft wind raps gently on the window, itching to taunt me. I scowl. The room is stuffy and the air is laced with the scent of bleach, a sterility too clean for a damaged place like this. Four, blindingly white walls trap me in an alabaster prison. These four walls remain, calm, stable when no one else has. When my mother and my friends have abandoned me because they’re scared of me. Everything has seeped away, everything I ever loved. These walls are all I have left. A symbol of what I have become. Empty.

A morbid melancholy stole over me. Anxiety gnawed at my heart. I was a living corpse. There was a feeling of chill in the air every day as I felt. I faked illness so as not to go to school. Despair hangs heavy in the stifling air. It was a dreary day for me , cold and without sunshine. I dread people and always avoid people. The door was locked from the inside. A cold grey light crept under the curtains. The windows were secured with locks and bars. The room felt cold and sterile.The flowers faded for want of water. A single lamp was suspended from the ceiling. The clock ticked louder and louder in a quiet room. I regarded the room as a refuge from the outside

Which seemed crazy because she was just a girl in a dream. I didn’t even know what she looked like. I had been having the dream for months, but in all that time I had never seen her face, or I couldn’t remember it. All I knew was that I had the same sick feeling inside every time I lost her. She slipped through my fingers, and my stomach dropped right out of me—the way you feel when you’re on a roller coaster and the car takes a big drop.

The rushing wind blows a scent of sea salt across my body, tickling my nose and awakening my senses. Slowly my eyes open to absorb the beauty of the morning sky, which is delicately speckled with poignant white cotton balls. A loud snore can be heard from the main room of the apartment, while the stilled breathing of my brother drones on. Carefully, I crawl out from my bed exiting the guest room and making my way slowly across the tiny apartment. My entire family lays across the main floor in a tangled mess of inflated beds and plush blankets. I traverse the maze with a multitude of leaps and bounds until I make contact with the porch door; which I slide through with relief. Standing within the square enclosure the turquoise tinted water greets me with beauty and graciousness. Even from the

A single beam of light shone thru the curtain. The specs of dust in the room danced between the rays, whisked into the air by the pleasant breeze tip toeing thru the screen door. I could feel the warmth on my cheek as I rose from the sheets, thoroughly rested. I briskly got ready, slipping on my tennis shoes, old and worn. Stepping outside, I was greeted by the painfully sweet aroma of sweet pea flowers, entranced by the blissful gleams of sunlight, and spellbound by the familiar screeching of parrots, flocking in clouds of bright vermilion.

I took a deep breath as I walked through the doorway. The door was stuck open, hanging on just one of its hinges. It was clear that no one had been near this place in a long time. As I entered, a stench hit me. It smelt sickly sweet, almost like rotten fairy floss. I looked around the room at the faded and ripped wallpaper, and the broken furniture. The air was so thick with dust it was almost impossible to breathe, and everything was thickly covered with dust. The little light there was came from the cracks in the yellowed blinds.

The car suddenly stopped and jolted me from my sleep. Disoriented, I looked around and tried to make sense of where I was and what I was doing. Over to my left, I saw my sister doing the same. Tall, blue, connected houses surrounded us and we were parked in the middle of a pristine parking lot. Green, luscious lawns sat in front of those blue houses. A gigantic tree surrounded by beautiful multicolored flowers sat to the left of a dumpster and a wooden sign with white script on it. “The Pointe at Stoneview,” I read to myself.

When she opens her eyes, she sees the ceiling above her; tries to count as many dots as she can in an attempt to calm herself down. However, the dream remains, stubborn and relentless. It feels like a splinter, unwilling to leave, and she bites on the back of her teeth and squeezes her eyes shut in a pathetic attempt to stop herself from crying.

It was a cool September evening and my mom was driving me from Los Angeles all the way to Johannesville. As we drove on quiet, deserted roads I stared out the passenger’s window and saw nothing but hills with tall, dry, golden-brown grasses. It certainly wasn’t anything like what you’d see in pictures of beautiful landscapes but it wasn’t too bad either, I actually kind of liked it. Looking at those golden hills rush past my window somehow relaxed me and sent me into a staring trance, my mind traveled to other-worldly places where I could let my imagination run wild.

A headache and too many cords was what she woke up to. The beeping on the machines that surrounded her left a ringing noise in her ears. She looked over to the over beds to see other kids around her age; she looked at some of the girls and thought that they were drop dead gorgeous and wondered why

Silent. At the edge of the sky there was a magnificent white patch, a turning page, catching the sun. The rest was ivory grey, with a subtle hint of mauve, just enough to announce the coming sunset. Scanning the horizon were the white cotton balls on cerulean satin, with a subtle layer of dove grey underneath, which was thin enough to let the light through. Stood there like a ghost, a silent observer of the venerable castle, and the clouds. The colossal mountains were shielding the inferior castle. Beyond the towering mountains was a decrepit, venerable and ancient castle like structure. The azure roof was coated and concealed by the thick opaque dust. The roof was as dusty as an abandoned warehouse floor. It was an elderly going paler as it got older and ancient. As I nonchalantly walked up the moaning narrow staircase, a thick mist of cold crisp air blew through me, rustling my hair and sending a chill down my spine.

A chilled breeze caused my hair to stand up on end, so I peek over my shoulder to see the window in my bedroom door open. The blue, polka-dotted whipped around violently but I couldn 't hear the sounds of a strong wind. Huh, could have sworn I 'd closed that. . . I spring to my feet and shiver as I step across the cold floor toward my room. On my tip-toes, I pull the screen down to shut it and take a minute to stare out the window. The moon cast a dim light over the small town, illuminating only the fronts of houses and the tip of trees, abandoning all else to darkness. A light fog danced in the distance and I smiled thinking how perfect it looked on Halloween 's night. I looked down from the top floor one last time then tugged the curtains shut.

It was three o’clock in the morning. Outside the window, the sky was still dark. There were barely any stars in the sky, and no cloud cluttered. The sky was painfully dark and motionless. Except for the faint light from the moon, everything seems lifeless. In a dark room, there was a girl sitting up on the bed, leaning on the wall beside her. She was looking out the window. Through the window, the girl can see the sky and the top of some buildings, however, nothing special or attractive. But, the girl has been staring at it for almost an hour now, silently and peacefully.