Fiction: Group 3
broken plastic tubes and most importantly – blood. I was drowning in my despair, and this time no one was
there to rescue me. “Please” I begged, but there was only silence. I stood up, my body weak but my
memories strong. I wanted to open the blue door in front of me, and beg for help. But I just stayed still,
letting the clockworks of life function.
I waited, and soon enough a young man came, his eyes full of pity and hatred. He helped me up and told
me that I could leave within a few hours. The man didn’t wait for a reply, after seeing me in my condition
he had fled, writing down a note saying
medication: 3 hours of therapy for at least one month
. I was unsure
of how to respond, my voice cracked and before I knew it the young man had returned to collect me after
helping me up and driven to the outskirts of my old village.
Before departing the outskirts of what was left of the village, I was handed the note written only hours
before. My strides were shaky, each inhale slowly becoming harder – whether from the anxiety or air, I was
unsure. As I got closer to my house I could hear cars and construction, smell oil and metal machinery, but
even worse… as I appeared at the remains of my house, the peace was gone. All I could see around me was
tall buildings, so dense and dull I wondered how life could sustain in such a cold environment. Falling to my
knees, hands covering my muffled screams. I was in a coma, they never told me what had happened to the
outside world.
They. Never. Told. Me. What. Had. Happened. To. The. Outside. World.
They had never told me that there was pollution so thick that it covered nature but not the concrete, they
never told me that the water no longer reflected lights of all colours. But I was never told that I can no
longer look up at the sky, I was never told that there was no compass blue sky or that the clouds were not
pearly white anymore, or the fact that the sun no longer shone on my face. I pulled myself back together
and sprinted down the rice field, the once clammy grass now dry like splinters of wood.
I had stopped so abruptly that the air braced itself from my impact, before my legs could think, my tongue
did. Screaming out at the sky, walking up to the water and bashing my hands, cursing the river for what it
had done to me, my sanity slowly drifting away. The veins on my arms throbbing and the city stilled, but I
didn’t care. I never would.
Slowly reaching out to my pocket on my skirt, grabbing the note written by the man, I opened it. A phone
number was written in bold font underneath the advice, without even having to look at the number twice, I
had memorized it. It was my brothers phone number that he had always wanted; I knew the code he had
told me. If anyone is hurt we will take a job to help and never change number, racing out of the water
before me, I headed towards the city. Wet and shivering, but determined to reach a phone box. I entered a
phone booth and called the hotline, my brother’s voice answered, it was deeper, but still his.
I didn’t even have to talk because he knew it was me and told me where his office was and that he was free
to listen. So I ended the call and after hours, arrived at his office. My appearance scared those and my
curiosity causing them to pity me. Knocking on the glass door, I saw a face, my brothers and as he
welcomed me in, we both stood crying and accepting each other’s company. Not caring about the outside
world for those few minutes I would forever cherish.
Entering his office he motioned for us to sit, and I had practiced this with him when he was twelve and I
only seven years old. But now was not a game, and as I answered his question, he truly knew that I was
gone for.
For when I look up at the sky, there are no longer lights of all colours.
