Notes

Diego Deleon-Michel
English 7G
7 january 2020


Crumbling Sun


It was midnight on a Sunday when I noticed that I was starting to feel weak. Although that usually happens I was still not used to the sensation of feeling so weak. The old lady next door always gave us at least enough food for us too survive but six months ago she passed away in her sleep leaving us with 2 cats and no money, food or water. Fortunately we gave the cats away to someone who could take care of them although they were very hard to find. The old lady was kind and forgiving and never asked for anything of us and she had been saving enough money to survive when she's old since she was 13. We lived on the outskirts of town so we got the least of the noise . But its was still the same as everyone else. Although we were very fortunate to have any place at all. I thought to myself most of the time that if i were to live on like this i would have a need for other necessities besides food and water and waste my money but it never seemed to happen. I looked up at the sky hoping that i could see the moon tonight but as always it was covered in clouds as if it was hiding it's pity for our poor conditions.
3:00 pm the next morning I got up and looked at the broken mini fridge that i found out on the street somewhere, but we had no plug to be seen. I grabbed our last apple from the fridge it was almost completely rotten, sad and gloomy. And at 4pm i went out and said goodbye to my mother who suddenly turned from a depressed frown too an almost forced smile with bags under her eyes and nearly bony figure and waved goodbye like we would never see each other again. I had gone an hour too the broken bridge where me and my friends used to play when we were little, and crossed it exactly like I usually do. The bridge looked saggy and when I didn't expect it, it tilted and turned over a 20x40 foot ravine almost begging for me too fall. When I crossed it I got to the bus stop 30 minutes after and waited on a three hour, 30 minute ride getting too town at 8:30 AM and running so fast that i get too my job that's a 40 minute walk exactly on time not wasting a second and I get to work
I get out of work at 6PM and take the late bus that goes faster than the early one without any stops. I get off at the station only to meet up with my friends as we walk home from work. Amile which is pronounced “ameel” was left without parents at a very young age after they died of starvation when he met an old man who was from america. He took him in and gave him the name Amile. He said he was there for an experiment to observe poorer countries and was leaving in april too head to his last stop. My other friend is a girl named Rafia and she's Amile’s distant cousin who took him in after the old man left. She's a little spacey but she's still one of the most active people I've met. Amile showed me a scar he got for falling into one of the machines but by raw luck he made it without his arm being cut off. And of course Rafia was talking our ears to death about how they should “improve the conditions in our lives!” and how she has “a dream to one day go to a better place like america!” or some weird stuff like that. By the time we got to the halfway point I had been feeling terrible and sick, hot and cold, hot and cold my whole figure had been looking droopy and my vision was fading and blurry i had been dragging my feet behind the two of them trying to call out but my voice wouldn't move because of the nausea. They started to split up into four, six, no ten! I was about to drop on the ground when suddenly I woke up in a mattress with a splitting headache and a wet towel on my head. The strange aroma was interesting but soothingly nostalgic. And just then I remembered that I had to get to work but it was too painful to move, I was exhausted!
My clothes had been switched too slightly nicer ones that i could tell had been made by hand and smelled like summer. Someone had just twisted the handle to come inside the room and then appeared Rafia, her uncle and Amile. Amile had been coated in dust and oil and Rafia had her pet cat in her hands although i don't remember her having one’. “Hey guys you mind telling me exactly what happened and why I have clothing that would cost half a week of my salary on?” I asked with a confused tone. “Well you see you suddenly passed out with a high fever and we picked you up, dragged you all the way to town and stumbled across an old friend of my mother's that deals in more shadier businesses that pay more and it just so happened that my uncle had been visiting too catch up on how she had been and when he found out you were there he came running inside.” I was surprised! I had only met him once and he came running for me. I mean… I'm surprised he even remembers me it was like 18 years ago, the last time we met! Although he and my father were great friends before he died.`` Oh right my job!” I said in an excruciatingly loud voice “ I'm probably fired now… but it's not like I'm in any condition too work either. I guess I'll just get another job, I mean it's not like anyone's NOT out for employees. And the manager at my workplace is always so egoistic. I'll just deal with the consequences. hold up wait! I have a good job for you it's not in the best condition but you might have to put up with it…” he started into a wonderful grin anyway it starts next week be there or you will regret it shorty! And he chuckled with joy and walked out too leave the rest of us until I had fully recovered and 1 week passed and as I stood in front of the building i looked up at the flag as it stood proudly on top of the building making me think that this job is actually pretty decent!. Until as I looked down and my smirk turned into a frown, I noticed that I already hated this job.
The building was so close to its final days, the tilting structure had an almost intimidating. Everything but the perfectly clean and sparkling flag had been 10 times more intimidating than my last job and I felt as if it's figure coated in spray pain and crust would consume me in madness if I stayed there too long. As I walked a long hallway that had disturbing messages written all over them with invisible words saying too stay out of our cage!” I trekked down the long hallways filled with mostly unfortunate women children and a couple of men to. The putrid smell was like corpses had been hidden in the floors and ceilings and the few rugs that there where had been soiled by who knows what. I was absolutely terrified and horrified with my skin scattered with thousands upon millions of needles made from hair. Fortunately I was lucky and got rafias uncle as the manager and he showed me the main properties of the machine and my first day of work began.
After the day ended i went out with an absolutely disgusted look on my face and the clothes he gave me now smelled like feces and mold. I can say that I was satisfied with work but still it was worse than sleeping in a grave
A week has now passed and I had gotten used to the used too the new machine and I had now been given the super useful power of not being able to use my nose, in other words I can't smell anything from bodies too moon houses, I despise it with a passion.
I ve been placed into a seat next to a very nice little girl who always talks to me about her friends and her home her name is ava. The one on the other side is named shammi she's a little weird and makes mistakes a lot but I help her out every now and then. But something terrible happened an hour after coming in and it changed our country forever. After a little i heard several people scream from below and tremors happened within our room and I smelled smoke. Rafias uncle told everyone to stay where they were and we obeyed until suddenly the ceiling collapsed above and i was knocked unconscious.
When I woke up, there were fires and holes everywhere. And I could hear a faint yelp beyond the door and when I opened it there was a man trapped under rubble with both legs injured beyond recognition. I tried to help but the more I pulled the more it hurt for him and the rubble moved to. I screamed and cried as I began to hear my body make weird noises and but i didn't try hard enough and with one last cry into the warm dusty air he was no longer with us as water blood and fire stained my eyes i could only find more survivors and as I limped to the rubble and machine parts i searched with my ashy palms too find the slightest bit of hope, i had found ava! I explained the situation to her as she nodded with uncertainty and doubt of our survival. We found a crack in the wall that was big enough to walk through and hiked through the walls. we had found the staircase but the actual stairs were torn to shreds and spikes of wood and dust littered the next floor down along with the bodies of unlucky fellows who dared to cross. W had no choice but to cross the abyss. W had made it halfway through but ava and i suddenly froze for w where revealed a terrible sea of fire beyond the rail. The rail wobbled shook and suddenly cracked and was nearly falling. I had reacted fast, I grabbed her arm and swung her light delicate body over to the other side and fell into the void of scorched ground.
But what awaited me was not death but amile! Although he was missing an arm and looked broken. Of course i had no choice but to carry him too the hallways and move. It was startling to see him without a limb but i moved on anyway. When we got to the corner I saw rafia who looked back and ran straight at me as if she had the intent to kill. But when I looked back she pushed me and smiled. It was as if everything was in slowmotion and with that I was pushed out the second story window with the horrid image of rafias image being replaced by stone. And with that I blacked out too be woken up in a bed with armless amile, rafias uncle and friend, and ava. But no rafia…
2 months later, my mother died of sickness and Amile’s wound closed.