The City in My Heart

Emotions, feelings, and life. You cant live without those. Of course you have to have food and water in your body, but without emotions, feelings, or life, youre not human. I would say I'm a good and happy guy. I just dont like to show others my true self. This is my story and how I went on a lockdown.

I'm going to start this story when I was 5. I loved watching Sunday cartoons, drawing, and best of all, make believe. You probably guess I had lots of dreams and you're right. I had lots of dreams. I was also very creative. Everything I did was full of life. When people saw dark, I saw light. I made good friends throughout school life, and I really enjoyed the company of them. There was one friend in particular, his name was Rick. Rick was one of those cool kids. But not too cool to bully others. In fact, he enjoyed helping others than bringing them down. Then we entered middle school. I wished middle school never existed.

I still had that creative part in me, and I was always happy. I had to say farewell to most of my elementary friends because they had went to a different schools. But Rick stayed with me. After school, we would hang out, play video games, and go to the movies. But around 7th grade, Rick started to disappear more. As a good friend, I got worried. I went to his house, but he wasn't there. I went to his favorite places, but he wasn't there. He sometimes would show up at school, but the next day, he would be gone. Then, he didn't come all together.

The police showed up at our school. The news crew showed up to our school. And I was shocked. It was all over the world, and my best friend was in it. The headlines screamed, "14 Year Old Teenager Committed Suicide in His Home". Suicide? That couldn't be right. Rick wouldn't do that. Rick loves everyone, and everyone loves and respects him. This is couldn't be right. That afternoon, I sat down with my parents to watch the evening news. I felt sick. My parents laughed, saying how suicidal kids are good for entertainment. I wanted to throw up. They didn't know. They didn't know how much hurt I was feeling. That night, my lights, my dreams, my hopes, they all blacked out.

I thought of my heart as a city. It needs air to operate the proper uses of the body. It needs food, water, and other chemicals to manually control what I do. The brain is the head of the branch, the heart is the power source, and my limbs are the citizens, following whatever law the heart and brain makes. But when one fails, the rest fall along with it. That is what happened with me. It took awhile for me to swallow that Rick was gone. But when it hit, it hit hard. Food didn't taste the same, water felt weird, life somehow became dark. My body started to realize that I wasn't eating enough food to produce energy. To make adjustments, my body made some changes. If I ate too much, I would throw up. I became very thin to a point where my ribs would show. I didn't sleep much, so I became tired during class, which resulted in failing grades. I had no idea that the death of a friend could be so damaging.

Not only did I put myself in the darkness, people around me went to the darkness with me. My mom crying all day, begging me to eat at least one bite. My father drinking huge amounts of alcohol to forget that he was living with a zombie. My city went into full lockdown mode.

July 4, 2009. The birds were chirping, the sun light cutting through the windows, and the smell of air. I dont know if air has a scent, but it smelled nice. For some reason, I felt kind of happy. I didn't know the reason why, but I felt a little sense of hope. Knock knock* I went down stairs and opened the door. Standing before me was Rick's mother. I said hello, and she said hello. Then she looked at me. She was looking at me before, but now it was more of a studying type. "W..what happened to you?" I shrugged. "I was starving myself", I replied. She looked startled and didn't know what to say. Then she got a piece of paper and gave it to me. "Rick, Rick wrote this for you. I found it, 3 days after his suicide." I held the paper. My arms were shaking, my heart beating. I put the paper down to say thank you, but she was already gone. I took the paper and started reading.

"Dear Bryce,

I know Ive been in and out a bunch, and I'm sorry about that. I realized having a fake smile, fake happiness wasn't going to last long. So I decided that youll get use to me gone. That's why I disappeared a lot. By the time you find this letter, I'm probably dead. BUT, dont stop dreaming. Man, you got the best of the best ideas in the history of mankind! Dont stop dreaming. Know that youre still my best friend. Our friendship will never be broken, even if Im gone. Oh, and you might be wondering why I decided to kill myself. Well, I'll tell you when we meet again.

-- Love Richard"

Tears were flowing down like waterfalls. Dont stop dreaming. Dont stop dreaming. As by some magic, I was brought back to life. I saw dreams again. I hoped for hope again. I cracked up a smile. My stomach growled, telling me it was hungry. I rushed to the kitchen, made myself the longest sub ever. I gobbled that thing like I would never eat it again. My stomach growled, then died out. It was satisfied. I didn't throw up, which was a plus. My heart became beating again, my brain started to think again, and my limbs started to jump up and down. My city had fixed the power outage and it was back on. Tears were flowing down, not because I was sad, but because life, I had life again. The darkness was gone, and light had came back in. I could feel every cell in my body, doing its work. Okay, that last part might be weird, but you get what I'm saying. I gotten my life back.

Just like cities need people, a mayor, and jobs, our body needs them too. If one fails, everything else fails, because they work as a team. But to keep up the system, you need to be positive. Once you feel hopeless, your body will feel hopeless. If you feel down, your body will go down. Its a train reaction. I hope everyone here can continue to dream, vision, hope, and breathe life unto others.