Stranded Pixels of Us

See You Around

"That is quite something. I doubt if I'd have had enough air to breathe in considering all the spree of words and all." Drake smiled and Alessia slightly chuckled too.

    "It's puzzling that we meet people around the same age and yet we are million light years apart in our view of the world." Drake said with a rather philosophical look which Alessia seemed to enjoy.

    Her phone rang and it was her mum, so she picked anxiously.

    "Baby, I'm here already. Sorry for keeping you waiting" Her mum said honestly.

    "It's okay. I will be there in a minute" Alessia said with a smile on her cheeks.

    "My mum is here already. See you around?"

    "Yeah. Bye" Drake replied with a warm look. He stayed there trying to embrace the air, all of it in that moment as she left through the door. Thoughts decided to flood his head space to give him unsolicited company and he let out a brief smile. He picked up his bag and left the building too with his earpiece in his ear, playing nothing but listening to the world as he trekked home.

    Drake stayed in his bed sleepless, he turned left and right and to no avail. He was overthinking and sleep just couldn't break this chain of thoughts. What was today? Everything was strange and he couldn't explain as he touched his face where he felt the little pains from James' punch earlier in a time that he couldn't explain happened or not.

    After long hours of mental workout, his brain surrendered to sleep and Drake was wearing a blank face as he slept. 

    "We don't need him. He's worthless and undeserving of love from anyone. Come on! Take a look at him. He is not what either of us desired." A man in a hospital shouted in a room with a woman who just had a baby and a doctor who stood there.

    The woman looked at the child in her arms with disgust, equal to or maybe more than that of the man who seemed like her husband. She handed the child to the doctor without thinking twice. "We never asked for this" She said as she gave the baby away.

    In a sequence of events, Drake found himself in the toilet in his school and the writing on the mirror, now a different one but still in red ink. "You are undeserving of love and care" The mirror read boldly. He opened the tap and to his aggravated shock and fear, he saw bubbles spilling on his hands with a hideous face reflecting on each one of them.

    Still in this streak of horror, the guys; James, Hakim and Nathan came out of the toilet and laughed so hard it felt like fists hammering his chest. 

    "Come out, Beauty!" Nathan said as he mocked Drake.

    Alessia came out of another toilet and wore a gown that was only seen in horror movies as she advanced towards him. "What did you think? That one conversation was going to change the fact that you're lonely and sad?" Alessia asked with ridicule underneath every of her words.

    "No. This is not real" Drake shouted with sweat and tears all over his face as he avoided eye contact with Alessia.

    "If this isn't real enough, I wonder what is. Maybe the fact that you were discarded by your parents or the fact that your life has been one endless sad song." Alessia whispered while Nathan and the other boys laughed.

    Drake was shaking and his breath was unstable as he hurriedly made his way out of the toilet into the hallway where all the school children were dressed in costumes as they laughed at him as he walked pass them.

    "Ahh! Ahh!" Drake breathed loudly as he panted straight from this horrible nightmare. He was sweating and his face was all down like that of a junkie. He kept breathing shallowly as he tried to get himself together. He sat up, put on his light by the side of his bed and took his bottle of pills and tossed one tablet into his mouth.

    After a little stability, Drake dozed. But before he could give in totally to whatever kind of sleep this was, he woke up again.  He was constantly fighting this battle against the relentless sleep evident on his face as he tapped his fingers each time he woke up.

    The next day at school during lunch, Drake was seated in his usual spot of seclusion with his meal staring him right in the eye.

    "You don't look so good. Are you okay?" Alessia asked with concern as she sat across him with her food tray in her hand.

    "Drake was scared to his spine. He still hadn't come to terms that the Alessia he saw all night was a nightmare and not the one standing right in front of him. He looked so sick as he wrestled sleep all night. Right when he sought answers to the weirdness surrounding yesterday, today was proving to be another battle he really wasn't up for.

    "I'm fine. I didn't have enough sleep last night" He said with a gloomy look plastered on his face.