A bridge between worlds

Prologue

It was the fourth term of school and by the end of the second week an essay would be due. This was nothing new to any of the students. They each started at their assigned cubicles in the library. Each day they would research and jot down their evidence into their notebook until the end of the first week. On the second week they started to write their essays. The essay topic was of death and the natural phenomenon of it. How organic things were born to die. This is what had started the panic attacks.

Tobias was sixteen, the prime of his youth, he owned a car and a good standing in school- reputation wise. While Tobias researched the topic of his essay, he began to become very unstable. Each passing moment he knew that he was only closer to death. Each day since the assignment was issued he grew more distant from friends and relatives, it seemed everyday tore him apart more than the previous. The due date had come and passed and Tobias was a wreck. His thoughts ventured between Heaven and Hell and what it was like. He felt an unbearable weight on his chest with every breath he would take during the day, and an unusual nightly discomfort.

Tobias fought for his sanity daily. His teacher would never get off the topic of death (the class was Literature, not forensics).

The weight became unbearable for him and he called his only friend- Shyan. They would converse about the class, Shyan had third and Tobias fourth [block].

"I don't know, it's scary to think that one day we won't be here." Tobias would say.

"I know it's scary, but think about it this way- you'd never care about it if you would always have it. It's like food," she would chuckle, "I mean... Food is great, right? Once you're done eating, you may feel sad that you have nothing else to eat, but just think... While you ate the food, every millisecond you savored your food. That macaroni you ate in less than thirty seconds, that is what made you love it. If you had an endless supply of mac and cheese then you would probably never eat it again."

"You know I would eat all the mac and cheese until I couldn't fit any more in my chomper." Tobias retorted. He would sigh, "but Shyan... It just makes me want to do everything I can... but at the same time, I just want to turtle up and cuddle with something and be safe."

"Don't be such a baby." She would tease. "Tobias, I believe that you will love your life and do everything that you put your heart to." She would become silent after that statement.

The call would be silent for a couple of minutes until one of the two would have to dispatch to go help a family member in a task.