Matt

But the light didn't shine, didn't convey the right direction.

Home. All he had wanted was to go back home. Everything flowed through him fiercely, every memory, every aching, heartwarming thought of love and affection and burning bright smiles pulsing through his veins, flickering through his blood, as he paced and paced towards the epitome of light in this darkness, the soaring sun which seemed to be something other than the true celestial body, for its heat was too artificial and static to be the comforting rays of sun.

     Yet no matter how much he continued walking, he simply seemed to remain in the same place. The same darkness with the swirling orb of shimmering light and the endless blackness in between.

    Everything was lost. His home. His family. Him. They were all lost to him as he continued to drift away in the middle of nowhere, a sickly sweet abyss of glittering loneliness, twisting torture gorging through his throbbing mind as he felt a cry tear up his insides.

     He was hopeless now. Just hopeless as his heart deteriorated from the lack of faith within. He couldn't find them, would never be able to find them, in a miraculously-meddled maze such as this.

    Lost. Everything was lost. And his memories, the key that usually unlocked the treasure chest, which in this case would be his home and the presence of his entire family- being both blood relatives and the members of Pentatonix- didn't help, for he couldn't even locate the direction of the hidden chest.

    So he decided to give up momentarily. He plopped down on the stretch of blackness that lay beneath him, sitting against the frigid black ice as he shivered.

    This was not the first time he had been lost but it was the first in a long time that he had been trapped unbeknownst to his whereabouts in a prison such as this. This metaphorical, yet clearly literal cell of suffering that held him jailed to his mind and jailed away from the usual occurrences of his life.

     He should have been in a concert right now. He should have been in his last concert with his family, displaying his departure like a bird leaving the nest for the first time, but he was here. He was stuck here without his wants, stuck to be alone forever.

    He didn't think that living on the solo would be similar to this current and dreadful experience, yet maybe it was. Maybe he was being warned about leaving Pentatonix. Maybe he shouldn't leave. After all, all he did want to do was go back home...which he now realized probably meant to stick with them.

    Anyways, it was too late, he thought to himself. It was too late for here he was rather than beside his fellow
friends and family, rather than on stage singing alongside them for the last time, their voices harmonizing melodiously in the roaring silence of the crowd rumbling in awe, grasping their mics as smiles rose on their faces, smiled reflecting the smiles in the audience.

    The hissing glow soon diminished as he knew he'd be long gone. He was going to be stuck here forever...stuck here, lost, gone, hopeless, shards of light shattering down to his soul...gone- he was gone.

    Avriel Benjamin Kaplan was gone. He had not only lost home but he had lost himself too. He was lost. For the light never conveyed the right direction.