The Insane Boy

Chapter 22

For context, I wrote this when I was... 14? 15? I'm 21 now, studying psychology at uni :) I figured I may as well publish this.

He is asleep, but I wake him quickly.

I throw him the stack of bread I brought, but his attention doesn't waver from me

'I don't have long, I think someone might have seen me.' I whisper, glancing at the door. At the sight of the bread, Nox is shaken out of his bleary state, and his slender fingers reach through to take a piece. mid bite, he point to the bread, and then to the cell across from him.

I turn to see a girl sitting there, her fingers wrapped around the bars. Her hair has been shaven down to a number one, and her round cheeks contrasts with the protruding ribs in her chest.

She is not Insane.

Quickly, I hold her out a slice of bread. She hesitates at first, but reaches out eventually with her hunger overcoming her fear.

'They brought her in two days ago.' Nox whispers to me. 'She doesn't speak, not a word. But they don't bring her food so she needs it.' He takes another slice.

Between him and the girl, the stack of what must have been over 20 slices is gone within five minutes.

Nox leans back against the wall, his eyes closed.

'Even when I can touch the farthest reaches of infinity, I still must give in to pathetic human needs.' He says. Then he looks up. 'At least I am not ruled by them.'

'Your ruled by them as much as I am' I retort

'No. I can escape desire, you give in to it, again and again and again.'

His words spark my anger. 'One second I am a equal; next second I am a child. You just use me.'

Yet you keep coming back.' He says.

'Sometimes I think you are as emotionless as the guards.'

'No, the guards feel nothing, but I feel everything. Yet my emotions are so insignificant when you can see them beside the boundless universe.' He says

'They matter here. They matter now.' I say, but he shakes his head.

'Nothing matters.' He whispers blankly. 'All we are is matter, yet nothing matters. Life is meaningless unless you give it a meaning.'

'Oh, I have a meaning. My life will matter if people are cheering my name at the end, and I have created a future in which they can grow in freedom.'

He laughs scornfully. 'Only in death do people truly ever commemorate what someone did. You can go through your whole life without praise but in your death they shout them to the nation. Humans are so fickle. They do not say thank you until the person is gone. They don't know what you have until its gone.'

I pause. 'You said they. They doesn't include me.'

'I think you have seen enough to know that thanks should always come before the end.'

'But I am just human to you.'

His eyes fall to the ground. 'No. I drag myself out of my mind every time you come; I leave the beauty of the universe for the pain of reality just so I can see you. And no matter how hard I search, I don't know why. You fascinate me. There is a joy in your presence, a lure. You are not just human. Not to me.'

I stand there for a moment. I am his pet. A child next to him. Yet he sees me as more? How? I am nothing to him compared to his universe.

'You told me I was nothing. You said I was a pet, a distraction.' My voice is rising, and my hands are beginning to shake with the effort to hold in my rage and confusion. 'You told me I was nothing compared to you.'