Little Inklings 2024

A LIFE WITH A TICKING CLOCK By: Cici Cisneros ’28 On April 23, 3052 Today is the day. Today will be when I finally pass and join all those who have died before me. My parents, my best friend Mike, and many more. Dying at 34 isn’t so bad, at least I got to live part of my life. I’ve loved, lost, and had bad times and good. The one good thing with the system is knowing to make the most of your moments before they’re gone in a flash. When I got told by the Deciders and they said I would be gone by today I was fine with it. At least my death was peaceful unlike poor Mike’s. Death by sharks. What a painful way to go, I told him not to touch the water that day, “Just stay home” I said “then you’re guaranteed to go peacefully.” if he listened to me maybe… never mind it’s better not to reminisce or else I’ll be plagued with nightmares again over his frantic shrieks that day and the horrible popping noise of his bones being ripped to pieces. I’ll be with him soon nevertheless. Sometimes I think “What if we cheated the system?” That simply wouldn’t work if it has gone on for generations. Would it? No, it couldn’t people have surely tried… but what if it could… No, it can’t, It just CAN’T. As I’m writing this last thing I say goodbye. Goodbye to all those who loved me. I love you all too. Goodbye Sheila I should’ve tried harder, for us, but instead, I say goodbye. April 24, 3052 It had to have been a fluke. How am I still here? I was tossing and turning all night not quite able to go to sleep, the scraping of the tree branches outside my window and the cool comfortable blast of my air conditioning were nothing compared to the sound of my ragged breathing and heavy pounding heart. I wondered what it would be like when I was gone but nothing happened. I wonder what will come to me now. Will the deciders come for me later today? Perhaps they are on the way as I write this. Perhaps I should go to them, though I doubt it would be good if I did. Thousands of thoughts are plaguing my head, each one feeling like a revving race car around a track, loud and obnoxious but then gone quick as a flash just to be replaced by the next and the next and the next till eventually it circles back puzzling my mind once more. As I walk to the phone ready to report this strange feat, I start to hear the muffled creak of the steps going up to my door and the loud BANG as someone kicks down my door. I turn around with a shocked expression and see a strange man standing at my door with it ajar. He shouts out at me “Why are you still here?” “I don’t know, ‘’ I reply. “Very well then,” he says. Soon I hear the snap of a trigger and suddenly everything goes black. 26