By Noah Vickers

Click. Click clack…click….clickity click clack click…clack click… ?

Hmm. Similar combinations of a mere eight unique characters inch themselves along the screen and come to a halt within a second. My spine, arched forward like the head of a question mark and crooked somewhere in the middle, slumps against the foam backing of my wheelchair. I raise my right eyebrow in a moment of skepticism, dramatizing my facial expressions for my faint reflection trapped in the array of blue light to observe.

“You must complete your story tonight,” Mr. Snave warned a few minutes ago, and the sentence echoed around my head like a child inside a bouncy castle; it stomped all over me and didn’t want to leave. The one sentence I had written down begins to stare at me with a malicious grin as I struggle to stay alert in this reality, losing myself to the endless void of my computer.

“You could take some inspiration from your own life, maybe create a character based on someone you know,” a new message rings through my ears.

I allow an urge to antagonize this wisdom to take over my thoughts. Who would want to read about anything related to me? I don’t do anything interesting, I strike back. I instinctively think about these exchanges of dialogue in my head as a warzone in which I am the commander of one side. I imagine the wasteland in which my soldiers stand, spotted with a few blades of grass nearly withered away as hundreds of leather boots trample over them in a reckless haste. I focus in on the faces of these mindless men; I spot many pairs of eyes, each one carrying an innocent glint that whispers to me, “I don’t want to be here.” I swiftly zoom out and forget about those disloyal figures. A menacing mint green, mint-conditioned tank appears in the centre of my field of view as I will it to be, emitting a plume of dust from beneath its tracks as it slams into the ground. Time to end this convers—

RRRRIIIIIIINNNNNGGGGG!

“Alright class, time to pack up,” Mr. Snave shot a sly smirk in my direction. “Remember, the story’s only … blah blah blah…I better not…blah blah… sob stories …blah… failed to have any self-control…blah blah. You know what happens if I don’t see anything there after midnight…”

I push myself down the hall, engrossed by the spectacular sight of the polished marble underneath as I desperately avoid eye contact with the horde of bodies flowing around me on either side. I feel a small bump to my right, followed by an aggressive tug from behind a few seconds later. I should have been a bit more aware…

“Hey! Wheelie! Watch where you’re going!” Chuck heckles. Without hesitation, he lurches in front of me, snatches the glasses resting on my nose and murders them with a blistering ‘crunch‘ against the pristine tiled floor. After a beat, I find myself resuming my trek down the hall, the guffaw of Chuck and his goons echoing through my ears as they prance in the other direction.

As the hours pass by, the streets and houses and trees and people blur together in my sight like a long-exposure photo. The wobbly wheels keeping me upright jolt me awake as I climb onto a flimsy, splinter-infested wooden ramp perfectly fit for me. I notice a large black ’50’ engraved into a white, circular tile which rests firmly on a yellow brick wall, and then shift a few degrees left toward the brass-plated doorknob, noticing a dent placed perfectly in its centre. As my fingers wrap around it, a rush of familiarity and comfort blows past me as if I were a bird in its plunge through a strong breeze. Home sweet home. My hand rotates ninety degrees to the right and I push forward, making use of my body’s whole strength, leaking a captivating smell that tickles my nostrils, forcing my eyes shut and growing a pool of drool under my tongue. Chocolate chip cookies, fresh out of the oven. After the door is fully opened, I see the scent flow through the air, drawing me in like a marionette.

“Hi, sweetie!” I recognize Mom’s voice bellowing from the kitchen.

“Hi,” I respond monotonously, as if we’ve had this same exchange a thousand times.

I roll a few metres down the hall, coming to a hard stop next to a door to my right, as if I had just rammed into a concrete wall. My fiery rage from Chuck’s antics and my burning desire for a single cookie are unconsciously extinguished within a second, leaving me unsatisfied but passive to resistance. My body twists to face my fate, the white door towering over my little disabled figure. I give it a little push, revealing a new world –  in front, a rectangular wooden desk sits upon its skinny legs at a bit under a metre in height, a single bed is tucked in the corner to my left, with snowy sheets wrapping its hidden mattress, and four blue walls keep everything together and in order – my room. I welcome myself in, parking in front of my desk and placing my computer in the centre as I empty out my bag. The screen tilts upwards, reminding me of my minimal progress on this story.

I feel my brain begin to heat up as I ponder my predicament; it is like someone tried to open Google Chrome 27 times in my head and now I need to process each tab opening at once. Without anywhere else to go, I return to my nearly victorious mental warfare. This is the only place where things go my way. I can practically hear the commanding, raspy, annoying voice of Mr. Snave, warning that I would “get a big zero” if I fail to finish. I recall the tank that I had summoned, aiming its artillery blast at a horde of helpless enemy troops. I wonder how they feel, staring at the end of their lives. I quickly disregard that thought. I made you. All of you. You are not real. You feel nothing. I fire the cannons. Victory was mine. In my triumph, I close my laptop and lean back. I’m free.

Interesting.

My mouth forms a mischievous grin as I begin to imagine the old man’s frustration as I roll into class empty-handed, as I imagine the attention I would get from him calling me out by name; something along the lines of “—-

Wait. What’s my name?

It feels like something so simple, so easy to remember, yet as I dig through my memories, I come up with nothing. Maybe it’s written down somewhere. I scavenge my bag, pulling out my binder, and I turn over the cover to find it completely empty. Now that I think about it, I can’t recall filling out any worksheets or anything. My mind starts to spin as I struggle to fathom the possible reasons for my lack of a name. Do I have dementia? Ha ha, funny April fools’ joke, emptying out my binder… right? I recall the fact that my glasses were just shattered into a million pieces. Why can I see perfectly fine? I close my eyes and return to my now victorious soldiers, standing still, awaiting directions from someone or something. I zoom in on one of them, and give him some circular glasses to match his round chin. I take them away. I give them back. He doesn’t notice a difference. Why is that? Because I said so. I am the author of his story. I open my eyes and face the full-body-sized mirror on the door.

I am a character.

I do something that I’ve been wanting to do for as long as I can remember.

I stand up.

You weren’t supposed to do that.

Feeling no pain, I push my wheelchair to the side, and glance at the mirror again. A question mark looks back at me, oddly marking an assertion rather than a question.

I think your time has come.

I open the door – no – the door opens before me; I no longer have hands, or really any resemblance to a human being. I see a white void; an endless valley of snow like what was on my page – almost. The first line reads something along the lines of “click clack clickity clack.”

My author really needed a character… someone…actually wanted me.

I feel an emotion that I have never felt before in my short life; I feel relieved. With a faint but genuine smile and a tear crawling down my cheek, I accept my fate. With at least a bit of a conscious decision now, I place myself at the end of the line, finally bringing some character to my creator’s story.