Your father’s belt hugs tightly to your arm. You twirl the syringe between your fingers, a little container with a world inside. You take a deep breath, and ****** the needle into the blossoming  purple flower on your arm. You wince at the pain, but the ***** feels like a kiss. Your finger slips the plunger into the syringe, and you feel the cool liquid glide into your bloodstream. With the syringe still in your grasp, the pillows catch you in their embrace as your body crashes in a heap. Weakness floods your body; washing into your legs, hips, torso, arms, and finally your hands, as your fingers unfold from around the syringe. It rolls off your hand and onto the ground. You do not hear a clatter. Limply, you throw yourself onto your back and stare at the white ceiling; it shifts as your eyes lose focus. Silence consumes your ears. A smile slides onto your face; your problems melt away. The bed disappears from under you. You’re floating; you’re flying; you’re invincible. You laugh. You laugh until tears run down your face. Your crazed barks echo in your small room. Untouchable freedom projects from every pore. Nothing matters right now, except this euphoria running through your veins. You’re flying head first through space; speeding past cartoon planets. Good god, you’re flying, you’re flying. You’re dying. You’re flying
The room starts to flood back into focus. You desperately claw at your freedom as it slips away from you. You try to dispel the oncoming reality, but it’s inevitable. Reality punches you in the jaw. Your head screams with static and your arm aches. Worries creep back into the crevices of your mind: parents, school, friends, grades, college. It overwhelms you; panic fills your bloodstream. Your spine arches sharply as you scream from the pit of your stomach. This is real. This is real. You are no longer flying, or in paradise, or happy. You curl up in a ball and begin to cry.  You are nothing more than a lost child, alone and scared