How long had it been since he had seen her? Her ghostly white skin, those bright green eyes that looked magical with her jet-black hair, it was now all a memory. There was no picture, no other person to prove that she had actually existed. But I knew, she was mine and no one else’s.


“Michael,” someone whispered from the dark. The thin boy with dark brown hair awoke, he peered into the darkness but saw nothing.


“Hello?” he called. “Angee?” The room was absolutely silent except for the sound of the frantic wind pounding upon the glass window. It was her, it had to be. No one else he knew had the same soft musical voice like she. He sat upon the black comforter waiting, waiting for her do appear but nothing happened. His mind was racing, he never realized how much he had truly missed her, how much he had truly loved her until now.


“How could they do that, how could they take her away like that. I never got to say goodbye, I never got to tell her how I truly felt.”

“She knew, she did.” The voice was reassuring.

“But Carrie, she’s gone and I am never going to get to see her again.”

“Michael, you don’t know that, if she was honestly meant for you, you two will be together someday”

“Someday? I would rather see her now” he threw himself upon Carrie’s bed face down.

As she spoke he inhaled the sweet lilac smell of Carrie, it was almost identical to Angee, this upset him even more. “Mike, it has been almost a year and you are still depressed and all you do is mope around. When we hang out it’s like I am by myself, you were my best friend.”

“No Carrie, I am your best friend.” He stressed the word am as he got up off the bed and went to sit next her on the pale pink shag rug. “Hey,” he gave her an innocent smile as he dropped down to her level.

“Michael, I don’t know what to do”

“What do you mean?”

“Ever since you met her, you’ve changed and not into anything that I like either”

“I’m sorry I matured” he beamed.

Obviously Carrie knew that he was joking, but she wasn’t amused. “You didn’t mature Michael, I don’t know what she did, but she changed you” Her eyes welled up with tears.

“No, I am the same old person I have always been”

“You aren’t anything like you were, we used to talk on the phone every night, we used to hang out every weekend, we played football and made cookies, We don’t do ANY of that anymore” she sobbed. “Now all you do is keep to yourself, come over every other month, and you sit at home all the time doing absolutely nothing, and it is all because of her.” The word her came out of her mouth like it was some nasty disease, but to Carrie it was, it was the thing that stole her best friend.

“If that is really what you think, then maybe you don’t know me well at all”

“What! I know you better than anyone” she stood up, “well I did anyway.”

“That’s right Carrie, you did know me, but I am a human being, and like all humans things change, we change!”

“Well seeing how you changed so much, you can get out of here, don’t talk to me anymore and go back to your little isolated life, the one that you are wasting away in!”

Tears streaked her red cheeks as she ran to the door of her bedroom. The entire time Michael had been transfixed on the carpet, he had looked up just in time to see Carrie’s dirty blonde ponytail disappear from the room.

Michael was stricken with grief and regret. What could he do now? Go apologize? No, that wouldn’t do anything at all; maybe make things a little worse.



He stepped out into the frigid afternoon air, the brown leaves crunched as he made his way down from 441 Eastbrooke Road, Carrie’s house. He walked down the street, breathing deeply, staring dead ahead to try and keep himself from breaking down in tears.

“I lost my girlfriend, and my best friend, I lost my mom!” he screamed kicking a pile of leaves that lay in his path. “Why is this happening?” he asked the quiet earth. Now, it was his tears that were streaking down his red cheeks, he felt weak, there was a tearing feeling at his chest. The same feeling he got every time someone he love had left him.

So many feelings had passed through him in the past few weeks, depression, regret, desperation. He wanted things to go back to normal, when everything was good in his life. He had an amazing best friend, a beautiful mother, and a girlfriend to die for. How desperately he wanted them to all be at his side right now as he walked against the autumn wind.



“Michael, we need to talk” a hoarse voice called from the kitchen of the small 2 bed roomed condo of where he lived.

“Yeah dad?”

“Carrie called hysterical”


“Oh man, what did she say?”

“She told me what happened,” he strode across the room placing his right hand on Michaels shoulder, “It hurts me to say this son, but I agree”

“What?” his mouth dropped.

“Maybe you should talk to someone, someone that could help you”

“Like a shrink? No way!” Michael ran from the kitchen and up to his room.


“How could he do that? Send me to a shrink! Don’t they get it, everything would be just fine if Angee was back in my life, but no she isn’t because they took her” he talked to the image of him standing alone at the mirror.

“They took me, but not just away from you Michael” He whipped, eyes wide but saw nothing. The sun poured in through the window, giving the normally dark room an eerie swamp-like look.

“Angee, I know its you,” he murmured to himself as he turned back towards the mirror. Examining his face he realized how ghostly his skin looked, his piercing gray eyes and white-blonde hair all seemed to blend together with it.

“Angee,” he started talking to himself, hoping that it was her talking to him, hoping that she would hear and come out to him. “I miss you, I want you hear, I want you next to me”

He imagined her there, her skinny pale arm wrapped around his waist like it used to be. Her purple-pink lips formed together in smile showing off those bright white teeth of hers. The usual black hoodie and dark jeans hung on her lengthy figure, he missed this so much, and he missed her.

He had figured out months ago that he was obsessed, and the obsession had grown five times more up until this day. He put his arm around the imaginary figure, and started with hopeful eyes as he wished that she was real.

Michael had kept Angee a secret, mainly because Angee was a mental patient at Darthworth hospital for two years. Darthworth was just through the woods that lay behind my house. One day while Michael was taking a walk to clear his head like he did frequently, he crossed the tiny hand made bridge over the creek and sat in a small patch of grass alongside the trail. The silence was broken by a voice, a song-like voice that seemed to come only from a dream.

“Hello there”
Michael looked up to see a girl, she was thin, and she was dark but mysteriously bright. He stood up and walked over to her. “Hi”

“My names Angee,” she smiled and he instantly knew that he loved her.

“I’m Michael”

The two spent the next couple of hours talking and getting to know each other. Her favorite color was blue, but not just the general color blue, but sky blue, Angee loved fast food, which was different than most girls who were on diets and ate only salads and rice cakes. The two had a lot in common, they both liked the same kind of music and both of them actually liked to read.

That night when they parted, he ran back to his house in high spirits and for the next couple of weeks he spent every night waiting in the woods for her to come back, but she didn’t. It was at the end of November before she finally appeared.

“What took you so long?” he questioned. And right then is when she told him of the hospital. He felt sorry for her, but he loved her, he knew it was unsafe, but he couldn’t help himself.

They’re relationship had lasted for only five months before she disappeared. At first Michael thought that it was like the first time they met, she didn’t show up for three weeks, but he knew, he could feel that something was wrong.

On the second month of her absence, he decided to go ask for her at the hospital. He walked through the vacant white halls searching. “May I help you” an old lady with obviously dyed red hair and thick black glasses asked.

“Yes, I am looking for Angee Reynolds”

The happy expression on the women’s face disappeared upon hearing the name; she looked over at a short man with a comb over who immediately showed up at Michael’s side.

“Are you in any way related to Ms. Reynolds? A good friend, a family member?”

“A boyfriend” he replied. The doctor took him into a small empty white room with dozens of plastic blue chairs on every wall and sat down on a chair closest to the door. Michael was too nervous to sit down next to him; he had a horrible feeling that something was wrong.

“I am sorry to tell you this young man, but Angee Reynolds passed away quite recently”

He was shocked, he opened his mouth to speak but nothing came out. The room was spinning and he felt like he was going to be sick. “What? How?” he managed to get out while holding back the vomit.

“She killed herself”

The words struck him like lightning; he wanted to run far away. He wanted to smack the fake upsetting look of the doctor’s face. He wanted to turn back time, he wanted to stop her.



It all came back to Michael in a quick rush, when he opened his eyes he realized that he was laying on the cold wooden floor alone, the mirror was shattered. What happened? He thought.

“Michael” it was her voice again.

“STOP!” He bellowed, “Stop! Shut up!” The quiet whispers were driving him mad.


“Michael” The voice kept repeating over and over throughout the room.

“SHUT UP! STOP!” Michael started screaming at the top of his longs, his arms flew in every direction knocking pictures off the walls, lamps off the tables and books off the desk. Lamps shattered, picture frames cracked, the screaming grew louder and louder.

“MICHAEL!” it was a different voice, it was deep and gruff, but so far away. The angel-like whispers rang in his ears blocking out all sound.

The door of his room burst open but without noticing Michael kept yelling and crying. Someone wrestled him to the floor, attempting to quiet him.

“Michael, its me, its your father, please, everything is okay” he begged. Angee’s voice did not stop, so he kept yelling.

He sprawled his arms in every direction that he could, he bashed his head into the cold wooden floor and everything went blank.


Two months later Michael sat at a clean white table in a bright white room with light blue plastic chairs on either side of the table.

“You look tired” Carrie said.

“I am”

“You don’t sleep here?”

“I don’t sleep”

“I’m Sorry Michael”

“For?”

“Not helping you when I could tell that you needed it”

“Its not your fault”

“Then why do I feel like it is?”

“Its not”


In those months of being at the mental hospital, Michael had not yet heard Angee call his name, he was no longer upset and confused. Michael was numb. He felt nothing, he didn’t show any emotion, and he was nothing.