I look at the time on my phone it reads 2:36 am. I normally get up at 6 am for school. I knew that since I was awake right now I would be tired throughout my school day and that it would be smart to sleep while I still could. However my mind won’t allow me to. I don’t know why it restricts me from sleeping at this time of night. It seems to be something different every night. Some nights I’ll be stressing about school or I’ll be doing school work because I was too tired to do it when I first got home, or in some cases I’m just too sad to sleep.

I never really have an actual reason as why to why I’m sad. It’s just late at night my mind seems to drift into this dark place where I reflect on all the mistakes I’ve ever made and think about my future problems. Like thinking about how in the world I’m going to make it as an adult. Paying bills and buying my own food is going to be hard. How could I possibly be worrying about something so far away? Thoughts like this kept me up at night and I knew this would be the death of me. Two hours filled with angst and repressing thoughts pass.

“Elle! Get up out of bed!”. My mom screams from the bottom of the stairs.

Her scream breaks the silence in my room, causing me to jump. Today was friday, which meant that I had a weekend of watching netflix and looking at memes on instagram to look forward to. Two more nights of no sleep to add onto the other 2 nights that I laid awake all night. But before I got into too much thought about my ‘exciting weekend’ I still needed to get through this friday. So I began to get dressed, putting on the simple outfit of black skinny jeans, vans, a band tee-shirt and then proceeding to cover up the shirt with a plain black hoodie. My weekday outfits were nothing too revealing and definitely not picked to impress any guy or girl. I dressed comfortably and wore what I wanted. Which mainly consisted of black or grey clothing items. Once I was fully dressed I applied deodorant, perfume, and brushed my teeth/hair. This process takes me about 25 minutes bus and by time I’m done I have to go get on the bus.

I arrived every morning at my high-school around 7:50 am. From this time till 3:10 pm I was trapped in school with hundreds of students. School wasn’t completely horrible but I definitely did not enjoy it. However it gave me a place to think. So instead of listening in my classes I stared off into space and let my mind wander. It thought of things only a person like me could understand. Crazy, wild, unthinkable things. I’ll never be sure why it was like this, or why I didn’t try to control it. I always feared that one day it would get the best of me and take absolute control.

For now I wouldn’t worry about that I just had to through the day and get home. Maybe attempting to sleep once I arrived home. But deep down I knew that this would be an almost impossible task for me. I was already in my last class which meant school was almost over. So with my last few minutes of class I constructed a plan to go straight sleep when I got home. “Ring Ring!” the bell interrupts my thoughts and it’s finally time to go home. My day went by super quick. It was like I was stuck in a dream all day. Was it possible this was a dream, did I even wake up this morning or was i still asleep? It was finally getting to me, my sleepless nights had caught up to me and were starting to make me feel insane.

I knew if I didn’t sleep soon that this would end badly. So I quickly got up gathering my things and made my way to my bus as quickly as possible. The bus ride was shorter than normal because one minute i was at the school the next I was walking upstairs to my room. I walked into my room and immediately lunged for my bed. Not bothering to cover up or even take my shoes off. I closed my eyes and thought of peaceful things that wouldn’t make me stressed or make me overthink to the point where I wouldn’t be able to sleep.

A mysterious voice whispers from an area in my room “Get up, you can’t sleep now”.

I raised up slowly scared to meet the voice that had just yelled at me. While turning around to the area of my room where I believed the voice came from the voice occurred again. “I’m right here, what’re you looking for?” I  jumped up in fright leaving my room checking every room of the house to see who this mysterious man was and where he was. It seemed as if he was right next to me whenever he spoke to me. But there was no one in my room and after searching everywhere I had realized that there was no one in my house but me. None of the doors were unlocked not even the front door that i came in because i made sure to lock it. The windows were all still sealed and locked.

“You are home alone and there is no man in your house talking to you”. I repeated this to myself several times as i washed my face and stared at my reflection in the mirror.

“You are correct there is no man in your house. I consider myself a young boy and I’m technically not in your house but I am inside your head. Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Tyler and I’m going to kill you. Well actually you’re going to kill yourself but I’m going to be the one motivating you to do so.” The same voice I had heard earlier called from what seemed to be right next to me.”

I ran out of the bathroom scared of what i had just heard. Who was this boy and where was his voice coming from? This made me realize how badly not sleeping had effected my mind. Hoping that being outside and feeling the cold wind breeze against my face would wake me up a little. I start to run to get my body moving. Unaware of where I was going i run as fast as i can just wanting to get rid of the voice forever. Running would get my mind straight and get rid of the voice. I’d be able to sleep and stop acting like a psycho.

Could it be possible that i was psycho? “No”I said to myself. I was just sleep deprived and needed to sleep immediately or this situation would worsen.

Tyler, “Elle this is real. I am real and I am here. I’ve always been here. Not sleeping just helped you realize that i exist and you can hear me now. Elle the time has come, if we don’t leave soon it’ll just get worse. You’re never going to be able to sleep again. And if you can’t sleep then you can’t process correctly. Meaning you won’t be able to properly communicate, you won’t be able to obtain a healthy diet, and you won’t be stable around others. Elle if we don’t leave soon someone will get hurt. I know you don’t want to hurt anyone so let’s make this quick and easy”

“What are you talking about what’s wrong with me? Am I insane? Why would I hurt someone? And who are you and how do i get rid of you?” i ask these questions while my voice shakes. I’m talking to myself and i lost my mind. That’s the only possibility.

Tyler, “Listen i’m only going to explain this one more time to you so pay attention. I’m tyler, i am the voice inside your head. I control your feelings and emotional thoughts. I consider myself a boy and I’m exactly like you because we’re kinda the same person. However i see the truth behind things and can predict when something bad is going to happen. For example i know that if we don’t leave today something horrible is going to happen and neither of us want that. So we can do this the easy way by getting it over with quickly or you can be difficult and force you to do it. In the end I do control you though. But i’d rather not have to be the bad guy and push you to do it. I want you to realize how real this is and that it’s your responsibility as a decent human being to kill yourself to save others.”

I was fed up with this whole situation. It was getting far too intense and i refused to let it go on any longer. I raised my hands to my head to cover my ears and bent down on on my knees. I then start to violently bang my head against the concrete. If this wouldn’t stop him I don’t know what would. Once i started to gush blood I knew I had to stop.

Just as I raised my head up thinking he was gone he spoke again. “I’m still here and I told you you’re dangerous. Now let’s go before it gets dark.”

My body raised up from the ground as if it had been magically lifted. My legs started to work without my consent. I was not controlling them. Eventually they started to move faster than I thought was possible. I was unaware of where they were taking me, but no matter how hard I tried I could not stop them. I was no longer in control of my body. They seemed to be taking me towards the train tracks near my house which was about a 15 minute drive but it seemed like it only took me about 5 to get there.

Tyler, “Elle we’re here now you know what you have to do” I didn’t know what tyler meant by this. How could i possibly know what he meant. I didn’t know what anything meant anymore.

Tyler, “Elle go down to tracks and wait”. What did he mean by wait? I acted like i didn’t know what he meant but deep down I did. Tyler already told me before that i was going to have kill myself. I was guessing this was how I do it. I was so terrified. He had complete control over me and this was going to happen no matter what i said or how much I begged him.

“Please Tyler I don’t want to die. We can fix this. Please don’t make me do it.” I wept with fear. Begging this boy inside my head to let me live. He seemed to not care due to him forcing my legs to move towards the tracks. No matter how much I begged him or how much I cried. I couldn’t stop him. The train was roaring quickly towards me. Smoke arising from the engines and the train whistles screaming at me. It would be over quickly and I’d be gone. I only had a few more seconds before it would hit me. So in my last seconds I wanted to capture a peaceful image. I closed my eyes and thought of all the good things. I thought about all the great adventures I went on and all the laughs I shared with people I loved. I was ready. The last second before the train hit me I made sure to thank Tyler. “Thank you Tyler”. I whispered to the boy inside my head then I was gone.