A Room

The walls are closing in and it’s getting dark. Then I see a bright flash.

-long pause-

It’s May 7, 5000. I’m trapped in a school photo.

—

It is the last period of the day, and also picture day. They called the 7th grade to go to the library at Oak Hill Middle School. My teacher told me to go to the fifth person in the row. My mom wanted me to wear nice clothes, but I wore normal clothes anyway.

I look at my photographer’s camera. The photographer seems normal, but something is way off. I don’t know what. I walk up and give her a purple slip that has my name and my age, and lists my previous school photos. She tells me to sit down in a specific way and I do. Then she tells me to smile, and she flicks a switch. Right before she clicks the button to take the photo, I can see all the faces of the trapped kids in her lens. A look of horror slowly creeps up my back and comes onto my face. I don’t know it yet, but as that photo sucks me up, I will stay in that photo for ten years. I don’t know how she pulled it off, but she just tells my teacher I walked out the door.

I can see through part of the glass, but I can’t move. My arms and legs are locked in place. Every single emotion is going through my head. I don’t know why, but my head is able to move. I see a long hallway with black light torches and red doors opening to different pictures. Suddenly, I see my best friend who went missing last year, staring into my eyes.

As a tear runs down my face, I hear walking; it is the lady. She came to collect the tear of a lost soul. She had just begun her quest to collect the lost tears, and she needs one hundred tears. Not everyone cracked as easily as I did. Sometimes it takes months for kids to crack.

She needs to complete this task to get back to her family. She was trapped in a picture like I was! If she completes her quest before I get out, I’ll stay trapped in this photo forever.

The lady walks over to me and is generous enough to talk to me. We come to the agreement that we both want to get out of the photo. She lets me and friend out, and we run as fast as we can back home. The lady sacrificed herself and stayed in the picture forever!