Part two
"Embrace reality even if it burns you."
-Pierre Bergé-
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The next morning,
Sean opens his bag and searches his homework. He remembers that he put the homework in his bag last night... But, why is it not here?!. He opens every pockets in his back, every zippers, checks inside every books. He starts to sweat a lot... almost like a panic attack.
He suddenly stops searching and realizes that what he remembered last night is actually 2 nights ago.
Not actually surprised, this happens for years. He sighs and rubs his forehead... he worked for that homework for 5 hours (that means 4 and a half hours of trying to focus) and he just had to forget about the other important thing to remember, bringing it. What a waste of time...
"Everyone... submit your paper work, right here!" The teacher says. Everyone stands up except Sean. Noticing it, the teacher puts on her famous How-typical face. "Seanan... you didn't bring your paper work, did you?" the teacher says, glaring.
"Umm... no...? I forgot to..." Sean says, trembling.
"You didn't work on it... just be honest. And also, you didn't work on my other paper work... You're a month late on that one. Meet me after school," the teacher accuses, finishing the conversation. He can hear giggles and wheezes, he can see that the whole class is neither holding a laugh or mocks him. He just remembers that there's another paper work that he needs to work on... well, life stinks. How many school-work I haven't done? Approximately a thousand.
He places his head on top of his hands and arms and sleeps, ignoring the situation (cause it happens too frequently). He's tired, too tired to even think about this. He didn't sleep yesterday, like almost every other day in his life...
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At break,
He sits alone at a small table. With no friends... nobody wants to be friends with someone like him. He starts to it his sandwich, he haven't eaten lunch in months and he haven't eaten dinner yesterday, so... hungry, obviously.
Suddenly, Ansell slams his table and looks at him in the eyes with a why-am-I-doing-this? face. "4 PM... Grand Lake residence, you'll see me. Then, we can go to my house and work on the project... because, this is the only day, I don't have anything to do."... he says this very slowly, just like as if you're talking to a toddler. "You have no schedules, right?" Ansell asks, quite arrogantly.
"O-okay..." Sean answers, repeating 'Grand lake residence' over and over in his mind. If he forgets this, he's screwed up. Ansell won the national martial competition this year... So, he could beat him up and leaving him with a broken... Possibly everything you can name.
Ansell leaves him and goes back to his table which is right in front of Sean's table. "Why would you need him? He won't help a sh*t," Blake says, not aware that Sean can hear whatever they're saying. His friends don't know that Ansell plans to work on the project with Sean. That's so not Ansell...
"Freeman said that she'll give plus points if you sent a f*cking photo if you're working with your partner..." Ansell says, sarcastically...
"You're so desperate..." Harvey says, holding his laugh.
"I know, f*ck..." He sighs.
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Sean's just listening to them, talking... and it's okay... He's used to this, and what they say is true anyways. He won't help a thing on a group project, his mind is like a bird, flying from here to there and could not stop flying. He can't help it but to think on other things. It's weird, isn't it? When you can't control your own mind?
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After detention,
"Mom! I'm home!" He shouts, hearing the loud annoying vacuum cleaner. His face is sad, just sad... Like any other days.
"Sean, there's a letter for you from Dr. Watkins! I put it in your room!" Maia shouts back, informing. He went to a psychiatrist last week.
Sean's eyes widen... "Mom! The results came out?" He shouts back.
"yeah..." Maia stops vacuuming.
Sean immediately runs upstairs and storms towards his room which is right in front of the stairs and slams the door open. Heart's beating fast, cause this is the day... He'll know what's wrong with him. After all these years,...
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Flashback,
A+... A... then, another A+. Sean was undeniably genius. In primary school, he never scored below A. Most of his scores were A+. "So much talent..."... "He's the next inventor."... "Your child is so smart."... The teachers always praised him. He's not a teacher's pet, He never really paid attention in class, but it's never a problem... He could still keep up maybe or possibly without studying.
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But, on middle school... It all started to change as if the world was against him. His grades dropped drastically... He always forgot that there's homework or tests. He has to be responsible on his own... And responsible is never in his dictionary of life. He has difficulty in starting on doing anything or finishing anything on a... at least... reasonable time. What happened? It's like someone just zapped him with a curse.
"Another C?!" Sean's mother, Maia... asked as her eyebrows furrowed, confused and angered. "This is what you get when you play games all the time! Stop your game! No video games for you," Maia scolded, blaming the most blamed thing by parents. Sean was just staring at his marks... disappointed with himself. He should've done better, he knew he can do better.
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As he started to work on his homework cause he already passed the deadline, he couldn't get a single thing done... He couldn't focus. It's like focusing is an impossible thing to do. He couldn't make himself focus. He hated this subject... but if he didn't pass this, he'll fail. He clenched his fists, looking towards a blank paper... he couldn't get off his random thoughts about the conversation he had with Phil and about that kid who's chewing his food too loud.
And these... happened all the time... for years
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There's this one small time, he remembered so clearly until, maybe forever... "Sean... do you bring the book?" his friend, asked. Sean's heart skipped a beat, he had forgotten that there's a literature project.
"Umm... no..." Sean answered.
"What?!" his friend yelled, with rage.
"I'm so sorry..." He said, guilty.
"Sorry doesn't chang anything, you idiot!" Another teammate said in frustration.
"Why bother anyways... It's our fault to trust him..." His friend said.
He was heartbroken.
Because of this, he lost 2 things : his scores and friends. This, also happened all the time. Always forgetting things. Irresponsible.
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End of flashback,
All of that happens continuously until his mother starts to realize or be suspicious at least, that he's not okay...
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He takes the letter and reads it. The answer that he longed for years. He's diagnosed with inattentive type of ADHD, insomnia, and depression. All this time... he had a disorder... three even, but the main one, is ADHD. And the rest, is just moderate to mild leveled and caused by the ADHD itself.
He sits on his bed and rubs his hair. It feels like there's something inside of him that's crushing his heart slowly but, surely. He knows he should be at least relieved that he finally knows what happened to him... but... he doesn't know what he's feeling right now. It's all mixed. He reads the letter...
'the symptoms of inattentive ADHD/ ADD, missing details and becoming distracted easily,'
Everyday...
'trouble focusing, seeming not to listen, daydreaming frequently,'
Everytime...
'regularly losing/ forgetting items needed for daily life, often has trouble organizing tasks and activities,'
Always... This letter just simply sums all of his life.
'difficulty in time management',
speaking of time management ... it's 4.15... Ansell... He sighs in fear. he should've walked faster and not watching the man feeding those birds. Now, he's gonna feel the wrath of Ansell Walter.
"Mom, where's the meds?" He asks.
"The anti-depressants are on your desk, others will arrive in about 2 weeks they say!"
He reads the instructions on the plastic jar and drinks 2 pills. He opens his small wooden box he had put beneath the closet. The box's his personal things that he loves and bought with his days of no lunches, he grabs the cigarette box that he hid below a green cloth (for green screening... He loves editing videos). He takes a cigar and some money and puts it in his pocket. After the project, he wants to buy another cigar box for stock.
He goes downstairs and "mom... I'm going out to work for a project!" He shouts.
"Okay," Maia replies. He goes out and heads towards a nearby bus station.
He notices that the sky is purple and a slight orange, not like the usual. The wind breeze is stronger than usual. Everything is new... just like his feelings. He takes a lighter on his pocket, lights up the cigarette and smokes. He didn't smoke yet and a day feels weird without doing it.
He crosses the road without looking around, just looking straight to the bus station. Suddenly, "move away, kid!" Someone shouts. He looks slightly to the left and sees a truck heading towards him with full speed. He lets out black thunders to surround him. There's no time to run, the other side is too far and the truck is too big and too fast.
Black thunders immediately stun the truck as it's about to hit him any millisecond. The drivers are also stunned... They all surrounded with black thunder, the drivers are in shock, they did not see this coming.
He walks away, almost having a heart attack and almost died. In this world, people are used to this kind of stuffs, like stopping a car or got stopped by somebody's power. Don't worry, It'll go off in about 5 minutes.
He sits on the bus station and checks his pocket. What the he-, he forgets his phone... he just stunned the truck for nothing.
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5.00 PM
He arrives at Ansell's residence. "You're an hour late." Ansell glares at him, sitting at the bench. Well, at least he remembers the name 'Grand lake'. Sean becomes quite used to his glare... He's not the calmest, most patient person. But, why the hell all of the school likes him?!
They walk to Ansell's house and when they arrive, Seanan immediately widens his eyes. Is this even a house? It's a mansion or some sort of modern castle.
Ansell opens the short white gate that you can easily climb over it. Sean comes in. Ans gestures Sean to follow him as he closes the gate. His mansion has a quite big garden full of hyacinths and white roses... there's also a big tree near that window.
They go inside. Sean looks around and the more he looks, the more he feels so poor. The hall is insanely big... The design is so modern and classic black, gray, white themed. And on the end of the hall, there's stairs but, behind it, he can see clearly that it's a swimming pool. Is this a hotel or a mansion?
Ansell opens his laptop room that he already placed on the living room which is on the left side of the front door. "You can sit there..." He points at a sofa, besides him. Sean sits as he still looks around, kinda got overwhelmed. The living room is almost twice as big as his. There's a chandelier made from, probably diamonds and silver, on the middle and a white carpet covering almost the whole room. The sofa (or what they actually call it, 'chesterfield')... this is not a cheap sofa. Basically, you're just seeing a room worth ten thousands or even more. Not to mention the shelves and the little figurines inside it, the big plant on the corner of the room.
"okay... so, we're gonna start this sh*t," Ansell spats. "Do you have any f*cking idea?" He asks, the same question again.
"What is... this about?" Sean asks, the same question again.
"A video for climate change... 30 minutes," Ansell says, holding his anger.
Sean's eyes wide open. He didn't realize nor heard that this is all was about making a video, which is one of the few things that he's interested to and he's been doing. How an idiot... He should've paid more attention. His heart jolts up in excitement as ideas starts to come up, almost immediately.
"Look, if we can't finish this, we'll hac-"
"How about... working on the intro first?... the title, I suggest like a big words in the middle of a green forest then change it to a city/ just a really burnt forest. the intro will explain what is climate change, eh? And.. maybe... umm... you explain, I record..." Sean says, making Ansell a little bit surprised. It's like a completely different person and it's scaring him a little. Does this kid have a split personality or something?
"Do you have a green screen? Like... a green cloth? Or a blue one, that's fine..." Sean asks.
"Oh... I have actually," Ansell says, gaining his spirit and hope that he'll pass this thing.
"Then, we should add some animations..."
"Can you edit it tho?"
"I don't believe I can't...?" he's been practicing and perfecting his editing and animation skills for years, making realistic green screening is easy for him. The lighting, and whatever...
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"After all, life goes on."
-anonymous-
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