I originally didn't want to share this work publically, but I decided that maybe it would be a good thing to share. I wrote this my senior year of high school when we were told to write about a fear that we had and how we faced it.

Shadows were cast around the room. There was nothing but absolute silence. It was vociferous. It was suffocating. I was left with nothing, but the darkness of my room and the abyss that is my mind. I tried to think of something happy. It's just ... Everything that I find blithe always ends. There's always an end. An end. The end. My end. Death ... My death ... My breath caught in my chest as my mind went from a midnight abyss to a dark, deleterious void. There was nothing. I couldn't breathe. I felt dead. There was no feeling in my body. I was dead. Oh, God. I was dead. What was going to happen? I couldn't handle it. I felt tears on my face. It was dark. There was just a black void. I was dying; I wasn't going to see light anymore. My mind drifted further. What is death like? Nothingness. I was becoming nothing. I won't be remembered. I won't remember. Even if it's not the end, I won't be me anymore. I will be nothing. My life had barely begun and it was already ending. The thought left a bitter taste in my mouth.

I blinked. My room had returned. Tears stung my eyes. My face was aching. My nose was running. My head hurt and I just wanted to go to sleep, but the darkness around me was as familiar as that horrifying void. I reached blindly toward the dim light of my clock and felt around until I felt the familiar leather case of my Kindle. I immediately held the power button and sighed in relief as the light filled the room. My eyes found the clock on the shelf. 11:00 ... Well, looks like I'm going to be awake until midnight ... Heart-heavy and eyes leaking, I typed my passcode into the device instinctively. I opened YouTube and found the stupidest and funniest videos possible. I continued to watch videos until all thoughts of anything related to my previous panic had faded into the back of my mind.

I was kept safe with the light shining around me for at least another hour. My eyes were starting to get heavy. I yawned. I promised myself that I'd go to sleep after one more video. It was to make sure that I was going to go to sleep. My heart clenched slightly as I remembered my panic. I sighed and stared at the screen. The video ended and I shut my safety net down. I put it back on its shelf and sighed. I pulled my blankets onto my body and curled up tightly. I tried to relax my mind. I tried to think of nothing. Not the nothingness that I feared, but a welcoming one. My mind started to wander; but though my thoughts had started to approach the dreaded topic, I had drifted off before the topic had reared its ugly head.

That night repeats a lot. My mind was on an endless loop. I was stuck on repeat. It was an endless time loop of panic and suffering that I couldn't escape. Though, lately, the panic has been lessening and it doesn't happen as often. I don't know if that means I'm getting over it or what, but I've finally been able to sleep peacefully most nights.