text: [Themes: modern, socially important, serious]
  
  Opium, a young Asian male adult living within the chaos of the city in the year 2010. His messy dark hair hanging over his face partly hiding his half opened eyes, as if he was trying to not see the world around him. His body language was curled and hunched over reflecting the way he felt on the inside. His was one of those people where more thought was done then what was said. Always wearing long sleeved shirts with pants; hiding up his weak veins covered in tiny dots and scabs.
  
  [Author's Note: hey, Jackels here. This story is for my english creative assignment, 1000 words. therefore i didn't get to develop into different paths as much as i would of hoped, but there is a main story. Enjoy this short story. This story is about the hardships of living in modern times with depression, with a background message about race and gay acceptance.]
  
  > Begin
  Society is encased in an over modernized and populated city living a 9-5 lifestyle. This is a reality for all when youth slipped away only to get front-faced with the realism of living as an adult, if you can even call it living anymore. More of a sense of being a robot running through its procedures programmed by expectations, debt and an overpowering government, manipulating us into this lifestyle draining away our life by the decades. This reality, this dystopia I want to escape.
  
  > grab a rope
  This world has been feeding of me for far too long, its all building up in my head. I've been feeling the hurt for years. Intense ringing overloading my brain and numbing the rest of this body. I was never like this from the start; it's the system that fucked up my heart. The rope around my neck gets tightened but I don't struggle. Roll back, eyes black out.
  
  > grab a needle instead
  I grab the needle in hope to escape this dystopia by the only way I know how. I know this drug is killing me, but I am already dead in this world. Like a child trying to touch the flame, only to get burnt and suffer the pain. But its all part and price of the game, this is my freedom. My veins are already bludging through the skin by the pure excitement of what is about to unfold. I watch the blood drag back giving me a sense of affirmation to continue to inject this toxic substance letting it flow throughout my body. It gives me a sense of home and familiarity, fulfilling my sense of eleutheromania.
  
  > close eyes
  My eyes are closed. I have left my old realm behind, with only my imagination left to wonder.
  
  > You've escaped
  My mind creates its own world of my ideal utopia. This is my place. My minds eye is wide open as I look around exploring the place I am creating. I gaze around and see untouched nature all around me. Hundreds of different green and brown colours cover my vision. Greenery of trees further then the eye can see with their infinite fractals, never reoccurring texture, pure natural nature of Mother Nature. Without fault, this is what true beauty is. This forest engulfs me with its smell of petrichor.
  
  Looking at these trees I notice that they are all different, twisted or straight, thick or thin. But yet they are trees. People don't judge and are hateful towards trees for looking a certain way, they just accept and appreciate that they come in different forms. Why don't people approach other people in this way? Without it there would be no hurt, hate and increased the murder rate. My eyes are then drawn up to the sky, a partly cloudy sky. With fluffy clouds weightless, motionless chilling in the sky above me. Yet I can tell they are clouds; they come in endless shapes and colours, never reoccurring. With a combination of whites and greys making up the colour of the clouds. People do not disturb their peacefulness in the sky; they admire their individual natural beauty. This is an approach my world is in need of.
  
  I hear a voice not far in the distance softly calling out my name; "Opium...Opium..."
  
  > follow voice
  I decide to investigate that voice calling my name, "why were they calling my name... do I know them?". The voice is leading me through the trees, weaving around them until I reach a clearing amidst the forest I am surrounded in. That's when I spotted him, Davey. He ran towards me with his flowing blonde hair blowing in the wind, smooth like a calm lake on a summer's morning. Eyes with all the blues of the sky. He embraced me with toned arms, wrapping around me, it was a blanket of warm and love made out of a fit white body. I've been deprived of because of fear of judgment. But right now, I felt acceptance and I could not be harmed.
  
  I know this love is forbidden and people can't accept this yet, not even my own family. But it is decaying my life trying to hide this and being prosecuted for who I am; my race, my sexuality. Maybe this is the core issue for the way I am feeling, but I can't change who I am for social expectations, I shouldn't have to.
  
  > go back home
  After long contemplation I come to the conclusion that I must return to my real world and leave this mental utopia behind. It would be wrong of me to enjoy this world knowing that there are people back there that were the same as me; confused, depressed and out-casted for being their true self. I will return though. I will be back for this place, I will be back for my man; Davey.
  
  I lay down in the thick greenery of grass and weeds staring through the cracks of the clouds into the infinite sky. My eyes cease to stay open as I leave this dream reality. I finally awaken and back where colours are mostly grey. I pause for a second... I am not back inside by body. I am floating around it, why? I look closely to my body; it is a dark purple colour, one it should never be. I had overdosed. How can something so blissful kill me? Taking away my perfect reality and my real reality. I knew drugs would ruin lives but never thought it would happen to me. I failed my chance to make a difference and help, but all I will be known for is my selfish pleasure seeking. Its too late now as my soul drifts with the infinite air space into nothingness. At least I have escaped this dystopia once and for all.