text: I spent two years in my early twenties obsessing over a single story, one that I must have written countless times and hundreds of pages for, only to throw away each attempt once completed. With each attempt, the story changed length. Sometimes it was several pages long, other times hundreds; nevertheless, the story which I wanted to capture elusively remained the same. I left the story unfinished as a failure, and had nothing to show for two years of work until now: this story is what I ended up with instead. It was originally about a boy; I imagined him between the ages of nineteen and twenty-one; a quiet type, maybe an intellectual had it not been for his grades in school. An uncertain type, maybe even bland to those who didn’t know him well enough. He was the single feature of my story that remained constant. I wanted my story to capture what it felt like to fight depression, and the boy was my outlet to do so, and yet I was so ill-equipped to write the story I wanted. I never even managed to give him a name. The desire to capture a story I knew too well was life-consuming. I was so caught up with writing that with each iteration, story and reality began to mesh together. The boy’s thoughts became indistinguishable from my own. The writing became too personal. I inadvertently ended up laying out my insides on paper. And I realized: I never gave him a name because to do so would be to give up my own. With that realization, I forced myself to stop, and I wrote what I thought would be my last line two years ago. And it was as if by turning away from my story, my life began to move again. I stopped writing for some time, and rediscovered the friends and family who had always been there for me. I started to grow again. The story came back to haunt me though, on a winter morning, years later. I was looking at the desk that I had spent so many hours at, and I remembered. There was a story about a boy--about myself--that I had tried to write. I was no longer that same person, and while a part of me was relieved to have forgotten the worst of it, in giving up on his story, I had suggested an end. It wasn’t the end that he deserved: only because of him could I write the sentence: *I am still alive*. I had forgotten about him. I decided I would give him an ending, one that would celebrate the past, that would celebrate growth, celebrate the continuity of life, so I sat down at my desk. I drew a blank page. He drifted down the sidewalk back to his apartment in a haze. The frost collected on his boots and chilled his toes. Nothing had happened that day, just like nothing happened the day before, and the day before that. He had been left behind, and there was nothing left to feel. Maybe if he hadn’t been so lonely, he’d feel something other than tiredness. Except he felt nothing except tiredness. He hadn’t slept in weeks. What was it like to not be tired? The boy couldn’t remember. His vision swayed as he reached the front of his apartment building. The blood rushed to his head and he felt as if he were going to pass out. He sat down on the steps and a thought interrupted his mind. It took over and filled him with fear and disgust and also longing. It was a thought that hung from the ceiling, and he tried to look away. He got up from the steps and moved on towards his front door. As I continued to write at my desk, I heard the thud of my own front door closing. My chance to finish the story was suddenly threatened by some unknown housemate, who could burst in at any moment. I wanted to yell out, “Please don’t disturb me! I’m writing,” but I knew it would be futile: someone who should not be in my story would find his way in. I began to write faster, and my handwriting became sloppy and illegible--all the while spilling words onto the page--and somewhere in the rush, I ripped the page I was writing on. Ripping a page feels like spilling a drink. The medium is violated. The unbroken page is a barrier that protects a story, unadulterated, from the outside. To rip a page, then, reminds a story of its physical nature: it brings the story into physical being. When I ripped my writing, I panicked. The story rushed to an end, and I tried to patch together a conclusion from the confusion of broken pages and memories and stories. I heard the seal burst with the squeak of my bedroom door knob. I swiveled around in my chair prepared to confront whichever intruding housemate stood in the door, frustrated and confused, only to be taken aback. The boy stood in the doorway. He had a surprised look on his face, but he was without a doubt my own creation. He didn’t look like me; I had imagined him as looking better than me; being better than me. He was beautiful but he didn’t know it. “Oh, I... I must’ve walked into the wrong apartment without thinking... mine must be the one next door... I’m sorry.” He stammered. I wanted him to stay, so I said, “No, no, please stay for a moment. I could use someone to talk to for a few minutes.” “Oh... okay.” He said. I sat there shivering in my boxers, my body twisted in an awkward fashion towards him. The chair squeaked when I shifted my bodyweight. Across the room, he stood, expecting me to speak, then he made an uncomfortable shuffle as if he were afraid of what I had to say, and at that moment, all I wanted to do was hold him and stroke his head. I wanted him to know how much I loved him--to know how much he was loved--so much so that I let my emotions overwhelm me, and blustered out what I knew he needed to hear: “You’re not a waste to anybody.” He looked confused but thanked me nonetheless. Too embarrassed to make eye contact, I looked down at my feet, frustrated at myself for making such a strained and bumbling attempt to comfort him. He did not know who I was. I tried to calm myself, and repositioned my chair to face him fully. He must have seen the writing materials because after a moment, he gestured to the space behind me and asked tentatively: “What are you writing about?” “It’s a story about a boy, and his attempts to deal with the life he has. I’m in the middle of my story, but I haven’t really thought of an ending to it yet,” I replied. “How long have you been writing it?” “I started years ago, but I destroyed most of what I had written for it, so I’m starting again.” “You weren’t satisfied with your work?” “No, I wasn’t, but the more important thing to me is that I keep writing.” “That’s good. I recently picked up writing myself, but every time I try to write, I also end up unhappy with my work. I must have written a hundred pages by now.” “What do you write about?” I asked. “I keep trying to write about my own life. Trying to get these feelings I have onto paper. I’ve been having these thoughts, and I’ve made some mistakes, so I guess I’ve been having kind of a tough time and I’d like to put it into words.” “I tried writing about myself for some time, but I didn’t realize how harmful it would be to my own health.” “What do you mean by that?” he asked. “It treated it as a way out of the worst part of my life, but eventually, it was what kept me from moving on. I kept coming back to it because it was what defined me. Writing about it felt like I was reliving it.” “I’m sure it hurt.” I smiled sadly. “Like you wouldn’t believe.” “It helped you though, right? When you needed it most?” “Writing saved me. The boy in my story saved my life. I’m trying to move on though. My work reminded me of *that* period of my life, but I want to feel whole again. I’m finally about to finish what I started years ago.” I said. Then I pointed to the story on my desk. “This story is going to be the end.” “I see. I’m hoping that writing might save me too.” He paused for a moment, afflicted with a feeling I knew too well: the fragile hope of someone nearly resigned. On the verge of tears, I leaned forward and tried to study his face, to commit it to memory. I knew this encounter would be the last time I would ever see him: it felt as if the space between us, the space between my desk and the door, the space between the lines of writing, was expanding. Traversing the space of memory with words and sentences seemed to take an increasing amount of energy. Eventually, we would pass a critical moment when our words would never reach the other side, and the story would come to an end. It took me a few more moments to say the line I had been waiting to say to him: “It’ll be alright.” When he spoke, his voice came from a distance: “Thank you.” He paused again and shifted his weight a little bit before he spoke again. ”Listen, I’ve got to get back to my apartment. Thanks for talking to me for a bit, and thanks for the advice; if that’s what you would call it.” I sat up straight again. “No problem, and... could you close the door when you leave, would you?” “Sure. And thanks, again.” I watched my door shut and heard the latch click and lock. Struck with shock, I turned around to face my desk again. Looking down at the page I had been writing, I recognized that my story, the one that I began writing both years ago and earlier that morning, was nearly complete, except it needed a final line; one to acknowledge the end to all those years I spent so long ago too afraid to move. It had to be a line I could shout from rooftops. So I sat very still for another moment, thinking, and afflicted by the bittersweet swells that seem to accompany the endless growing pains of my life, it came to me. Suddenly, I whirled around. “This is the last story I will ever write about you!” I yelled through the closed door, but he was already gone.