I got to school.
I am happy and the day is going fine.
Then, right in front of my grade nine business class, where there is a notice board, I see a list of men and their last name, and the in the second column the names of their dad or some other famous person and then in the very end, a number. I turn around and I ask a friend what that number means. He tells me it means what plane number you will be going in. I’m stunned. I ask him what does that mean. He tells me it is the plane number which will take us to Iraq. He is also in plane four. I don’t know what to do. I start panicking. I start thinking surely this is not happening. And that they cannot just send us to Iraq for nothing. I didn’t even enlist. I then am at the four corners and see the screen on which shows that’s its mandatory for every able bodied man to go to Iraq. Everyone was notified before. I wasn’t. I was getting shocked. I didn’t know what to do. I don’t know what my parents would say. Slowly, everyone in the school starts disappearing as every man goes to Iraq. I then go into an empty classroom, where an old-ish Indian lady is cleaning the classroom. I turn to her and say, no one can just take us away, right? I don’t want to go. Give me something to do, I don’t want to go. She turns around and tells me she can let me stay if I can convince another friend as well, and also and then, I’d have to always stay in school. I am just looking at her with one hand on a bookshelf and I slowly burst in tears. I tell her, I don’t want to go there. I love my parents, and I want to stay here. I love everything here. I ask her dramatically, is there any guarantee that I will be allowed to stay here? You tell me! She herself looks sad now. I look at my watch, its three o clock. I have one hour. I tell her she has one hour to change my life. SO please do something. I don’t know what to do. I sit in the benches at four corners. I’m afraid of what will happen if I don’t go. I’m afraid of what would happen if I do go without telling my parents. My cell phone is on me. Somehow, I end up at the base where all the buses are coming in with all the people dressed up in proper soldier suits. I don’t know what to do. The setting is a barren desert-ish landscape. There is a barbed wire type fence at the back. I sit down on a wooden bench. Right behind me, is Tom Cruise. He looks to me and says. There is a woman at the gates, who is selling trinkets. She told me that even if it takes her entire life, she will make the money required and will get her son back from Iraq. I start crying. I then stand up on the bench and decide I will not go, no matter what happens to me if I do stay. At least I will stay with people I love and not fight in a stupid fictitious war.