"New View" by Joshua P

Continuing on through the struggles is harder than just leaving it to fate, but then again
what is the point of life if one doesn’t persevere even through the hardest of times. These were my thoughts when one of the most tragic things in my life ever happened. I feel the need to warn some of the readers about what I’m about to say because it might bring back some unpleasant memories of the day, but know that I have the purest of intentions when I tell this story. It was an odd and heavy thursday morning when I had woken up from a restless night due to a jam packed night of homework. The air seemed gentle and warm, but the atmosphere didn’t feel right, but me thinking it was nothing went about my daily routine of getting ready for school. When I had arrived at school I noticed that my usual friend group wasn’t were they always hung out so once again in this instant I felt the warmth of the wind, but also a very heavy pressure on mind much like the one, one would Imagine if they had started swimming to the bottom of the sea to scuba dive and the pressure just began to slowly build up. I had arrived entered my first period class and didn’t see my partner in front of me anywhere so I took it as he might have been sick. A couple minutes later he arrived and his faced seemed really red and there was something in the way he walked and sat down and completely ignored my initial try at a hello that made me feel really uneasy due to the previous feelings in the morning. I see him walk to our teacher and explain something to her and she gets somewhat serious, but not to the extent where the whole

class notices but enough for me to see a change in her features. After a while he returns to his seat and puts his head down and our teacher goes on with the lesson. After first period had ended i tried asking him what was bothering him but he refused to give me an answer but instead apologized for not saying hi back and gave me a handshake. In that moment where we were exchanging handshakes i felt his hands tremble as if he had a fever and were stuck in bed because of it. After that I walked to my second period where I still felt fine but weirded out by that transaction between him. Towards the end of class our teacher gives us our homework and sometime to do a bit of it in order to receive help from her on questions we need clarification on. During that time our teacher receives an email and goes to check, but with her I couldn’t see a change in her facial expression so it was much harder to tell if something serious had happened or if it was just something that she needed to read. As she finished reading she told the whole class that there would be a morning announcement during third period and that no other information was given to her in regards to what the news could be so as I left her class my worries began to expand due to the multiple possibilities of something bad happening because of the vibes I had been receiving all day. When arriving to third period, everything seemed fine until ssr was over, after that my reality became a complete disbelief in the world. Mr.Jaramillo had begun his morning announcements, but as opposed to the cheerful and somewhat monotone voice, he began with a heavy inhale of breath and began to tell us that Julius Gallardo had died. My initial reaction was total disbelief and I immediately looked around at my peers to see if any of them had similar thoughts to me and to my reassurance they were all dumb struck. The rest of the period we were left to do nothing because of the news, but to me I just couldn’t register the thought of it. I went over various scenarios in which he could have died, but none were helping

my cause that he had died peacefully. The following period I just sat in my chair absent minded listening to music. I’m glad no one tried to talk to me during that time because I would have either snapped at them or cried for no reason. Then, my last period had arrived and it was AP Physics. I still thinking that none of this was real, expected him to be there sitting at his desk that was one person ahead of me and two to the left and due to their being not enough people in the class I always had a good view of him. It was at this moment that all my built up feelings came out and began crying and not that light cry when your parents used to scold you when you were little, but that cry when you lose someone close to you and the sudden realization that that person will never be able to conversate with you even if it is about how communism should be our government's plan of action. All those sudden memories of how he had helped me in honors history and how he was able to help me barely pass it with a C+ because of a last minute test study session. My mind had shut down and was only open to sadness and weeping, my body slumped in my chair almost all of that period until I remembered that there were others in that class that knew him even more than I did and I immediately got up and went to go comfort them as if we were a family. After that period the school was holding a section of the gym open for anyone looking for mental help and they also had multiple posters in which we could write our last messages to him. After the day was over I went to the car were my dad was awaiting, yes I’m a senior with no car and still get picked up by mama and papa, and once again I wept and explained to him what had happened. He comforted me as best he could, but he only made me cry more because of the things he was saying and he also helped me realize something that at the moment I didn’t. You see that was only the story that changed my perspective on life, but in reality it was bad for me. In my own head I was beginning to feel as though things were piling up

on me at school, work, and my social life which clearly wasn’t good for my mental health. I was beginning to imagine a life were I didn’t exist only because I thought I was a burden to others. I was beginning to have a set up mind on whether or not it really meant anything that I was on this earth. I had seriously and most disappointingly thought about killing myself in order to alleviate the burden of trying to be good in a world that is evil at times it needs not to be. I decided to not tell anyone because if I did they would make a commotion and I really don’t like getting unwanted attention. When it was revealed to me that Julius had done what I had been planning on doing sometime in the future, I instantaneously got rid of that thought for various reasons. One is because I saw all the pain and suffering that it had brought on other students and friends of his and me so I would never wish that upon anyone even my worst enemies. Secondly, I dreaded the thought of leaving my parents to deal with the constant reminder that their son died on their watch, and that they were responsible for it when in reality they had no control over it because of my discreteness with my feelings. Lastly, I felt like there was more to life than just giving up the moment my life became hard, because I am pretty sure that Julius was going through a lot more than anyone of us could have imagined and he probably couldn’t support it any longer and he caved in. He taught me a lesson before, the day of, and after his suicide that I must continue to move on in life because I now know that whatever hardship I am going through, it can’t amount to others who are going through it even more rough in life than I am and that if they can keep going then so can I!