I started dying when I was sixteen.

Not of some terminal illness or something like that.

I started dying emotionally. I, simply, lost my will to live. I didn't want to die, necessarily, but life seemed unappealing, I suppose. I was caught in limbo, unsure of exactly how I felt about the scheme of anything. That's when I started to die.

My brain was being worn down by everything, by the prospects of having to go on in the state I was in. I could feel my head going numb, and I knew it in my heart I couldn't go on the way I was, surely. Something would take me early; Time would realize I was a mistake and erase me from existence.

This was of little concern to me, however. After all, who would mourn? My mother and father, perhaps. My brother. No one else came to mind. There wouldn't be dry eyes, certainly, but they wouldn't be not dry for long. No actual grieving.

So, instead I focused my time on going to school, to work, home, then back again the next morning. I found myself in my room more than ever, wishing my life away, tracing with my fingers the pencil lines I had made as a child on the walls, the television on in the background, noise to drown out my persistent thoughts of mistaken existence and worthlessness.

I started spending more time online, as well, clicking and clicking anything I could find to mute the buzzing in my head. I found other things to listen to; people, stories, adventures. Things that were meant to exist. Things that mattered. People listened to them. They were noticed. I noticed them.

I fell into the endless amounts of videos and people and videos and people until the buzzing in my head went silent. Then, I would go to bed; sleep, school, work, home. Again. The buzzing persisted until I silenced it, once again, videos and people.

I went on and on and on, until one night, the buzzing did not go away. The screaming thoughts did not silence.

I was seventeen. I was almost dead.