Ummm... Hi! This is just a very small expansion of Lord of the Flies that I had to write for English class. I did it, like, three hours before it was due (early in the morning) so please forgive me if there are any more errors than I've already noticed and corrected. Also, the finally draft that I saved at my school was originally longer, but this is the version on my mom's personal computer. I can't really remember what I wrote more about in the second part (I know it was important and something I wanted to include, though) and therefore I'm sorry if this doesn't provide the closure that was needed.

Sunset

Ralph's pensive gaze faltered slightly as a large gust of wind came his way, sending thick strands of blond hair through his line of sight. He couldn't care less, it seemed, that the sun was falling below the horizon and that the clouds in the sky began to darken ominously. Couldn't care less about the large estate that stood behind him when his feet finally touched the cold floor of the balcony; couldn't care less that the days on the calendar slipped by without a word as silent whispers greeted him from his door. Ralph simply stared at the skyline, imagining a thick brush of trees in the distance.

"Ralph,"

It was odd how Ralph found it impossible to find his voice whenever spoken to. It was as if his mouth was a large dam, wanting all the water to burst out, but it was too well-protected to accomplish its goal…

"We need to talk,"

His face, a larger dam in which cracks began to build, drips of water seeping into a lake below…

"Ralph…"

And his body was a stone wall fabricated of the concrete underneath him, gripping onto the curved edges of the railing. Strong and hard. Not going to break, not at all…

"Sweetheart, talk to me…"

The boy barely recognized the hand being put on his shoulder. Not the action of it, but the hand itself. It was an unfamiliar surface with thin, gaunt, and soft features. Perhaps he would have remembered it, had it been many a year ago. Now, it was a stranger's hand. The same hand that had carried that same piece of paper that rested upon a desk somewhere nearby that told a tale of a war not unlike one he was fresh out of. The same hand that had wiped uncaring drops of liquid from his face, and the same hand that he had remembered before to be picking up a suitcase and slamming the door whose knob it had grabbed on to with a painful bang.

Ralph's mother stared at him with blue eyes that mirrored his own dulled ones, her lips curving up ever so slightly in a sad, tight, smile in hopes that his own lips would part and say something, anything, with emotion. Anything at all. Such a task proved to be too difficult for Ralph as his throat tightened up once more.

He tried again.

Feeling a sort of sticky wetness coat his lips as he forced them to open and project sound, Ralph asked, "How?" He knew that the stranger knew what he spoke of. It was the only thing she could have known about, after all. "H-h-how did he...?"

"They don't know," his mother said. "all they know is already in the letter."

Ralph stared down at his feet, horrible, red, and darkened images flickering behind his eyes as he squeezed them shut. The things he'd pushed back far, far, into an all-but-forgotten, yet silent, corner of his mind threatened to menacingly peek through the wall he'd built around them for his own protection, for his survival in this forgotten world.

Ralph looked behind him, already knowing that his mother—the stranger—had left as a soft click of the doorknob signaled her departure. He felt something twinge within his chest, ignoring it. The feeling only pulsated more and more as the minutes passed, the room falling into shades of deep blues and dark grays that were only illuminated by the shining moon in the night sky.

I'm here now, aren't I? he reminded himself coldly, Isn't that what I wanted all along? He'd gotten what he wanted, hadn't he? So now he was here, in a place that he'd forgotten, yet coveted like jewels or gold. It was here, in his reach, and he had forgotten how to grasp it! His heart yearned for the company of those he'd lost, and instead he had now the company of a large space that was as empty as a starless sky, with familiar forgotten objects that held no value in his heart, and unfamiliar forgotten company that he wished to have value, but did not.

So Ralph pushed the empty space and the stranger's company into another box in his mind, staring at the nighttime fields below him, the open sky above him, and the concrete ground at his feet as rain began to harshly fall from the heavens as the little diamond-like droplets landed on his face and mixed in with his tears and fell into his mouth as a sob passed through his throat and racked his already-shaking body as he let the walls built in his mind crumble to pieces.

Ralph had never felt so alone.

Feedback/flames/constructive criticism would be largely appreciated. Thanks!

-Juni