Column 4

I couldn’t sleep last night because I felt like several humans were dancing flamenco in my stomach. When me and Anne went up to read and answer questions, I was shaking a bit and asking myself ‘please please don’t vomit’. It is 8am. I have been lying in bed and staring at my hands. They are tiny. The fog outside is thick enough to hide buildings. Bye bye, buildings. I am playing The At Least Game to try and make myself feel better. It isn’t working. Here:

-at least none of my limbs have been amputated

-at least I am not dead (I might be)

-at least Michael Cera exists

-at least my job isn’t ‘dog thief’

I decide to go outside and try to find fruit. Nowhere is open and I get upset until I realise that it’s only because it’s Sunday. The fog is everywhere. I am walking through clouds and I am not cold because I am pretending to be an oven. Please fill me full of potatoes and meat.

There is a very wet white bench by the fake lake outside the houses of parliament. I wipe it with my tshirt and sit down. Teams of black birds bounce up and under the waterline. I put up my hood and sigh and shiver. Den Haag was fun. My body feels like a large, empty, human shaped bag. I imagine folding myself up until I disappear. I imagine falling into the water and drowning and then my body being slowly eaten by the biggest birds until I’m just a skeleton who someone finds and uses to decorate their new house.

The night before, someone told me a story about the fake island in the middle of the fake lake. He said that once, a man got drunk and rowed out to it and planted a bunch of marijuana plants. And then the plants all started to grow and no one could reach them so they just grew taller and taller. Eventually, they burned all the plants on the island in a large fire. Now it is home to a few sad looking trees.

I’m not sure if that story is true at all.

I think that probably it is not true at all.

That’s okay. I like made up ones.