[ WP ] `` I do n't sleep . '' He/She said .

I'm still new to this writing bit... but I ended up with a longer writing piece than I expected! 
 
 Part One: 
 
 When Greg came to my house late one summer night, I knew something was wrong; the rapid-fire ringing of my doorbell and pounding noises coming from my front door shook me from my sleep. 
 
 “ Mr. P! Mr. P? Are you there?! Hello!? ” 
 
 I ’ d just been woken up from a dream about collecting an extremely rare penny that had quickly changed into a quest to find a tropical swamp... well, you know how dreams are. I groaned as I looked at the bright red numbers on the clock near my bed stand. 3AM... who the hell could be knocking at my front door at 3AM? 
 
 A part of me thought about arming myself with a weapon of some sort…what if this was some criminal trying to get into my house, or some junkie or crazed maniac? 
 
 Then again, only students in my classes call me by that nickname. It ’ s either apparently too hard to say “ Mr. Praetorius, ” or the kids at my school are just too damn lazy for their own good. As I cautiously tiptoed towards the front door, I could hear the tense breathing and hyperactive foot-tapping of my late-night visitor. Whoever he was, it sounded like he was having some trouble. 
 
 Looking through the peephole, I saw a disheveled, panicked-looking young man in a dirt-streaked t-shirt and faded jeans pacing around my doorstep. Greg Spencer from 6th Period American Literature two years back. Quiet, sat near the back, rarely talked to the other students in my class. A quiet boy who liked to listen to music on his over-sized headphones during lunchtime and wrote a decent essay when we read books he happened to like in class. 
 
 Quiet Greg Spencer whose parents died in a murder-suicide a little over 4 months ago... quiet Greg Spencer who now rarely came to school, unless ordered by his caseworker or whichever police officer that had happened to catch him wandering around town during school hours. 
 
 I was tempted to have my phone ready to call the police, just in case. This was the first time I had ever seen Greg so distraught and emotionally… raw. 
 
 “ Mr. P, are you there?! It ’ s me, Greg Spencer. I don ’ t know if you remember me, but I was in your American Lit. class a couple years ago. Listen, I really need to talk to you! ” Greg called out. Some lights started to turn on from other houses in the neighborhood, as my neighbors were trying to find out who was knocking on a door at 3AM in the morning. 
 
 “ Hey Greg…of course I remember you! How can I help you tonight? ” I answered through the door, with my hand on the knob. 
 
 “ Listen, Mr. P, I need to talk to you about something important. Look, I know it ’ s really late, and I ’ m really sorry for waking you up so late on a school night, but I really need to talk to someone. ” 
 “ That ’ s fine, Greg. Do you grandparents know that you ’ re here? I ’ d love to invite you inside to talk, but I just want to make sure that you ’ re safe. Are you in any danger right now? How are you feeling right now? ” 
 
 “ My grandparents don ’ t know that I ’ m gone. They ’ re probably asleep right now. I, umm, I ’ m not in any danger or anything, but I ’ m feeling really nervous right now and I don ’ t know why. ” 
 
 “ Okay, okay. Hold on, let me unlock the door. ” I called out. I undid the deadbolt and opened the door. 
 
 He looked a lot worse than what I had seen while looking through the peephole. His hair looked wild, and his eyes had dark circles underneath them. Greg looked like he hadn ’ t slept in several days. A tiny part of me wondered if he was under the influence of drugs or mentally unstable, but I made the difficult decision to invite him in despite my uneasiness. 
 
 “ Come on in, Greg. Are you feeling okay? Is everything alright? ” 
 
 “ Thanks, Mr. P… I ’ m so sorry for coming over so late and so suddenly... ” He seemed to calm down a little bit. There was a sudden weariness that overcame his voice as his entire body seemed to relax a bit. “ I guess I came over here because I needed someone to talk to, and you were the only person I thought who could help me out. ” 
 
 “ Yeah, well, come on in, Greg. Let ’ s talk. ” I motioned for him to come inside, and closed the door behind him. 
 
 He cautiously stepped into my living room and sat himself down on my living room sofa. 
 
 “ What ’ s going on, Greg? What ’ s been happening? ” I asked as I sat myself down onto the old wooden chair that sat opposite the sofa. 
 
 “ I don ’ t know, Mr. P… to be honest, I ’ m a wreck right now. ” He was trying to hold back tears. 
 
 “ It ’ s okay, Greg. Just tell me what ’ s going on. ” 
 
 “ I don ’ t sleep, ” he said, “ I can ’ t. I mean, I ’ ve slept like a baby these past few months…too much, in fact. But after what happened a few days ago, I ’ ve been a wreck. I don ’ t really know what ’ s going on. I feel like my life is complete, utter... SHIT right now. I feel like I ’ m losing control of everything I thought was real in my life, and that there ’ s no purpose for me to even be alive right now! ” 
 
 Greg started to cry, his frustration and anger beginning to overcome him. 
 
 “ What do you mean, Greg? ” 
 
 Greg was sobbing now. “ I mean… I see everyone else and they ’ re so… HAPPY. And it makes me so angry to see everyone going about their daily lives as if nothing in their life ever goes wrong…and I get so ANGRY and jealous that they have so much to live for, while I ’ m sitting in the classroom wondering why my mom shot my dad and then shot herself, wondering whether or not it was my fault that they died, wondering if I even had a real family to begin with, because if I really did have a real family, then why did this have to happen to me?! WHY!? ” Tears were running down his cheeks. 
 
 I handed him a box of tissues, which he took and placed on his lap. 
 
 “ I mean, ” he continued as he took some tissues and started wiping his eyes, “ I thought that if I pushed all my feelings deep down inside me until I couldn ’ t feel them anymore, I ’ d have an easier time coping with everything. ” 
 
 “ You mean, coping with the death of your parents? ” 
 
 “ No, I guess that was just the straw that broke the camel ’ s back, ” he smiled wryly. “ Ever since I was a little kid, that ’ s what I did whenever my parents got into their daily screaming matches. Push it down and don ’ t let it get to you. Better to feel nothing than to give in to the feelings like Mommy and Daddy. You know, after you do it for so long, it becomes natural… normal almost. ” 
 
 I nodded sympathetically. “ It ’ s completely understandable, Greg. Sometimes we don ’ t know what to do, and we hunker down into ‘ Survival Mode. ’ And after a while, you spend so much time in Survival Mode that you forget what it was like to ever be… normal. ” 
 
 What I had shared seemed to resonate within Greg. He added, “... Yeah, when it got really bad, during the months up to…what happened… I got so used to ignoring all the anger and emotions bubbling up inside of me, that it just became... yeah- normal. ” 
 
 He paused to blow his nose with his tissue, and shook his head in disbelief. 
 
 “ I didn ’ t even cry at their funerals, you know? People left me alone, because they figured I needed some space or something. And they all looked at me funny for showing no emotion during the whole funeral, even when the caskets were being lowered into the ground. 
 
 “ And then after the funeral, I just sat around and did absolutely nothing. I felt incredibly numb and life seemed... meaningless. I didn ’ t see a point in school, in trying to do anything about anything… there were days when I just sat in my room and stared at the ceiling, for hours. ” 
 
 “ I ’ m sorry you had to go through that, Greg. No teenager deserves to go through what you had to go through…I can ’ t even begin to understand what you went through... ” 
 
 “ Well, it was manageable, the… coping. Better to feel nothing than to try to let the wave of emotions get to you, right? A little part of me felt actually PROUD that I hadn ’ t shed a tear at their funerals. Fuck them, right? I almost wanted to laugh at times… to tell everyone, ‘ I ’ m GLAD they ’ re gone! They were TERRIBLE parents, and I couldn ’ t give enough FUCKS now that they ’ re out of my life for GOOD! ’... but I knew that I ’ d get a lot of funny looks for saying stuff like that. ” 
 
 “ So, what changed, then? ” I cautiously ventured. 
 
 “ I.. I don ’ t know what happened. I was walking past the soccer field about a week ago, like I ’ ve done a million times before... and I suddenly thought about the time my dad brought me to the soccer field when I was like, 7 years old, and taught me to how to play goalie. I mean, it was seriously like the ONLY time in my entire life that he ever spent time with me alone, father and son. Real Father of the Year material, that guy, you know? 
 
 “ Well, I remember him teaching me to jump and dive for the ball, but I was too scared of falling flat on my face. So my dad showed me how to do it the right way, and he got mud all over himself and panting for breath... he was trying to shout out directions as he was doing this, but ended up looking like some fat, lumbering elephant seal barking around the soccer net, ” Greg smiled. “ And I remember, even at that young age, thinking to myself, ‘ Man, what a fool. He must either really care about me, or really care about proper soccer technique if he ’ s willing to embarrass himself and get himself dirty just to teach me how to dive for the ball. ’ And boy, the fight my mom and dad got into when we came back home covered in mud from head to toe… ” 

