I remember everything being just fine.
I remember yesterday getting up for work, having breakfast and watching the mailman drive by as he threw some white rectangles into my rusting mailbox. I remember pulling out of my driveway and having to stop for the kids who were running and laughing on the sidewalk that crossed through it; myself driving down my street, watching my neighbors herding their kids from foreign yards and getting into their cars to go to work like me. I remember being stuck in traffic on the highway, with close-knit-cars packed together, their drivers swearing and hitting their steering-wheels--I was only two minutes away from work then. I remember the smell of the office, my associates walking like swarming fish around me, with their heads down looking at copious stacks of white-and-black paperwork. I remember being handed some of my own paperwork, from an associate of a higher position than me, taking it, reading it, completing it, and filing it on the computer. I remember taking my lunch break, eating my mess-of-a-sandwich of turkey, lettuce, and cheese that I threw together yesterday morning. I remember getting up from my table and heading back for the last-half of the day. I remember doing more paperwork and looking over a project that needed to be looked over. I remember looking at the clock, reading only five minutes until my shift was over, and I get to go home. I remember seeing the second-hand hit five-o’clock, and I was already logged off and heading out of the zoo of cubicles and out the door. I remember driving home on the same highway in the morning, still congested with traffic and swearing drivers. I remember turning onto my street, seeing more kids running and playing with toys of a colorful nature. I remember seeing my neighbors smiling and nodding at me as I pulled down my street, just a few houses from mine. I remember turning left into my driveway, driving uphill into my opened-garage. I remember flipping the T.V. on and watching it--myself just trying to forget the haul of the day. I remember looking out the window at the fading sky, of such a black and purple hue. I remember eating my dinner, a good home-cooked meal that I whipped-up from scratch. I remember reading the newspaper after I ate, musing at the different stories. I remember checking my clock, it reading eleven-o’clock, and I remember myself going to bed, falling asleep in my cold sheets, and my dark room. But most of all, I remember everything being just fine.
I woke up to the sound of my alarm clock--it being six-thirty in the morning, with the dawning light from the sun soaking in through the curtains. I placed a heavy hand on the “OFF” button with sleepy remorse. As I sat up on my bed, the covers shifted and fell around me--just like any other day.
My hair was still wet from the five-minute shower I took when I was eating my breakfast. I looked out the window for the mailman, but did not see him in his little white-truck drive up to my mailbox. I thought this odd, for every morning he comes at this time to deliver me my mail. I shook the thought away with my head and went to the garage for my car.
I switched open the garage door and got into my modest-looking car. I stuck the key in the ignition and put it in reverse and down I went down my slanted driveway. I looked in the rearview mirror--no kids. I didn’t hear any kids laughing or playing anywhere in the whole street. I turned my head and looked from right to left down either sides of my street--empty.
Absolutely no one was there. I backed out fully and hit the button on my fold-down mirror in my car and the garage door hummed down. No parents or adults were outside with their children; nor were they getting into their cars; as a matter of fact, my car was the only one on the street. Above all, it was quiet.
I drove slowly past the pale houses, stretching my neck to look in any uncovered windows or doors. Of what I could see in those that were not protected by curtains, were just normal rooms, with every necessity one could need--besides the ones needing those necessities.
Inside the houses, they looked dark. Like no lights had been turned on. They also seemed to be staring at me, like their dark windows were their eyes, staring evilly at me for something that I am doing. I rolled out of my street, and went on.
The highway had no cars on it. It was just empty. Not even a six-laned highway had a car on it, only mine. I drove down it slowly, although I could have driven down it at any speed I wanted, it just felt like I should drive slowly, in case I might miss something. I turned left on my usual route to the road that leads to my work--a very tall building, with white walls and black windows--without signaling. I looked up at the stop lights above the intersection--there was no light in them. They looked perfectly fine, like no one had touched them, but there were no lights in them, just dark.
I rolled through the intersection and looked both ways, saw nothing alive or moving, and rolled into the parking lot.
The parking lot was the same, except there were no cars, just like on my street, and just like on the highway. I parked in my usual spot, and for some reason, locked my car. I walked up to the front doors, often spinning around and looking behind me in case I might see someone. I pulled open the doors with caution and walked in.
The main lobby looked the same; it had the same smell, the same chairs and couches, and the same painting of the vase full of red and orange flowers; just no people. I walked over to the elevators and hit the up-button. One of them was closed, the other was already stopped at about six inches before closing. I looked in the open one, but found only a dark and empty room. The up-button never reached the elevators.
I turned to the stairs and opened the door to the concrete steps in front of me. The room was cold and almost completely dark. I decided I had to go up to my floor to see if that too was empty. I headed up, with my hands feeling for the walls. At about five minutes after entering the towering staircase, I felt for anything that seemed like a door. I reached one. I opened it with a flooding heap of sunlight nearly blinding me, burning my retinas. After squinting and rubbing my aching eyes, I looked at the sign next to the door: Floor 7, it read.
My face distorted, “Floor seven?” I said aloud. I was clearly disappointed. I had been shambling up those black stairs for minutes and I only got to Floor 7? I should have reached Floor 20 by now! I rubbed my forehead, whimpered, and headed back into the staircase.
Now I should be somewhere, I thought. Myself shuffling through the blackness. The concrete is so cold, my hands kept telling me. I felt for a door, my hands sliding over the concrete bricks. When I felt it, I didn’t even have to think twice. The cool metal door handle struck my hand with a faint ache, I twisted it, and the sunlight hit me. I put my arm over my face, and once my eyes had adjusted to the late-morning sun, I looked on the sign next to the door. Floor 23, it read. I smiled and pointed at it, happy that I was only nine floors away from reaching my own. I quickly turned around and looked at the floor. Then I ran back into the ominous staircase.
I could feel the air get slightly colder, the heating system must not be as strong up here, I thought. I kept on shuffling through the blackness, a couple times almost tripping over too-steep of an invisible step. I felt along the gray walls, trying to count how many doors I felt as I walked up each floor--although, I might have lost count a couple of times. My hand hit something familiar, I opened the door. I saw the sun staring at me, and my eyes contracted, and I threw down my head to save myself from the sight. I could see the holes in my retina in front of me, in oblong shapes and in colors of blue and yellow and magenta. My eyes were immediately burned, and when I looked through the fading shapes to see that I was on Floor 31, I fell to my knees and screamed. “Where are you?” my voice shook through the floor. “Isn’t anybody here?” I pounded the ground with my fist, and I headed back into the staircase for one last floor.
I felt carefully then recklessly as I ran up the stairs, my state-of-mind changing with every pounding step that I thrust my foot into the concrete. I fell onto the door, beat at the handle, and swung it open.
I threw my head to the side before the sun could kill my sight and looked up at the sign, Floor 32, it said. I almost smiled when I saw it and pointed at it with a feeling that was similar to hatred. I had finally made it.
I turned around and looked at my floor. There was everything: all the cubicles, and swivel-chairs, and stacks of paper--of which most of them were spilled onto the floor, but it was empty. I slowly walked through the main hall made by the tight cubicles and looked in each one. Chairs were as they were yesterday, neat and upright; although some of the phones were out of their sockets, and were hanging off of the desks by their cords. Thoughts grew in mind, I became hysterical. I ran through the hallways made by the cubicles, throwing my head in each one to see if one person was in them. No one! “Where are you!” I yelled, “Why is no one here?” I fell against a cubicle-wall, hung my head, and began to cry. Before long I had shaken myself out of this fit, and moped my way over to the staircase-door.
I looked back at my empty floor, with the paper littered on it. It was empty, it was nothing. It looked otherworldly, a place usually thriving with so much life, now empty and deprived of any consciousness movement. I hung my head, and walked into the staircase.
It took me a while to get down to the lobby, it being the early afternoon; but, when I did, I was ready to just get in my car and drive as far as I could, looking for life. I walked through the parking lot to my car, and instinctively unlocked it. I plopped down into the drivers seat, shut the door, and stuck the key in the ignition. It wouldn’t start. I tried again and again, twisting the key in the outlet, but not even the engine gave a whisper.
My face distorted, I rested my wrists on the top of the steering wheel, and began to swear. I hit the steering wheel with my palm, threw open the door, and left my car, with the key in the ignition.
I ran through the parking lot and onto the road leading to the highway. I was unexpectedly tired and slowed to a walk when I got to the intersection; I shambled to the middle of it. I looked around unbelievably, turning from my right to my left, from in front to in back. I stopped towards the direction of my house, “Where is everybody?” I shouted. No one answered.
I stumbled through the highway back to my house, which took an extremely long time. I would often have short spurts of running, then would slow to a shuffling gait, and would also shamble from one side of the highway to the other, making invisible zig-zag patterns on the hot concrete. The sun also seemed to stare directly at me. The heat was enormous, and I was bathed in sweat from when I first walked onto the highway. I was also incredibly thirsty. My throat burned and my lips contracted, at times I became very lightheaded. But the thing that I was most concerned about was to find other people--or at least another person. I honestly did not know why this was happening, why I was the only one left in my town. Where could they all have gone? Were they taken way? Were they killed? Is everyone on vacation, and I never got a brochure? Whatever it was, I didn’t know, but wanted to desperately.
“Hello!” I screamed as I bent over the side of the highway, looking over one that was running underneath it. “He-llo?” I boomed over the side. “Is anybody. . . is anybody there?” I said as I began to shamble and trip to the middle of the highway. “Somebody! Can’t you hear me?” I almost fell when I looked up, “Oh,” I said, my neighborhood was coming into view, I ran towards it. I must have looked insane, running with arms and legs flailing down the middle of the highway to some tree-lined suburbia. I ran into the main road and tripped and fell in the gravel.
“Ahhh!” I screamed, not from the pain, but more from the experience of falling. I got up to my knees, feeling almost defeated, and flung my head around to see if anybody was watching. “Are ya’ just gonna’ stand there?” I screamed to empty houses and rolling yards. I almost knew that no one was there, but just in case, that is why I said that. Again, I almost figured that the houses and yards and the things in the yards were watching me, were all staring at me with hidden yet glaring eyes, like some overwhelming force against a minority. I got up, and threw a choked scream that died too quickly at all of the things that were staring at me--their eyes didn’t blink.
I limped with one foot trailing behind me down my street; yelling at every individual house that I passed. Finally I came to my own house and looked up at it, it sitting on a small hill, with its steep driveway. I limped up it, with my shoulders making obtuse circles to avoid some of the pain from the heat and fall. My face was twisted into that of a madman’s--my eyes twitching and unblinking, my mouth fixed into something of a distracted smile and frown, my skin soaked with dirty sweat, and my hair falling over my forehead, coated in a thick grease. I went up to the garage, flipped the cover of the garage-opener up, and punched in the code. It didn’t work. I tried it again. It didn’t work. Again. It didn’t work. I tried it several more times, and yet it still did not work. I thought. I knew. I squatted down and hinged my fingers underneath the little handle on the garage door. With all of the strength that I possessed, I yanked it up a few inches before having to grab the bottom of the door, myself squatting down again to get more leverage. I panted and coughed--and almost puked--but through some lost power, I pushed the garage door over my shoulder, ducked underneath it, and let it fall with a CLANG! I stood there, in my garage, in the dark, looking at my garage door; I spit on it, then walked to the door leading into my house.
Everything was how I left it this morning, still and dark. The machines in the kitchen did not work when I pressed their buttons, nor did any other electronic device in my house work--nor, when I sat down on the couches in the living room, did they feel the same. My house had a gray-darkness to it that I had never seen before; it was quite literal, and it invaded everything. At that, I  laid down on my couch, and fell asleep.
When I woke up it was dark. I sat up through a heavy sleepiness, with my eyes almost shut from the sands that they produced, looked out my livingroom-window, and saw the sky as black as charcoal. There were no stars out, not even one twinkle of light in that black sea. I slowly got up like I had gotten too little sleep, and shuffled over to my kitchen. I was surprisingly not hungry, but decided to check my fridge anyway. When I opened it, I knew something was off.
Although it was pitch-black, I could tell that there was something different about my fridge, like something was wrong. I squinted, and when I saw the slightest sign of bizarreness, I reached my hand in, and felt around. Nothing. All of my food was gone. My eyes widened into a glare, I at once hated whoever had done this to me, although I was not hungry, that was my food, and they had stolen it. I took my hands out and mumbled something vulgar.
I stumbled into my garage, and without thinking of taking any other way, I ran to the garage-door, and began that feat of strength again.
The door slammed down on the ground with a breaking force, I looked back and saw that it had multiple cracks, and one large hemorrhage in the middle of which only blackness passed out. I shambled down my steep driveway, making sure not to fall down the sloping concrete. Once I had gotten off of my property, I didn’t look back as I stumbled through my street, in the opposite direction of which I went to work.
This part of the street was heavily guarded with trees; they would cross over the street and touch in midair, like two embracing emotions. Their leaves would occasionally fall all throughout the year, making a new green-floor in the summertime, of which that season was now. I walked under them, not being able to see them that well in this pitch-black, without any helping light from the stars. I began to stroll down the street, peering at the houses that seemed so invisible. As I got to the end of the street, I began to see lights. I stopped for a moment, smiled, and ran to them. I ran from my street that fed into Main Street, and then into the main part of town.
Some of the lights of the shops and street lamps were on and I could hear distant music playing somewhere. I ran stumblingly down the sidewalk towards a candy shop. There were the usual red and white lights flashing on its candy-painted walls, and I threw open the door and shambled in.
There were some lights on, but it was mostly dark. I walked to the counter but saw no candy; not even the smell of candy was in the old air of the place. I spun around and walked from every shelf on every wall, and saw the huge painted faces of clowns and of smiling candy staring down at me from childish-colored walls. “No candy,” I said, and decided to look once more on the counter. All of the boxes and trays were empty, and I threw them on the floor. They shattered with a definite sound. I tripped out the door, and ran across the street to the clock shop.
The Olde Style lights above the walnut-door shown yellowley out onto the cream-colored sidewalk. I opened the door like it had never been locked before and stepped into a looming maze of wall and grandfather clocks. I stared at them, tall and dark brown, with their golden guts of wheels and springs. I looked each of them in the face, but saw none of their hands moving. They were all stopped at different times, and I became hysterical, ran over to one of the tall grandfather clocks, and said: “C’mon! You got to tell me the time! You gotta!’ When it didn’t answer me, my face fell serious, and I stumbled out of there backwards, nearly falling over in the street.
I heard the music again. It sounded playful and happy--it came from the carousel. The carousel was down at the end of Main Street, it being one of the main sights of the town fair that would take place for a week once a year in the summer, of which that fair would be here in a couple of weeks. I ran with my limbs flailing in the hot darkness, running crazily down the gray road that ended in the carousel and the other fairgrounds. The lights became brighter, and as I saw its abstract shape shining in the darkness, I noticed too that it was not moving.
I almost ran into it if I hadn’t stopped right at the face of a metal horse, looking at me with a kind of disengaged hate. The whole thing was shining bright with the thousands of lights that spread around its canopy, base, and columns into the night. It gave off a sort of aura, of yellow. The music of the carousel did not cease, although no usual movement accompanied it like it should.
I began to run around the circular toy, giving myself support with every small push of the columns that helped to stand the canopy up. I started asking if anyone was there, looking at every horse and swan and mythical creature that was impaled on this child’s attraction; no one answered. All of the animals on the carousel seemed to stare at me, when I realized this, I backed up slowly into Main Street. “What?” I shouted, “What do you want with me? What? What is it?” they kept on staring. “No,” I said and turned around and ran down Main Street, “NOOO!” I ran down with my arms and legs flailing, looking like a live animal in a frying pan. I finally tripped, and fell in the middle of Main Street, kneeling on the concrete.
“WHERE IS EVERYBODY?” and I fell over and fainted.

Dr. Miles was looking over some paperwork when an assistant came bursting in: “He’s down.” Miles looked up, dropped his paperwork on his desk, and ran with the assistant to the main viewing-area. Everyone was already there, looking on the huge screens at the man-down in the middle of Main Street.
“When did this happen?” asked Miles.
“Just now.” said Dr. Dufresne.
“Show me it, I want to see.” said Miles. They rewound the tape; Miles watched as the man ran into the dark of Main Street, fell to his knees, screamed, and fainted. “Good--everything looks like it is going well.”
They turned the feed of the video back to live, and men sitting in rows of desks began writing and scratching things down in their notebooks and putting them on file. The man was still down in the middle of the street, just slumped over and sleeping.
“Alright,” began Miles, “good job everyone! Now back to work!” at that, he went back to his office.
After about five minutes of going through stacks of paper of facts and information, Dufresne came to Miles’ office, knocked, and was let in. Miles was standing up, still looking over sheets of information that were attached to his clipboard when Dufresne said: “How well has he done?”
Miles looked up: “Very well, but for certain, we really can’t say.”
“He was alone in his town--”
“Yes, that was always the objective; it is really true that if you take away people, one will go mad.”
“Yes, we seem to have proven that, will we try again?”
“I think we will have to.”
“But with him?”
“The research hasn’t shown us if that would be necessary, but to further the journey with him, that could pave new roads in this field.”
“What will happen to him next--will we take him out, and bring back everybody?”
“We might--or we might not, you see, this case with him can really go either way, he played the game how some of our researcher’s hypothesis were explained, so either he still could succeed, or he could fail.”
“But he hasn’t done that bad--has he? I mean what else could someone do all alone in their town?”
“We don’t really know, he played the game, and only further research will tell.”