Pain. It’s coursing through my body. The electric shocks spread through my body as I get brought back to life. again.

13 months. I’ve been stuck here for 13 months. Stuck in this hospital. Stuck in this room. Stuck in this bed. Most patients can go outside in a wheelchair, get some fresh air every once in a while. But I can’t. Oh, the joys of possibly dying at any moment. It’s so great, I really recommend it. I can’t even have visitors, and the doctors can only come in if I start dying again.

Isolation. I always thought I would like it since I’m not much of a people person. But being isolated for 13 MONTHS, not fun, even if you hate people. The last time my dear mother visited she suggested that I write an autobiography since I’m probably dying soon. What a great idea. I guess I should start then by introducing myself. I’m Tourn Paepair, a 17-year-old girl who’s been stuck in an isolated hospital bed for 13 months because I have this highly infectious disease that apparently could kill me at any minute and will immediately kill anyone who comes in direct contact with me. It’s called sudorapthinianworsintian or something like that, I wasn’t really paying attention to the doctors when they told me.

Doctors. They are amazing honestly. They’ve had 13 months to come up with a cure for this disease and they’ve already come up with... absolutely nothing. 13 months of research. 13 months of me being stuck in an isolated hospital bed. 13 months of my parents and sister worrying about me. Whenever they revive me they are always nice enough to tell me the date so I can keep track of how long I’ve been in here. All I have in here is this notebook and pencil, that I’ve been using to write this wonderful autobiography and count the days that I’ve been stuck in here.

Autobiography. My dear mother wants me to write about my life so that when I die and they can’t revive me, all that I did will be recorded. Not that I did anything that great. You know, just saved a country from absolute destruction using only a paperclip. Well 13 paper clips, actually. How? Well, I guess I am supposed to be talking about that.

Paperclips. I’ve loved them since I was little. They’ve always been so useful, something I’ve aspired to be. When my little sister Creisad was born, I thought she would have the same fascination with paper clips that I do. Instead, she got fascinated with staples. I never understood her fascination with staples, paper clips always seemed so much better. But her staples didn’t help save the country, my paper clips did.

Saving. If someone told me when I was little that I would save a country with 13 paper clips, I wouldn't have believed them. I would be excited because, well paper clips, but I wouldn't have believed it. It sounds crazy, saving the country with 13 paper clips. But it’s true. Ok, it took a bit more than just paper clips, but it was mostly the paper clips. At least it started with the paper clips. In a place, possibly worse than this isolated hospital room, high school.

School. I never really liked it, 13 years of grade school and then 4-6 more years of college. Not for me. But I guess that’s over for me anyway. It all really started in sophomore year, in history class. We started learning about World War 2. We got a project where we had to research and present about any topic during the World War 2 time period. So, being me, I immediately started looking for something about paper clips during World War 2, while recruiting my friend Tlacut to help me. And we did, something done by a wonderful group of people.

Norwegians. I love Norwegians. They were the ones who created the wonderful invention of paper clips, and then used them in rebellion during World War 2. Giving me the idea for the rebellion that I started. The Norwegians led to me saving my country, which is pretty great if you think about it. Tlacut and I really, we worked together leading the rebellion to victory.

Rebellion. There’s been so many in history, I can’t keep them all straight. But I can tell you all the details about this rebellion. While my paper clip fascination was happening in my childhood, there was a lot going on in the government. Things became more corrupt, more awful things started happening. Once I got to high school it became blatantly obvious that there needed to be change. And I wanted to lead that change. Tlacut and I learned about the Norwegian rebellion, how the symbol drove the people. We realized how our nation needed a symbol, and how paper clips could be that symbol. On the day of the presentations, there were 13 people, each with a paperclip pinned to their shirt. Tlacut and I had gotten 11 of our friends to also pin paper clips to their shirts. 13 people. 13 paper clips.

Teachers. They shape our minds, tell us to be creative, then punish us when we do it in a way that they don’t like. Our group got in trouble for starting the rebellion, but it was already started. The next day, 34 people had paper clips pinned to their shirts. The day after that, 125 people. By a week after the presentation, all 1000 students in the school had paper clips pinned to their shirts. A week after that everybody in all the schools nearby had paper clips pinned to their shirts, not only in school, but all the time. It spread throughout the country like wildfire, despite the government trying to stop it, even banning paper clips from being out in the open. But that didn’t stop the rebellion. We wore our paper clips proudly, and cops looked the other way, pinning their own below their badges.

President. That title holds so much power. But when I first met the president, he didn’t seem that powerful. He seemed scared of little 15 year old me. The girl who started a rebellion with paper clips. the girl who was able to bring a corrupt nation to its knees and create a stronger one in its place in only a matter of months, though he didn’t know that yet. He tried to convince me to stop the rebellion, to make peace. I told him that’s exactly what I was doing, because there was no peace in the nation. The look of fear in his eyes was priceless. It was the thing that kept me going during the rebellion.

Fighting. Now, most rebellions have 2 sides and a lot of fighting. This one didn’t. Everyone had already known the country was a mess, they just didn’t know how to lead it to a tidy system. But I did. I created history. I changed the world when I was only 15 years old. I created this new society, a new country where life is so much better for all.

Society. It’s judgemental and always has been. After the new government was in place I got a lot of judgment from society, wondering why directly after the new government was in place I didn’t try to change the world again. Why I wasn’t doing anything amazing. Honestly, I was tired. Organizing and leading a rebellion is a lot of work. I wanted to nap, for a long, long time. If only I was allowed to.

Smiles. I must have smiled and posed over a million times for photos after the rebellion. Photo after photo. All the photos and interviews were suffocating, especially since it meant being with people, which is awful. I needed an escape. And my favorite escape growing up besides organizing my paperclip cache has always been swimming. I was in a random town for one of the thousands of interviews I had to do, all of them asking the same questions. I desperately needed to go swimming, but there was no pool where I was staying. So I snuck out one night, down to a lake in the middle of the woods. I don’t know how I found it, I’ve just always been good at finding lakes and ponds. And I went swimming, for probably the last time in my life. Swimming for hours and hours, not knowing that it would be my last day in the outside world.

Science. It was never my favorite subject, so I never really paid it much attention. I just saw it as something that took time from me that I could have used collecting more paper clips. So when the doctors were going on about my disease and how it was caused by some parasite that crawled up my nose into my brain while I was swimming, I wasn’t exactly a happy camper. Not even a slightly cheerful camper. I was a downright miserable camper.

People. I’ve never really liked them. Growing up I thought I would be perfectly fine if everyone else just went away and I was left alone. But now that it’s actually happened, that I’ve had to go 13 months with no people, I would give anything for any human interaction. I want someone to talk to. To laugh with. I want Creisad. I want Tlacut. I want my parents. I want any human interaction. I want to be talking to real, live people. Not this piece of paper that I’m writing on. Talking about this one thing I did 2 years ago. I want some human interaction besides people bringing me back to life every time I die.

Freedom. I’ve given it to the rest of the country, yet I am deprived of it. I want it. And I want it now.

“Let me out!” I scream, my voice hoarse after not being used in 13 months. “Let me out right now I want to get out!” I scream as loud as I can, praying someone saves me from this. “I don’t care if I die, I want to get out! Let me out, you evil humans!”

Response. That’s all I was looking for. Just a voice. Saying something, but instead, I get silence. I get even more silence that I can’t escape. I’m trapped here inside this hospital, with no sunlight, no clocks, no people. With no sound. Silence for 13 months, minus being told the date after every time that I die.

Cure. That word has been giving me a flicker of hope since I was trapped in here. But there is no cure. They’re not going to find one, not even trying. Just keeping me safe from other people and keeping me alive until the spirit of the rebellion goes away and it’s okay for me to die. But they don’t get that.

Pencil. They’re sharp. What I’ve been writing with all this time. Writing this autobiography. That’s actually turning into a suicide note I guess. This one’s especially pointy. Looks like my dear mother knew what she was talking about. guess it’s time to say goodbye. There’s no point in my life anymore. The rebellion has Tlacut, it can live without me. I did this to myself. I was dead the minute I started swimming in that lake. Now I’m going to die for real. And stay dead.

Goodbyes. Saying goodbye is painful sometimes, but necessary. It’s time to say mine. Goodbye world. Goodbye Tlacut. Goodbye Creisad. Goodbye mom and dad. Goodbye to all those who helped the rebellion. Goodbye to the doctors and nurses who will find my corpse. It’s only a matter of time until I die, I want to take it into my own hands like I did with the rebellion. I don’t want to die yet. But I have to. There’s no point in my life. I can’t do anything when I’m stuck in this isolated room around the clock. If you’re reading this, it’s too late to save me. Goodbye

She’s dead. My sister’s dead. And I’m writing on her suicide note. Our parents didn’t want me to read it, but I still did. She’s actually dead. I knew she could die from this disease, but she killed herself. She stabbed herself in the neck with a pencil. I felt my heart break as I realized this. It’s shattered into a million pieces. My older sister, the person I look up to, who led a rebellion with paper clips, killed herself. The more I say it the more it hurts. The pain her death caused me feels like it will never go away. I’ve always done what she has, I might follow her lead with this too. Stop this pain inside of me. Just end it. I just want it to be over. I want to be with my sister.