June 13, 2003 is a day I will never forget. Mark…Mark was his name. We were both 8 years old. The last time I saw him, he was drowning and struggling to survive down a rigorous river. That day we built little boats out of whatever we could find in the forest near my house. After we had built them Mark said that we should go down to the nearby river and race the boats. I remember looking up at the sky and seeing a huge gray cloud heading at the direction of the river, I pointed it out to him but he didn’t care. So I decided to go along with him.

By the time we got to the bank of the river a massive storm had caught up with us. I told Mark that we should go, but he said that the race would be quick and as soon as we finished we would rush back to my house. The river was starting to rise rapidly and I still thought it was not a good idea, but I had gone all the way down to the river and I didn’t want to waste my time. We both grabbed our little wooden boats by the stern and Mark counted to three. At the count of three we let our boats go. I stood there and watched our little boats race down the river. Mark however, sped down the river to see who would win. Ahead of him I saw a tree root sticking out and I screamed at him to watch out but he couldn’t hear me because of the heavy rain. He stumbled with the root, fell down the speeding river, and saw him screaming at me “Your boat won, your boat won!” That was the last time I saw Mark.

You might be wondering why I’m telling you this tragic story. Well believe me or not, last week I saw Mark. I was at school and it was 3:00 pm. I was putting my books away to go home. As I was closing my locker I looked to the right and I saw a short, skinny, black hair boy staring at me with a little wooden boat in his hands. When I closed my locker with a loud “Clank” he was gone. At the moment I thought I was just seeing things, but as I walked home he appeared out of nowhere holding the little boat out to me and said, “Want to race again?"

I ran of as quickly as possible to my house, full of fear. I felt my heart beating rapidly in my throat. My house was just a block away. I got inside, locked the door and sped up to my room. I was out of breath. As I entered my room and slammed the door behind me I saw Mark sitting on my bed staring at me just like he used to. I turned around to leave my room but the door was slammed shut. My back was to the door, I looked at him and he said, “ Why did you run of like that?” in the sweetest voice you could imagine. That sweet, innocent voice made him look even creepier. He approached me with the little boat under his arm. I was trembling like mad. “What’s wrong, don’t you want to be my friend anymore?”

I couldn’t speak! I didn’t know what was going to happen next. He was now one foot away from me. I looked down at him and he said “ Why don’t we go to the river and race again, just like yesterday” This was crazy! He thought the day before was the day we went down to the river. “Boom” a huge beam of light blinded me and in a blink of an eye we were standing by the river bank in the exact same spot where we had been on that June 13 five years ago.

We were facing each other face to face. He had the sweetest smile on his face. Suddenly he pushed me of the bank and into the rapid river. I felt the cold, icy water overcome my body. The swift river pushed me down, under the surface. I realized my pant had gotten stuck to a rock. I had no air left…I struggled to swim to the surface but I couldn’t. I was falling into a dark tunnel, into my death… “ Bam”. I was sitting in my usual desk on the corner in my English class and right in front of me was Mr. F. “Had a nice dream?” he asked me. I was dreaming, it was only a dream. What a relief! But on my desk was the same exact little boat I had built 5 years ago.