I saw this on Instagram and felt attacked by it, but then I was like, "Wait, that's a fun idea," and then I decided to do it except as a short story because this is much more manageable, since there's no chapters in a short story and, you know, it's short.

Every building, tree, and sign ahead of me is a silhouette, outlined by pink that fades into orange that fades into a yellow when whatever is blocking the setting sun is short enough, and I even catch a glimpse of the sun itself through some trees and clouds on my right, where the park is — the lofty, knobby trees I used to climb up, the soaring swings I used to swing on, the cold chains shocking my hands when I held on, breeze hitting my face, the plastic slides I'd slide down, covering me in static, lifting my hair to the sky, and the rocky trails I would ride on with my purple bike, dotted with scratched stickers that I didn't put on it, skinning my knees every time I went down the big hill, but I'd still do it anyway, and my father would come down and pick me up no matter how big I was and carry me and roll the bike back to the truck, all the while trying to soothe my tears, if I was crying — but in front of me is a long stretch of dirty sidewalk, weeds shooting up through the cracks, rocks and dust scattered, litter appearing every so often discarded near the edges, a sad road leading to a number of buildings, differing in height, in function, all faded, some shops, others services — businesses like insurance companies and a lawyer or two, though I never used to pay attention to the names of anything, only the trees and flowers in the middle of street, dividing each side of the road, now riddled with potholes but paved smooth in my memories, and the other buildings on the other side are much the same as the ones ahead of me, some with display windows, filled with the same things I can't afford now and some that I never could — not even when I was younger, when money was never a thought to me because my parents wouldn't let it be, but now I'm thinking of the solitary five dollars in my pocket from my threadbare wallet, along with the change from my piggy bank that rattles every time my right foot hits the sidewalk, nearly drowned out by the smack of my worn sneakers as I run and my ragged breathing, getting faster the longer I go, and I don't plan on stopping, not for a single second, not for anything, and I just have to run on, no matter where I end up and I try to clear my head or think about something else and ignore the drying tears in the corners of my eyes, which are stung by the wind I make as I run, and I try not to notice the few people I fly past because they look at me, probably wondering and speculating but I give them no answers and I don't want to — I don't want to talk to anybody, or at least hardly anybody that's available to me because there's next to no one in this world I can trust now, no one but myself when I'm the only one right-side-up, when everyone else is walking around upside down, completely ignorant and living in that bliss I'd like to go back to, but I can't because there's no way back, no way to unlearn what I've learned, no way to return to the past — like Gatsby taught me my sophomore year in high school, when he got shot in the pool and died because he took the fall for Daisy who didn't even love him anymore, not the way she'd loved him before because she loved that awful man she married instead, as horrible and detestable and unfaithful as he was, and then she didn't even have the decency to go to Gatsby's funeral when it was all her fault that he died in the first place, and nobody even cared except for maybe three people and how awful is it that the world doesn't care, that nobody cares about anyone or who they hurt, they just do whatever they want and disregard the consequences until they're staring them straight in the face, and then they feel bad and then they suffer and deserve it, too — they deserve every bad break they get and more because they only think about themselves, they only care about themselves and life is just like that, giving people what they deserve, but then sometimes it isn't because bad people get good things for no good reason, and then good people get bad things sometimes just because but other times because of bad people, and the bad people get off scot-free and it isn't fair, it isn't fair at all, and my mother, my poor mother, who has always been good to us and did her best to get me whatever I wanted, who worked long hard hours to help this broken family stay afloat, didn't deserve any of this, but it's all his fault and it doesn't make sense, none of it does, so I have to run on, go forward and not back, and the cars go past and they don't know and they don't care, and I wish I could be with them, smiling and happy and laughing and signing along to the scratchy radio despite it all, just like it used to be but isn't anymore and there's a stitch in my side and I can't breathe and it's getting cold even though I'm sweating and my old jacket isn't helping, and then I glance back and that beat-up dirty green truck sticks out like a sore thumb among the somehow nicer cars on the road so I see it instantly and I have to run on, run faster but it hurts too much and my chest aches and I have to stop and put my hands on my knees and lean over and try to breathe and nobody cares, not until the green truck stops in the street and the horns start honking and cars start flying past but the driver gets out and goes over to me and asks, "What are you doing out here?" in such a concerned way that it makes me angry so I push him away, and I want to scream at him so badly but I can't and he tells me, "Just come back home, okay? We'll talk. Come on, sweetheart, please," but I don't want to even though I have to because I have no where to go, and I breathe in and manage to say, "Get... away... from me," before I have to take another deep breath to get more air in my lungs and the rage burns and rolls in my chest, makes my fists clench, and he tells me again to just come home, that, "We'll talk about this. Your mother is worried about you. Come on," and I shove at him again, because how dare he mention her after what happened, and I wish it was my mother here instead but it's not, and he looks at me with such pleading, guilty eyes that my rage lessens despite myself, and people keep honking at the green truck with no driver, so I don't say anything and push past him to get in the passenger side and he runs to the driver's side and then we turn around and go back towards home, and I look out at the window, at the trees and the flowers, at the cars going by, and for a moment, when the anger fades, there's a wisp of everything being okay again, and the more he speaks, the more I think, the more the tears run down my face, it seems as though we only have to grab that wisp and pull on it to really make it happen.