"Saige!" My five-year-old little brother Elliot knocks on the my bedroom door. "I want to play," he whines, knocking again. I open the door slowly and eye my little brother. Elliot stares back at me innocently with wide - open brown eyes. I bend down to fix his shirt collar. Mom has him dress in button down shirts and nice jeans for school every day. She thinks that is is adorable, and it kind of it, but my poor, uncomfortable little brother definitely doesn't think so.

I sigh. "What do you want to play? I'm trying to type up an article." Elliot probably doesn't understand what I mean by "typing up an article," but he knows that I am usually holed up in my room doing homework or studying until after dinner time. I have a very efficient study schedule. My little brother squints at me, thinking. When he was even younger, he would put his hands on the sides of his head when he was trying to concentrate on something. I smile. Elliot is probably the most adorable little blonde- haired boy I've ever seen. Then again, he is my brother. I may be a tad biased.

Finally, Elliot nods decidedly. "Let's play Bounce." He jumps up and down happily in the middle of my doorway. I gently push him out of the direct path of the door and close it behind us. "Bounce" is a game that Elliot made up about a month ago. The game is very simple: you bounce up and down on the trampoline and count how many times you jump. The highest score wins. It's been Elliot's favorite game since he found a way to turn jumping on a trampoline into a game. He has sweet- talked me into going outside to play Bounce almost every day since then. I guess that's good, because it's some form of exercise, but sometimes I just want to stay inside.

"All right," I agree. Might as well have a short break before finalizing this article. "Let's go outside." I follow my favorite energetic five-year-old into our family's backyard. I only have one other sibling: my seventeen year old sister Amy. She is living at the dorms at her college right now, though, so Elliot and I have the whole place to ourselves. He climbs up onto the trampoline— a surprising feat for a five year old, and one perfected after many weeks of practice— and shouts for me to join him. "I'm starting right now," he yells. "One, two, three, four..." I grin and jump up after him to start bouncing.

After jumping to one hundred, I pause. "Elliot," I say, unzipping the little door leading out of the trampoline. "I'll be back in a few minutes. I've just got to finish up something real quick." My little brother nods and keeps bouncing, only pausing for a moment before resuming his counting.

"Ninety nine, ninety ten, one hundred, one hundred two..." I laugh. Elliot knows how to count, he just has a funny way of doing it. I rush back into my room and turn the computer on again. A Word document pops up with almost a full page of text typed up. I scan the document. "Talk Show Resigned!" the headline reads. "After I finish editing this," I think aloud to myself. "I'll email it to Mrs. Watson, then rejoin Elliot." Mrs. Watson is the freshman and sophomore english teacher who also is the staff member in charge of the newspaper. We have to turn in all of our articles to her before they actually go in the printed newspaper. I doubt she ever reads them, but it's a way for the school board to have at least some control over what we do. I decide to read through the whole article aloud to make sure it flows well and makes sense before I send it to her, though.

"Radio Star Resigned," I read, trying to make my voice sound like an official newscaster. "Just last week, one of King High School's students received a devastating phone call from the school board: if said Jonas "Talk Show" Parker could not bring listeners of his radio show up by the end of the month, he would be released from his position." I stop to take a large breath. "That sentence was absolutely terrible," I groan. I go through the whole article like this, occasionally stopping to fix a typo or to add a sentence here and there. After only about fifteen minutes, I have what I think is a fairly decent final draft.

Radio Star Resigned!

This last Tuesday, November 5th, the junior Jonas "Talk Show" Parker resigned from his position as host of the Talk Show daily show. The events leading up to this momental decision, though, might allow us to give Talk Show some grace. Although some of us will miss his show, it is for the better for everyone, including Jonas himself, that it is no longer airing.

Sources show that a little over two weeks before Jonas "Talk Show" Parker resigned, he received a dreaded call from the school board. The board said that, due to unforeseen circumstances that I will not mention, the radio show would be closed down by the end of the month of November. Obviously. this came as a shock to both Talk Show and all who knew. However, the worst was still yet to come.

On October 31st, Halloween night, Jonas Parker's best and closest friend, Carter Richardson, was challenged to a game of "drag racing" in a nearby neighborhood. After only a few minutes of racing through a dark neighborhood, Carter found himself unconscious, in a coma, and with his car totaled from crashing into a telephone pole.Luckily, however, no children out trick-or-treating were hurt. This is only one of the many examples this school has to show for the dangers of teenage car racing. Much to the regret of everyone close to him, but especially Jonas Parker, Carter Richardson died on November 2nd, never having woken up from his coma.

Although some of us will miss the entertaining and witty Talk Show show every day, you now understand the story behind Jonas Parker's unexpected resignation. Rather than having the school board humiliate him by closing down his radio show, Jonas chose to take the time off and resign to honor his newly departed friend. Until next time, Saige Erikson.

I let out a long breath before clicking the "save" button under the Word file. This is definitely one of the more depressing articles that I have written, but it has got to be at least ten times more depressing for Jonas Parker. At least I didn't know the junior kid who died. I'm sure the former "Talk Show" will recover soon and start another show, though. It wasn't like it was one of his family members who is now gone forever.

I send the document to Mrs. Watson, then sit far back into the swivel chair. There was something that I was doing before I came in here, I know. Mom and Dad are both at work until 5:30, Elliot— "Oh, no," I moan. "I left Elliot on the trampoline by himself!"

As if to prove my point, at that moment, I hear a scream from outside. My heart drops down to my stomach. If anything happens to Elliot, I'm never going to forgive myself. I stumble over a pile of books my dad must have left on the floor in my frantic hurry to get outside. The screams have stopped by the time I reach the back door, and I am hoping to all hope that that is good, not bad.

Finally getting to the door, I fling it open and frantically scan the yard for my little brother. Then I see him. lying still on the trampoline. He's not doing anything, just kind of lying there. I waste no time getting into the trampoline to see Elliot. His neck is at a really uncomfortable position, and even when I call his name over and over, my little brother doesn't respond. His eyes are closed and the only was that I know Elliot is still alive besides his slow, faint pulse is his tiny hand. Elliot's hand keeps closing and unclosing in a slow rhythm.

I'm in kind of a shock, but I know Elliot can't just stay there. I've got to get someone to help him. I run back inside to grab my phone and call 911. "Hello?" a female voice on the other end answers.

"Hello, yes, my little brother needs medical help. He... he had an accident on the trampoline." My voice is breaking. It is my fault that this poor five year old might not ever see his family again. I killed him. Then I shake my head. No. Elliot's not dead yet, and I won't let him die.

"Excuse me, miss. I need an address," the lady on the other end of the phone says. Her apparent calmness is kind of frustrating. Doesn't she know that we need help?! I manage to tell her where I live before she ends the call, promising to have the emergency paramedics here soon.

After the lady hangs up on me, I fumble with my phone to call my parents. I can barely talk to my mom through my crying when she answers. She understands, though, that something is not right with her youngest child. Mom promises to call Dad and be home as soon as she can. I turn the phone off and leave it on the ground as I climb up onto the trampoline again to be next to Elliot. Suddenly I feel a lot more empathy towards Jonas Parker, whose best friend died. This brings on a fresh was of tears. If Carter Richardson died while still in a coma, could the same thing happen to Elliot?

I am still in a heap on the trampoline next to my motionless little bother when the emergency ambulance makes its way into our driveway. It doesn't even fully story before five or six people dressed in all white jump out of the vehicle. Some abstract part of my mind that isn't completely freaking out can't help but wonder why they wear white. It is so they can tell how much blood gets on their uniforms? If so, then their laundry cleaners will be disappointed today. Elliot isn't bleeding, he's just... I don't even know. He's just terribly hurt, and it's my fault.

I run to the emergency paramedics. "My brother's on the trampoline over there," I gasp, relieved that someone is finally here to help. The newly-named pain machine will soon no longer be in our backyard, but for now all of the medics have to climb through the little zippered door to get to Elliot. After crawling in and out of the entryway a few times to bring the other workers tools and equipment, one of the medics walks over to me. He points behind him at the small group of people on my family's trampoline.

"Miss," he says warily. "We're going to have to cut a larger opening in the mesh walls to get everyone out safely. Is that okay with you before we remove your brother?" I nod numbly. They would have cut the walls with or without my permission, but it's kind of nice that he asked me first.

Watching your five year old brother being carried out of a trampoline on a makeshift stretcher is very sobering for someone who was so eager to leave him only half an hour earlier. I swallow deeply. My through feels like it is closing up, like slowly, but surely, I will not be able to breathe. It is my fault that Elliot might die— might never wake up from a coma, just like the high schooler in my article. I can't even remember his name anymore. Just like Dad, I think, letting the forbidden thought enter my mind for the first time in at least a year. I choke back another sob. My throat clenches again as Elliot gets lifted into the ambulance out of my view. I can't breathe. I want to shout for help, tell them to bring my little brother back, but I can't. The world goes black, and I fell myself hitting the ground and laying still.

Mom sits next to me. We are both beside Dad's hospital bed in a very white room. He is very pale, and there are small tubes running out of his nose and different parts of his arms and legs. Machines are everywhere, and there's one that beeps every second, over and over again. The machines kind of scare me, and I ask my mom what the tubes are supposed to do. Beep. Beep. She smiles weakly, like she is sorry for me, and pats my six-year-old head. She says something that is long and that I don't really understand before turning away to watch Dad again. I nod quietly even though she can't see me. I have never seen Mom this sad, or Dad this... this still.

A lady in a long blue shirt and baggy pants comes into the white room and starts to pull tubes out of some machines and plug them into other ones. She lifts up a plastic bag filled with some kind of liquid and attaches it to the top of another machine. Beep. Beep. Then she begins to do something with the tubes attached to Dad, and I curl up next to Mom even more and hide my face behind her. I don't want to see what they're doing to my dad. More nurses and doctors come into the room and move around. Another beeping sound starts, and some whirring joins it. I close my eyes tightly and try to forget about what is going on. I can't forget what happened three days ago, though. I'll never forget that.

Three days ago, Dad started shaking back and forth and clutching his chest in the middle of dinner. He accidentally flipped over his plate of spaghetti when he was shaking, but Mom didn't care. It's probably still there right now. Mom hasn't done any house work except for putting away my laundry in the last three days. Grab my phone, she nearly shouted at me. Dial 911 on the keypad and call it. I followed her instructions and brought the phone to my mom. I'm crying by now, and Mom has wrestled Dad to the floor and taken any dangerous sharp things out of his way. I've never seen my dad like that before, so random and jerking back and forth. It was like he couldn't control what his body was doing.

I peek out from behind Mom now to watch what the doctors are doing to Dad. He looks frail and weak. Dad is usually happy and strong. He never stopped smiling, and never missed a day of carrying my on his back to my room at bedtime. I think I would crush him now if I tried to get on his back. Why is Dad so different than he was before? I ask Mom quietly. She turns and stares at me. She never answers me, just goes back to watching the nurses work.

A month later, I look at the clothes Mom laid out for me, just like she does every morning. This never stopped, not even when Dad was in the hospital. He came home from that place, almost a week after he spilled the spaghetti at the dinner table. He came home, and then he went back. The same thing happened again, and this time I was the only one there. I didn't know what to do, so I sat on the ground beside Dad and cried. Then I remembered what Mom had told me to do the last time this happened. I was glad to leave my Dad. He scared me when he shook from side to side. I called the numbers 911, and that was the end of it.

Now, on my bed Mom set out a black dress and long black tights. Dad won't ever carry me to bed again. He's not strong anymore, or smiling. I don't know what he is, but it's definitely still. Very still, and not ever moving again.