“I submitted a creative writing short story. I haven’t done creative writing much, and to be honest, I’m not that committed to it. I mainly wrote this for fun and to help me through tough times, rather than a hobby I’d pursue for the future. When I heard about the award, I would say I felt both neutral amazement and at the same time assurance. I was surprised because I had initially thought that my essay wasn’t strong or good enough. By getting the reward, I felt a sense of assurance that at least some people out there see light in my work.” Vincent won one Scholastic Gold Award for his writing.

” I often get my inspiration from watching movies and history videos about the world, whether action, adventure, or fantasy, and integrate the ideas into my writing. I also get it from realizing what people go through and the events and conversations of everyday life. When you are intent in watching how other people work and the things they say, you are informed by who they are and why they are who they are. By looking at the world today, it is clear that the world is far from perfect, and perfection is only temporary, which is where I obtained my initial idea for my writing pieces. I wrote at the time, especially during the era of my life where I saw the world and its issues. I felt bad for those who were suffering, but at the same time understood maybe why they or the enemy did what they did. Another emotion was isolationism, which was seen through the pandemic. 

Part I:
The brilliant sky shines upon the verdant land. From a makeshift haven, rays of Glory beam through chartreuse trees. A woman, frail and wrinkled in her skin yet animated in her eyes, sways in her hammock.
She gazes at a small orb, a lively one, flapping its wings for the first time. She can only imagine a child taking its first step, but it was a distant memory. The blue orb descends, lifting its body as it attempts to gain height. A ray of light illuminates her Precious like an angel fluttering, content with life.
The joyous laughs of children surrounds her, kicking a black-white ball along a field- with her at the center. The stubby woman rises, stumbling toward a rhombus lying in the grass beneath a pebble. She lifts the rock and grasps the string, ascending the kite upward beside the Precious. The children of all colors, little of age, and jubilant in smiles, congregated, admiring the pleasant sight. She smiles, reminded of the first time her boy saw the glider.
A magnificent sight.
The children beg for the thread, jumping with glee. She laughs with them, engulfing the world with peace, yet a black hole grows within. Sucking the life,
Her life.
She extends her hand, accepting the demands of the children. Only to hit nothing, only to hit something solid, dividing her from the crowd. Her heart races as she forces her body forward, only to meet the same fate as her hand.
Their smiles fade as they gaze into the sky; the Precious descends from the heavens-
But only there wasn’t heaven, there wasn’t light.
Her world was inundated in darkness, and her face was inundated in tears.
->—<-
A young boy stumbles through the streets, bustling through the crowd. His milk white attire is spattered with cereal and spattered in cookie crumbs. His skin lays spots of charcoal with purple circles sprinkled about his flesh. Scabs dry from his exposed legs, and on his face lay a black eye. He’s a limping stick jostling between giants gussied up in suits, towered by stone buildings; potential shelter.
He is nothing but a grain in the bowl- a bowl of the lost and abandoned.
He turns to an alley, a dark hallway littered in bags and shattered glass with sticks where he sees a man bust a fist through another’s face- a man with a long beard and slim build. Blood gushes from the sitting man’s face, forming a puddle of the blood from a man who is forgotten by his fellow kind and kin, and who is left to rot on the dark hallways of the streets.
Eyes darting, the boy couldn’t bear the sight. His vision blurs, rising in search of a new spot to rest once more. For what had occurred to the man had happened to him.
No one he could turn to- he’d lost his fight long ago, of which was unfair in the first place.
Three to one and defenseless against armed, and left on the streets by the very people who had failed to care for him. He shivers as his eyes moisten; his heart pounds and his mind desires.
Emptiness grows from inside. No one has offered assistance and no one has bat an eye, indifferent about everyday life.
What had they been taught?
He halts, heart racing as his foot catches behind a ledge. He sighs. This wasn’t what he wanted his life to be.
->—<-
The fragile and untroubled woman sleeps, drifting away as she sways in her hammock.
->—<-
The boy drifts asleep, back against the wall with the natural air beating down. Another dark hallway would suffice.

Part II:
Transcendent, celestial and electric- the features of the divine prospect of a castle high upon a mountain. Distant as it rises past the clouds, the stone citadel, with a towering peak radiating in the sunset, rested upon a fortress preceding the sun. With a beaming, delicate ring of yellow, rays of light shot around the erection: a halo.
An violet airborne beast with skeletal and translucent wings landed atop the structure. With feathered skin of an eagle, its four legs are steady as a wavy tail wraps across the hood of the obelisk. It lifts it’s spiked snout into the heavens and unleashes inferno, setting the skies aflame.
Through her open window a mountain apart, she reaches for the door, eager to arrive at the sight. Her grin reaches both sides of her face, and her heart jumps like a baby bird up and down, awaiting its family for food and hope.
The door won’t budge; the door refuses, and her smile dims. Her heart settles, except with a growing hole of yearning. She’s reminded of her son and his wife, clothed in rags inside a chipping house, staring as they seal her away from her rest, from her privilege, and from her home- the very home she raised him from the ground, never to reach past the branches of content.
Tears soaked her face as she watched her son’s last glance, droopy eyes, darkened frown. If only…
Oh where are you ma?
She pivots, wiping her tears with a stomach churning.
I’m here! She cries.
A little boy appears, short in a newsboy hat and brown suit with a blood rose in his shirt pocket.
Would you read me a story? He grins with sparkling teeth.
She nods, and picks up a book with no cover- just a brown leather cover.
She opens it and opens her mouth, immersing herself with every word.
->—<-
His journey commences where he had a plan, but it is a plan he doesn’t anticipate. He yearns for his home; he yearns for his parents, but hope has no avail.
A maroon lamborghini stops outside a restaurant, and there left a woman in a ivory dress of feathers like an eagle’s led by a rangy man in a black tuxedo and a newsboy cap.
What do you want? The woman screeches, peering the ragged boy.
I apologize ma’am, I’m in a predicament… money… I beg that-
The couple burst into laughter.
You lackadaisical boy! The man laughs.
Just get a job! The only reason you’re poor is because you’re lazy, son!
Can’t believe brats like him still exist. The woman adds. Where are the parents?
You shouldn’t have run away!
His eyes filled with tears, he darts. Spoiled! He screams within. Where were his parents? Where were his parents? A mental hospital and a boy left on the streets? Where were his parents?
They were and are the exact opposite of the couple: a dirt poor house, too weak to care for the needy, too poor to afford luxury, too poor to afford defense, and too ignorant to consider the life of their own son. Yet, they were sufficient in selling their son’s life for the wealth they wanted- only to end up with nothing more than before.
So this is what content feels like? He curses the man and woman for their attractiveness as he continues to run, losing himself with every step.
->—<-
She lies on her bed, exhausted, reading to the boy as he gapes with admiration. She turns a page.
“Jacob loved pizza!” Maria cried. “If only he was here to experience the simple joys…”
->—<-
The boy trips and falls inside the crowd of colossals. Pain deluges his knee. He weeps, unable to cope that they’re gone, gone. No one looks and no one acknowledges, like a bowl scattered in grains.They walk to their businesses- to the livelihoods they have. He stumbles with his grit and relieves a sigh. No one bats an eye.
If only I was ignorant.
->—<-
She shuts her eyes and the boy disappears in a world of darkness,
->—<-
A man from the alley races toward him. The boy runs. His shirt is caught; he’s lifted off of the earth. His back slams against the wall. A shock to the face; his nose bleeds. Squealing, he frantically looks around in search. The boy slams the man’s face with a tight fist then unleashes a kick to the gut. The man stumbles and smiles, unveiling a blade.
The boy glances to his right, where lifeless bodies of the unfortunate reside- the elderly, the weak, the poor.
His eyes widen, adrenaline pumping as he stares at the puddles of blood expanding…
You people are whores. The man shouts sincerely, raising the weapon, but too slowly as the boy grabs a sharp stick, turns a blind eye, and impales the hardy stick through the man’s temple.
Shock overwhelms him as he freezes; he has to move quickly. Blood drips. Drips. Drips…
He heaves his body behind a garbage bin, hands shaking, body uncooperating, and teeth chattering as his mind rolls in turmoil.
Why?
He falls down, exploding into tears and wails as agony erupts his body as if a firework igniting.
Yet his cries were lost in an ocean of noise. Lost forever, his livelihood is stripped away.
His childhood is stripped away- a memory of how his parents sold everything he himself ever had and desired their wealth. And, now, there is a new memory of a man in jewels, beating upon those who never was a threat to him, and who sold his soul for his own desire of accomplishment.
And yet, no one notices because they’re indifferent in the crowd of spurring life.
->—<-
The elderly woman drifts to sleep within a dark, yet blissful room.
->—<-
The boy drifts asleep within a dark hallway, and deep inside is a heart void of feeling.

Part III:
The polychrome fish streak across the water, hiding in the shelter of bright yellow coral- the same shelter their entire lives. Boulders dotted the scenery as seagrass erected from the seafloor.
A black shadow shields the woman from natural daylight. She looks up, observing a gray body swimming about. It is smooth and youthful. Its fins flap; its keen jaws threaten its prey. A glass casing guards her from the scene. A safe place to be, a place she’s been her entire life: a fish in a tank. This one room and this one place, not once escaping to experience the real world.
Real.
But she is at peace in discovering the nature around her. Colors, colors everywhere she’d look.
She would’ve been jumping for joy, but something hit her: she hadn’t cared anymore, not anything, just herself, but why? What did she want? She had tranquility. What more did she crave? But then, of course, she already knew.
->—<-
His pilgrimage is complete.
He enters a vandalized glass entrance into an expansive lobby, scattered with wooden chairs and tables. The doddery people sit in white uniforms with shriveled skin, lifeless eyes, and emotionless expressions. Some are playing cards, some are conversing, and some are talking amongst themselves,
Themselves.
Some amble with canes, some roll in wheelchairs, and some are adjacent to machines. Some are shouting periodically, some are walking aimlessly, and some are dozed off. This was, and is, the only environment he felt he had a place in. Brick built the structure with hanging lamps illuminating the interior, and hallways branched from the main room, leading to separate rooms with glass windows.
It is definitely better than the wretched environment back at his old family.
The lobby supervisor gazes shockingly from the front desk window,
Are you okay sir? Do you need medical attention? She solemnly asks.
He shakes his head, and grins. The residents sneak a peak at him, then welcome him with beaming smiles. He had returned, and they knew it.
You’re here for her, aren’t you? The manager guesses with a smile, grabbing a napkin and wiping his face. The boy nods. His heart drops with every step- the culpability.
His fists clench, body showered in shame.
->—<-
She drifts asleep in peace, surrounded by water. Ocean.
Bliss takes her by its claws, lifting her through the sea and into the heavens.
->—<-
He couldn’t do it yet.
Lights turn off in the hallways, lit by moonlight from the skylight.
After wandering about the hallways, he sneaks into a closet, then returns to her room.
He drifts asleep outside a glass window, where he’ll hope to await her, for the last time.

Part IV:
Leaves glide, left to right, piling on the earth as spires of redwood that soar into the atmosphere with mist clouds beneath as if fog under a starry night. On the drab forest floor, eerie as the canopy of leaves dared Glory to trespass, she shivered in the howling wind. But, she was astonished to find the woods exanimate no more. Myriads of dwarf umbrellas danced in luminescence, glowing shades of rainbow. Body twirling like a spinning top, she dances too. She dances her heart away; her thoughts depart. Her desires obscure and her heart empty in inclination. But Glory is temporary, as her world soon is inundated in darkness.
->—<-
Hand against the glass with a deadpan gaze. I couldn’t. Not like this. Her smile as she whirls at peace with her beating soul. He bows his head, tempted to pummel the glass, but that would take the last person he knew away, a person he knew yearned for something better her entire life.
She was maternal to him, and she knew, because she had experienced similarity.
But she couldn’t afford to lose him too. She had sacrificed everything, everything to try to build from her wretched life, and now here she is. This is her reward for all the struggles of her life, from a crippling house to a crippling house, from delight from birth to losing everything she had fought hard to keep. This is what her son thought she deserved, and this is what her son thought he deserved. All of this was an expense of exiting their life of poverty, one that was not successful.
What was the point?
He shuts his eyes, shallowly breathing as he stares at her face. Green eyed, glimmering lips, white hair to her shoulders, she steadily dances in an empty room. He couldn’t stand the sight. How she would feel, and yet she mourns him, but he couldn’t, not anymore.
He could sob, but his hands had ceased reacting, not since… The pain in reacting, knowing that imprisonment was simply the answer. He will soon be the fog in the starry night, the darkness, and she was oblivious of it. He was sorry for her and had always been; Glory stripped away.
->—<-
The woman twirls and exclaims in joy, dismissing everything she had retained.
->—<-
The boy wipes his tears, slides his hand down the glass, and absences. He just couldn’t.

Part V:
The woman goggles a blooming rose- petals delicate, revealing a canary center. It blossoms, but yet has she. She’d experience euphoria, the first time in decades, for something so real, yet so far.
To swim, to venture the forests, to free a kite, appreciate nature, dance in the wild, but all she could do was read, trapped in her own mind and physical prison. She slumped on her bed, stirring some milk and cereal.
->—<-
The boy leaves through the glass doors, treading himself along. If there was any way…
His will was draining, and when it did, he’d be a soggy piece of grain.
->—<-
She pounded on the door, calling for the manager for the medic. They had come, but denied her request to leave for the twenty-fifth time today. Venturous, imaginative, yet never given the chance. She could cry once more, but soon, she finds herself upon a mountain’s peak.
She smiles and jumps, heart taken away.
This is lovely!
->—<-
On the streets, the boy frowns, touching a dangling pole with a jump, I’m sorry.

Part VI:
If only she could experience this with somebody, but they’re all gone, except for one. Hundreds of letters were piled upon her carriage, each read with serene and longing. She wrote back, for her journeys were extravagant: flying a kite, in an enchanting land of castles, and exploring the high seas, oh the stories she’d tell. He’d come, she assured. But when? He’d promised, he will.
It was only a matter of time. He is her grown Precious flying to the heavens.
->—<-
A newspaper: Serial killer sought after murdering at least twenty-five people
Believed to be a child.
$1,000,000 given to information on the suspect.
Saddening, but he didn’t care, not anymore. He didn’t care for their lives; he’d care only for himself. Who cared what others thought? He’d ignore everything unless it affected him.
He knew his family was coming; he knew his parent’s desires. He would not let them have it; they don’t deserve anything for what they did to the two of them.
The people too are running and searching, but not for the killer. They are in search of the award. Now, they are attentive to their surroundings. He would not let them have it either.
Now, it was time. Rope in hand, wrapped around the pole,
A loop came next, wide, but adjustable with force.
->—<-
She smiled, certain that her Precious was going to visit her.
She just knew it!
Oh the stories she’ll tell!
Then she finds herself in space, darkness with the light of Glory inside the Milky Way.
->—<-
A man and a woman in dirty clothing from a chipping house lead officers around the city in search. They are certain they know the suspect, and money is on their minds. To their surprise, they halt at a crowd. An oblivious crowd no more, as they amass in disturbance.
Sirens blare in the background, growing near.
In the center a pair of feet, airborne.
Enduring flight of an eagle,
A Precious.
Yet still,
Devoid of movement.
Of life.
->—<-
The woman beams.
He’ll come, and she’ll be complete, forever.
A bright smile, a Glorious one, a heart brimmed with equanimity,
A monitor rings, the people scamper briskly,
There, she’ll drift asleep,
->—<-
And he’ll drift into the void.