Let Me Sleep, or I'll Never Wake

My dad always calls me a lazy bum. It is because I often fall asleep without warning. I sleep in class, while eating, and even while crossing the street.

My homeroom teacher, Yvonne Smith, suggests that he take me to a hospital for an examination.

But Dad scoffs and says, "He's just staying up all night playing on his phone."

After that, he confiscates my phone and removes the lock from my bedroom door. Every time I get sleepy, he slaps me.

I don't want to be hit, and I don't want to make Dad angry. So, I start pinching my thighs, pulling out my hair, and even rubbing hand sanitizer spray under my nose to stay awake.

But whenever the overwhelming drowsiness hits, nothing can stop it.

On the day of the final exams, Dad happens to be one of the invigilators.

I bite my lip until it bleeds and silently beg myself inwardly, "Just this once, please stay awake."

Still, I fail to fight off the sleepiness.

Suddenly, someone flips over my desk. The chair tips with it, and I crash to the floor. My temple slams into the corner of the desk, and darkness instantly floods my vision.

Dad stands over me, furious and disappointed. "Zach Davies, are you really so obsessed with sleeping that you don't even care about your final exams? If you're that lazy, then stay down there and keep sleeping!"

I lie sprawled across my exam paper as my vision slowly fades away.

Dad, I think I am going to sleep for a very long time…

"Zach Davies! How much longer are you going to continue playing dead?"

My father Arnold Davies' voice echoed loudly throughout the silent exam hall. He walked up to me, his leather shoes clicking against the floor as he made his way up to me.

My face was pressed hard against the cold cement floor, warm blood seeping from where my temple had hit the corner of the table.

"Mr. Davies, I think that Zach really seems to have passed out," one of my classmates, Charlie Hartman, whispered from the seat next to mine.

"Passed out? No way. He's clearly just a lazy pig!"

Dad then grabbed me by the back of my collar with astonishing strength, dragging me up from the floor.

My head slumped limply to the side, the back of my hand scraping against the rough floor and leaving a bloody mark there.

"You're always sleeping! You fall asleep in class, you fall asleep while eating, and now, you actually dare to fall asleep during the year-end exam?" Dad growled at me through gritted teeth. "You might have no sense of shame, but I do! And I'm the department chair in this high school!"

He then dragged me out of the exam hall, my feet leaving two long, dusty gray trails on the ground.

The young invigilator, Ms. Victoria Morgan, stood up and looked at me anxiously.

"Should we send Zach to the infirmary or school doctor, Mr. Davies?" she asked.

"Infirmary? You fell for his tricks too, didn't you, Ms. Morgan?" Dad said with a cold scoff as he walked past her without even looking at her. "He's only like this because he stayed up all night playing games on his phone last night, and he's trying to get himself out of trouble by pulling this on us."

"But he looks very pale. I think there's something wrong with him," Ms. Morgan said, trying to approach Dad and stop him from leaving.

"Forget it. This rascal is just putting on an act. I know my son better than you do," Dad replied, aggressively yanking the door to the exam hall open. "Everyone, get back to your exam papers. Whoever continues looking around will receive a big fat zero on their paper!"

The exam hall fell silent once again.

Dad dragged me all the way to the other end of the school building, where there was an abandoned classroom that was seldom used.

It was piled high with broken desks and chairs that were collecting dust there, and a stale, rotting stench hung in the air.

He tossed me unceremoniously onto the ground. The back of my head struck the door with a loud thud.

It was right at that very moment that I suddenly felt an overall weightlessness to my body and found myself floating in mid-air in the classroom.

I looked down and saw my body lying on the cold, hard ground, still unconscious. My face was pale, my eyes were tightly shut, and my limbs were splayed out in all directions.

Dad then crouched down and grabbed my chin forcefully.

"Open your damn eyes, Zach Davies!"

My physical body didn't respond to him.

Dad scoffed coldly in anger and suddenly caught sight of the blood that had trickled to the side of my ear. It was the blood that had slid down from my temple to my ear and eventually reached my neck.

He frowned in disgust and grabbed a napkin from his pocket.

"I can't believe you even prepared red ink in advance just to play dead like this."

He used the napkin to rub off the blood on my ear with such force that it broke through my skin, and the blood began spreading even more.

"You're so damn disgusting, just like that useless mother of yours. All you know are dirty tricks like these."