“Today is the day I die? This is just a stupid calendar, how right can a calendar be?” she laughed it off, turning away from the calendar hanging in her fridge. “But this stupid calendar also told me last week, ‘today you will meet Tom Hanks, and guess what? I met Tom Hanks. I still think about that man,” she smiled, almost forgetting for a minute the words that were written in front of her. “Today is the day you die...maybe they spelt dye wrong. I was in the mood to dye my hair yesterday...but they couldn’t have spelt it wrong. I’m going to die.” With the realization setting in, she did what any sane person would do, having just been told they would die that day. She locked herself into her shed, avoiding taking any food so she couldn’t choke on something, but then she thought about starvation setting in, and ended up getting some. She sat on the ground, staring up through the window that only allowed a bit of sunlight to seek through into the room.

Hmph. I recall our teacher, Mrs Hart, telling us the differences between a fact and an opinion. “A fact is true!” She yelled in her high-pitched voice, “an opinion is not!” I consider the sentence ‘Today is your day to die’ an opinion. That appeared on a calendar for facts. I flip the calendar back to the page before, and found a fact: 'Elephants can remember things for a very, very long time.' Fact. I drag my stare off the 'fact', turning back to the date. May 2, I should be celebrating Voldemort's death. And plus, it's Saturday, I get to be online. So I sent a post celebrating the death of the greatest(a bit of a tosser really) villain ever appeared in the wizarding world. I found my mind floating to that calendar, I couldn't help myself. Must be a prank, I thought, forcing myself to turn my thoughts to the Marauders and the Weasley twins. But thinking of Fred Weasley only made me more concerned about it. On May 2, these people died: Voldemort Fred Weasley Tonks Lupin Colin Creevy Severus Snape ... The list goes on. I was horrified when a voice calls out in my mind, ringing at my ear, “You might be next!” I took a nap. My target was to rest a bit and throw away all thoughts, and I failed tragically. I had a dream. In the dream, I saw Albus Dumbledore, standing in front of me. Smiling. Then I remembered, that in a popular fan theory, Dumbledore is Death. Death is right in front of me. I woke up. Scared. It may really be a fact. I spit at myself for that thought. My mind's a mess, a real mess. Incredible mess. Like, the mess of a room that needed cleaning weeks ago. Like the mess of all toddlers crying in a kindergarten. One of my favourite lines from Dumbledore was, “Of course it happened in your mind, but why can't it be true?” It's gotten more and more creepy. But ‘you’ can be anyone, right? I tried to think logically. Anyone who reads the calendar. You're a twelve-year-old like me, or you're an old people in your eighties, you read it and believed it, today will be your day of death. I thought of Hermione’s comment to the Grim, and I completely calmed down. Grim made them die, so just ignore it, don't believe in it. Calendar fact be damned. Hermione’s a real genius. I wonder how many people saw this, got frightened, had a messy mind, wasn't careful, and got into some accident and really - like what the calendar told you - died. They believed in the fact, in the Grim. I don't care anyway. 11:59. P.m. My mind is a waveless ocean. At ease. 12:00. I'm not dead. I'm alive. Nice. You can accomplish a thing simply by believing that you can. Things can happen simply by that you believe it can happen. Interesting fact.

If the calendar were to read “today is the day you die”, how would you feel? Would you panic or would you be okay? Why would someone panic, there’s nothing they can do about it now? This is why:

They panic because they know they haven’t done everything they should have been doing, and now they’re at the end of their run they’re worried they’ve wasted their life. They have been putting things off, not fixing things that need fixing, not speaking their truth. As a result, the life they have always promised themselves to attain has not been attained and therefore they panic. They did not achieve what they know they could have, fulfilled their potential you could say, and there is no second chance to put it right.

When a person talks of what they’d do with their last day on earth, they recount endless cliches of spending time with loved ones, appreciating nature and going on a coke filled bender one last time. I think these things are ill-judged as they are predicated upon the idea that one will be happy with their life. If one does feel satisfied, then maybe they will have the peace of mind to do these things. But realistically, how many people are going to truly be happy with the way they have lived. Who is going to be able to come to terms with the fact their life is ending and they did not make the utmost of it and have no chance to turn that around?

I imagine many people’s last day, should they know when it is, would be taken up by reflection. Recounting on every little action, decision and effect they’ve had. Did I make the right choice, did I make up for the mistake, do these people know that I still think about them all the time? If people knew the day they were to die, instead of being peaceful I imagine it would be filled with existential angst.

Although the prompt provides nothing more than mental gymnastics rather than a plausible event, these postulations are very real for many people and have an antidote:

Start doing things you’re putting off. Stop lying and start speaking your being into existence. Try to resolve things you know you want to resolve. Or don’t, and risk having your last moments filled with panic, anxiety and guilt at the fact so much was left not done and unsaid.

As I checked the calendar for today’s fact, I was expecting something like “The current population in the UK is almost 67 million people.” I looked at today’s date and realised it said something odd. The words “The day you die,” stared back at me, was this some kind of messed up joke? How can they even be allowed to put that in a calendar which they then sold to the public, I was outraged. I got a black marker and scribbled it out, work started in 20 minutes so I slipped my shoes on and made my way to work.

I couldn’t stop thinking about what happened in the morning, it was a bit strange. As I was half way crossing the road, a car sped around the corner and just barely swerved to the side. I was so shocked that I fled the scene, by the time I had stopped running, my heart was racing.

I continued my day until the evening, it was getting dark and I had to get home from work so I decided to get a taxi. “Where are you heading?” He asked, “Almond lane, please,” I responded impatiently. I began looking out the window and day dreaming as we traveled.

“SKKRRTT,” The taxi began swerving off the road, I let out a yelp as I held on for my life. The taxi began rolling on it’s side, we were on a cliff!

I held my breathe and embraced myself for impact, I thought about my family. I should’ve made the most of being with them, I never apologised for all those times I hurt them. That was when everything began fading...

-Skyepiepanda I would just like to say that I’m 13 and getting into writing stories, and thanks for reading!