I picked up my feet and shuffled them through the snow. I wiped my frozen tears with my cotton grey gloves. “Why?” I asked myself, why did this ever have to happen. My father was on the run, and now I was too. How could I know something like this could have been happening to him? How could I know this is what my life would result to.

I make it through the large snow piles, snow starting to fill my shoes, when I see a lake ahead of me. If I made it past this lake I would be in the city my mom was in. I’d have someone to care for me, someone not like my mentally ill father. I stepped on the lake, hearing cracking below me. “What was that?” I asked myself.

I started to cry, unsure if I wanted to take this risk, hungry, and tired. It felt as if it would be so much easier to go back, to be with my horrible father. To give up on trying to find hope, trying to find my mother.

I needed to eat something, if I didnt find something I would be gone. I walked over to the bush on the side of the lake and saw a few berries still sprouting, they were a bit overipe but it would be better to eat something than eat nothing. I checked the berries to see if they weren’t poisonous, my uncle had taught me how to do so before he passed away. I had loved my uncle so much, but it was his time to go.

My mouth and pocket full of berries I was on the lake again, I couldn’t wait. I could visibly see the sign to the next city coming up, and in excitement I started to jog. A slow jog turned into a run. Crack. That was the last thing I heard before I had fell into the freezing ocean, I tried to fight my way up, get out of the water alive, but it was too late…

Maybe it would have been better to be with my father, a mentally ill man than to die, but to give him the satisfaction of winning, it was better to die.