I wish I didn't have to be here.

I struggled with all my might as the tentacles pulled me down into the trash pile below, ready to swallow me whole right then and there.

I had been volunteering at the landfill for almost a week now. It's not like I had a choice; I had had several misdemeanours and two felony convictions. "Now get a life," I remember the officer's last words when I left prison to finish my sentence with community service. I ended up choosing... this.

All around the landfill, there was nothing but big white and black plastic bags, creating a disgusting, patterned, and dull mound that smelt horribly of decomposing organic matter, chemicals, spoiled milk, excrement, and just about every other unpleasant odour you could think of.

Every single day I could feel my nose being invaded like a foreign army invading a peaceful country. I pulled my trusty bandana over my mouth and nose; it was far from the first time I had used it to block out the unpleasant smell.

It wasn't pleasant, but I still pulled through - until one day it turned deadly for me. "Randy, what the hell is this hissing noise?" I asked my coworker who was sorting through garbage bags not too far from me.

He walked over to my side. Then, right at that moment, there was what sounded like squirming and boiling water or melting plastic. I looked down at the garbage pile and noticed a green liquid leaking from one of the garbage bags, then some tentacles rising out of the garbage, like an undead octopus.

Before I could react, the tentacles shot up out of the ground, wrapping around my neck and legs and squeezing them like a stress ball. I grabbed the tentacles, trying to pry them loose from my neck in a desperate attempt to free myself and clear my airway, but to no avail.

Suddenly, I was yanked up off the ground, head facing the sky. As the tentacles began to pull my body down towards the pile of garbage below, I could feel the pressure on my neck and legs, my head starting to become dizzy and my body beginning to weaken.

I looked over at Randy. "Randy, help," I barely managed to choke the words out. But Randy just stood there, grinning.

"So long, Jordan," he remained motionless.

I thought about all of the crimes I had committed. From that time I shoplifted to the time I assaulted an old man and committed fraud. And all of the trouble I had caused my family and the people my crimes had affected.

As I saw the world around me go black, I wished I wasn't at that landfill. I wished I could start over.