For my final paper, I am going to write a chapter for my novel, Lucid: I’m Wide Awake, centered around the notion that objects carry a potential to fully consume human beings. I will provide a quick brief on Lucid and its characters that is relevant to this assignment so that the sample can be understood.

This chapter is centered around my protagonist’s twin brother, Darius. Josephine, the main character of the Lucid trilogy, is a nineteen year old female that is, at this stage in the arc, at the very rock bottom of her character development. It is Saturday morning, and Josephine is supposed to be watching her Darius while her mother is at work. Darius is severely affected by autism. In the moment below, Josephine is currently out getting cigarettes and has left Darius alone in the house and to his own devices. He has just woken up and soon becomes very overwhelmed by a glitch in his massive collection of New York City Memorabilia. Autistic individuals are often prone to developing obsessive behavior around movies, music, place, and, in this case, a very specific type of memorabilia that is often repetitive (how many Statue of Liberty figurines have we all seen?), and actually serves as a soother to Darius’ anxiety when he knows his collection is dusted, counted, and in order.

Here is a sample of the chapter. Enjoy!

IV

          Fifty. Darius ripped his covers off the bed, feeling his bladder twitch inside his pelvis. Fifty. He had just finished counting his collection of New York City Memorabilia, and could now allow himself to take his morning pee. He could finally let himself get out of bed, and let his toes crunch against his polyester rug that had turned his bedroom floor into a giant map of the New York City Subway System. Ashley had found the rug on the MTA website, on sale just before Christmas, and thought it was a perfect fit for Darius’ room. It was a new rug, fresh and clean and stiff against Darius’ feet. He stood up, his long bones popping in response to movement after his brief, hour-or-so rest.

           There Darius stood, starting his daily routine of taking in his surroundings and putting the pieces together. He saw the sun shining, so thus, it had to be daytime. Usually, during daytime, he was at Hoboken High School without Mommy or Josie. He spent his days in a contained classroom, with other boys his age (Chris, Lee, Joel, Rohit, Ivan) and one girl (Stephanie) that were like him. He attached minimal significance to these other kids, possessing no desire to become friends with his peers or even associate with them in any way. All he knew was that Chris brought in salad for lunch every day with very pungent, oniony dressing. Lee needed to pick up every stick he saw on the way to school and bring it into the classroom. Joel made loud noises in the bathroom that gave Darius a headache, and Rohit made no noise at all. Ivan wore diapers that stuck out of his pants. Stephanie would sing the songs from Annie every day during breakfast in the classroom, an activity during which his teenage classmates would be reminded how to hold and knife and fork, and she was sometimes so loud that Darius could smell her breath across the table. Her parents clearly did not take the time in the morning, as Ashley did, to make sure she brushed her teeth.

           But this daytime Darius did not see Chris or Lee or Joel or Rohit or Ivan or Stephanie. He had woke up in his bed, and was now standing on his new rug in his underwear. If he was not at Hoboken High School, that must mean it was what Mommy called a Fun Day: the weekend. He smiled wide, realizing that he did not have to go on the cold yellow bus or smell Stephanie’s breath over his freeze-dried eggs. This morning, he could have pancakes for breakfast, since it was a Fun Day. His stomach rumbled inside his sunken torso – he couldn’t wait for the sweet, syrup-covered morsels Mommy made so well.

          She had to be in the kitchen. Either Mommy was in the kitchen, or Josie was sitting at the countertop, reading a book and drinking some water. Darius yawned and blinked his eyes, smiling at these possibilities. If it was a really good day, Darius would see both Mommy and Josie in the kitchen. They would look up and smile, and Mommy would say, as always when Darius approached in his robe, “There’s my big man!” Darius didn’t know what this meant, but he knew that it always followed with a kiss and he would feel a warm feeling deep inside his chest. Yes, he could not wait for pancakes. He systematically walked over to his closet door and opened it up three quarters of the way, as he did every single time. He grabbed the blue robe that Mommy insisted he had to wear around the house, now that he was a Big Boy, and walking around the apartment in briefs was no longer acceptable.

          Darius slipped on his robe and started towards the door. Just then, he saw that one of his New York Rangers bobble-head figurines was out of place. His heart stopped, and he ran over to his bookshelf to straighten it out. A wave of anxiety ran over him. What if, he hadn’t counted his collection correctly? What if there was something missing? His bladder pulsated, full of the hot yellow liquid Darius knew had to be put into the toilet. But, his figurines. He straightened out Henrik Lundqvist, a New York Rangers player from a country called Sweden, born on March 2^nd, 1982, who catches in the left and makes $41,250,000 every six years. These statistics did not all make sense to Darius. He certainly knew that Henrik Lundqvist made a lot of money playing hockey – a lot more than the five $10 bills Darius would have to count during math lessons. $41,250,000 sure seemed a lot more than that. He would look up such information about each of his New York City objects on the internet, copying and pasting facts that stood out and putting them in a word document, to be printed out and duly hole-punched and placed into a giant binder that Mommy called his “log.”