This morning was really busy. I woke up only in my underwear, I didn’t know how that happened. When I woke up, it smelt really good, I woke up on a fluffy, good smelling bed. I walked around the room, I had the room to myself. I saw some curtains that looked really nice and a globe. I started studying the globe, all the places I went to, and where I still need to go.

            I took another bath, it made me feel like I was free and clean again. The bar was always new and always white. This time, I rubbed all of my body parts. I didn’t have to bathe with my clothes on, I didn’t have to clean my own clothes.

            Maria’s parents asked me if I needed to clean my only pair of clothes before all of this happened. I told them I needed them to be clean so for when I leave I won’t look homeless.

            After the bath and when Maria’s parents asked me to clean my clothes, I went downstairs to eat. The food was really good. It filled me up for the whole day, I was so used to having only one meal a day in the camp.

            When everyone finished their food, all of the kids left, the two boys, and Maria. Carlo went upstairs, I guess he was mad or something. The kids went outside and started to play.

            The kids played some game on the grass. The weather was cool and nice outside. The kids asked me to play also, I did not know how to play. The kids handed me a toy. And I said, “I’ll just watch.” And I watched, holding this toy, and I do not know what to do.

            After playing, Maria’s parents asked me how much longer I needed to stay, I was about to ask to leave today, but I still wanted to live in this house. I still wanted to see Maria every day, she’s the only girl who has made me smile, and I only know when to smile when she’s around me.

When I first got into Denmark, I went to some place with rowdy men. Everything was loud. I was just about to leave, and some boy came up to me, he talked about me in a negative way. I didn’t want to talk back because I did not want to sink down to his level. He looked my age, and I wondered why he was like that. We kept arguing and then he punched me. I punched him back and then I started running, I started running as fast as my feet could take me. His name was Carlo, from what I heard in that place. 

 I took another bath; I went into the cold ocean and took out my bar. I cleaned myself again, cleaned my dirty shirt and dirty shorts. I always feel free when I’m in the ocean and I feel clean. I felt the need to take a bath because of what happened earlier. I never want to feel like that ever again.

            While I was in the ocean, I saw two boys and a girl. They were playing around a barn and David heard one of the boys say the girls’ name, her name was Maria. When I heard it, I felt all weird inside.

            I was still inside of the ocean when the boys and the girl were playing the game, I saw how they played, they played a weird game, the two boys tied Maria onto a chair. After they did that the two boys left the girl in the barn.

            The barn caught on fire. I got out of the ocean and started to run to Maria and the barn. A lot of people were around the barn and no one was helping Maria. I took off my shorts and wrapped them around my head so I could see in the smoky barn. I saw Maria struggling trying to get out. I tried to untie the knots; they were not that strong so I undid them pretty easily. I carried Maria out of the barn, her eyes were closed and she seemed pretty tired.   

I am now living in a big house. I woke up in a bed it was soft and fluffy and really big.

            Yesterday, after saving Maria from the fire, a lot of people were surrounded around the barn. Maria’s family was there. Her two brothers, her mom and her dad, and Carlo. I did not know she was Carlos’ sister. I was shocked when I saw Carlo.

            Maria’s family started to talk to me, they asked me if I wanted anything in return. I was going to say I came from the circus but no. I wanted to see Maria for a couple more days, she made me smile. I said I was homeless so they took me to their home.

            On the way to their home, I kept looking at Maria, but when she looked at me, I turned away. Carlo didn’t talk to me. Maria’s parents asked me a lot of questions. A lot.

            When we got to their home, there was a gate so you can enter and exit, I guess they were really rich. 

            Maria’s parents told me to take a bath right away. When I got into the bathtub, my scars and burns burnt a lot from the water. After a while the water felt soothing. I felt new again. I hope I get to always feel like this, feeling free and new.

            After I bathed, I went into a room, there were clothes already put out for me. I guess they were Carlos’ old clothes. I think he got mad at his mom and dad because he hated me. And I hated him back.      

            When I clothed myself in these clothes, Maria’s parents called me down to eat. Everything was fancy, there was a big table and really good food.

            After that whole day, I was tired, I went to bed.

I remember the man telling me to go north to some place called Denmark. When I tried going north, the trail did not go straight, it went in zigzags, on the edge of the trail, was the ocean. I was trying to walk north but it did not show up right, I was walking the way the trail went, I hope that would work. After a couple of minutes, I was getting frustrated and I dropped my compass into the ocean. I lost everything. My whole life was in the hands of that compass.

After I lost my compass, I lost all faith in escaping. I guess they were now really close to me, close enough to spot me in Italy.

            I was now pretty far. I was trying to remember which way was north. I was walking and I saw two lights pointing straight at me. The licence plate was different, it was not from Italy. I guess they were just visiting here.

            They people in the car stopped and came out of the car. They saw that I was dirty and I was homeless, they talked to me in a weird accent. Not similar to mine, but I tried copying them, making them seem like I was not homeless. I tried my plan, saying that I’m from the circus.  They totally agreed with me.

            The people asked me where to get water in their accents. I told them I was going to fetch the water myself, so I took their buckets and filled them up. The trip was not that long, and I was used to this kind of labour.

            The people thanked me a lot, they offered me a couple of paper bills, I didn’t take them, and I didn’t know what they were, so I declined the offer.

            They asked me anything I wanted. I asked them if I could get a ride to the place, Denmark. They gave me a ride to Denmark and I thanked them in their weird accent. 

Last week, I found a lot of interesting things. I found a place to stay safe, and some juicy round things. I hope I don’t die from those things. If they were poisonous, I would have been dead already. I guess they’re not poisonous.

            When I found my place to stay, I always hoped that I don’t run into them. Or I hope they aren’t searching for me. I found a really dark and low key place. It was hard to come by, but it was worth it in the end.

            When I found those round juicy things, I took two, one that was orange and one that was yellow, when I got back to my home, I smelt them, they both smelt really good. It almost smelt as good as the white bar. But I liked the smell of the bar better. I first bit into the orange round thing, it squirted a little bit. And I guess you can’t eat the tough thing, skin type thing. I started to pick at it, I found that if you peel the skin, you find the insides; it was like opening a treasure. When I peeled all of the skin off, I ate one of the orange round thing slice, it was good and it made my mouth feel all tingly and weird at first, but after a couple more slices, they started tasting really good and made me feel good.                               

            After I ate the round orange thing, I tried the yellow one, it looked a bit different but it was similar, it had a skin and insides. When I bit into the first slice, it was like the orange thing, but worse. I didn’t like it at all. I kept the yellow thing anyways, I would think it would still help me through this trip, I still needed food. 

          When I finished eating the round juicy things, I went out to explore, it was a really bad idea, I was risking myself. I could get spotted by them. I did not want to be spotted by them. 

          I was exploring and it was really late. I passed by a bakery and it smelt very good. I guess it was closing soon, everyone was leaving the bakery. A baker came outside, he gave me a cold loaf of bread. He looked shocked when he saw me, maybe because he was the first one to actually notice me here in Italy. After he passed me the loaf of bread. I walked back home and saw a building, it had a cross on the very top. I heard about these things. I said a small prayer and ended it with, “I am David, Amen.” 

             The past couple of days, I have been walking and running, I am really tired and the bread the man gave me is almost done.

            When I opened the box there was no bomb to kill me. No group of them coming after me. When I opened the box, there was a loaf of bread, a compass, and a canister full of water, when I got all of the things, I first took a bite of bread, I was starving. Then a three sips of water to wash it down. I don’t think it will last me at least a week.

            After resting for a couple of hours, I took my compass and starting walking south, then I saw the forest. Should I go through it or around it? If I go around it, I’m not going to be going south, so I walked through it. As I was walking through the forest, I kept looking down to my compass, to make sure I was going the right way. After an hour or so, I saw the forest coming to an end, so I ran, and made sure I was still going south.

            After the forest, there was a barn with a couple of sheep, and a couple of shepherds sleeping and taking a rest.  They were in a really deep sleep, I could hear them snoring, I guess they had a long day of work. I’m used to no rest after work. If they saw you resting on the job, they would bring you with them. After the men took you with them, they would tell us the person went missing, I would always think that they never went missing. I never wanted to go missing, so I stayed working, and slept when the men told us to sleep.

            I was really curious what was inside the barn, so I went in, there was some soup, bread, and a canister similar to mine. I had a couple of slurps of soup, and took the bread, I took the canister and threw it on the table. I made it seem like the sheep came in and they were hungry and the sheep wrecked the shepherds’ lunch. 

Sorry I never really wrote the past couple of weeks, I did a lot of experiencing things. I finally got to Salonica, where the man told me to go. There I found a dock, lots of ships were waiting. They put stock and some boxes inside of the ship.

            After I got onto the ship, I went to some place named “Italy”. There were signs everywhere that said Italy.

            When I got onto the ship, there was a man, he came up to me. He was shocked, I was shocked too. I guess he was a fisherman, he smelled of fish. He told me to jump off the ship when we get close to shore. He gave me a lifesaver. And some bar, it smelt really good and it was white and clean.

            When we were close to shore I jumped, the water was really cold and I swam to shore. When I got into Italy, there was a truck waiting for the stock and boxes from the ship. So I went inside, when I got inside, I went to the very back, and moved some wine cases.

            When the door opened, there was another man, he was shocked, and I was shocked too. He talked to me in Italian, he said that I could stay but when we stop, I have to leave. I responded back to him in Italian, I never knew this language, but I spoke it fluently.

            When I jumped out of the truck, I ran as fast as I could, so no one could see me. I ran into the ocean, I had the bar that smelt of roses and looked clean. I unwrapped the bar, and dipped it into the ocean, it left some bubbles and the smell was starting to smell really strong, but not in the bad way. I cleaned myself.  I rubbed the bar on my chest, legs, arms, and everything else. I took off my clothes and scrubbed the bar all over my clothes, my shirt started becoming whiter than it was before. And my shorts were looks brighter too. I took a stick and cleaned under my toenails and finger nails. I felt clean. I felt happy. I felt free. I looked around me, and I saw the blue ocean sea, orange yellow sky, and the green healthy grass. I felt as free as a bird.  

            “The sun glistened on a drop of water as it fell from his hand to his knee. David wiped it off, but it left no tidemark: there was no more dirt to rub away. He took a deep breath and shivered. He was David. Everything else was washed away, the camp, its smell, its touch—and now he was David, his own master, free—free as long as he could remain so.”

                Today was a weird day, the guard told me to go over the fence, he’s going to be shutting it off for a couple of seconds. I was scared that he was lying, and he was going to electrify me and kill me, I do not want to die in this camp. I hated this camp, I hated the man also. I just really hate the man; I hate him for putting me in this stupid camp, and messing around with me. Even if we were long distant cousins, I wouldn’t talk to him, I wouldn’t thank him for all of the times he would give me things, I just really hate him. He told me that it was his last day. Why is he being nice? He’s not really nice in the first place, he’s mean, he’s cruel.

            The man told me to go until I see a box with a rope tied around it. And when I got the supplies, he told me to go south. All the way.  

            So, it was late, and the man that I hated, was the only one on site. He lit one match, and I guess that was my go signal, I was getting mixed signals, should I go? Or leave? If I stay, I’ll stay in this stupid place. If I leave, I am risking my life, but I will be discovering new places, new everything, a new life, a new David.

            Right now, I am running, I am running as fast as I can. As fast as my big feet can take me. I’m hoping the man doesn’t shoot me, or he tells the other guards in the morning. If he does tell the other guards, I am dead, literally.  I ran for a couple of minutes, I have not seen a box yet, was the man lying? Was he trying to kill me, kill me by leaving me here in the cold.

            I had a feeling I ran too far… So I ran back, and I found it! So is there a bomb that’s going to go off when I open it? Probably.