Author's Note

Dear Reader, you have my Utmost thanks for seeing this story and giving it a try. I know these kinds of stories are a dime-a-dozen so I appreciate you chose this one. Any feedback is welcomed be it extremely negative or positive. Thank you and try and enjoy.

Names Josh, Joshua Hill

The alarm rang out, causing someone to audibly groan before quickly hitting the "Snooze" button. In the dimly lit room a figure rose from a bed, letting out a loud yawn before standing up.

"Great, a new day," the person said rubbing his eyes, "lets see if today won't suck"

Turning on the light revealed the figure was a high-school aged boy, with messy-brown hair and light blue eyes. His face showed a small amount of hair growing, not enough to shave but enough for people to inform him of his "Caterpillar".

"Damn, no time to shower,'' the boy said, looking at the clock. The time was 8:10 AM. "Better hope it's not hot today"

Reaching into the drawer, he pulled out a white polo shirt with a logo on it. Quickly putting it on, he grabbed a pair of gray dress-pants and white socks before heading downstairs. Deciding that breakfast was overrated, he grabbed some snacks and threw them into his bag before slipping on some black running shoes. Opening his door, letting the cool October air wash over him was something he never disliked. He stepped outside and began walking towards a highway-overpass, quickly passing through the litter-ridden tunnel and making it to the only intersection he would need to pass.

"Yo Josh,what up?" A voice called out, causing the boy to turn towards the sound. "Looks like I left at the right time to bump into you!"

"Yo, Nathan, what’s up?" The boy waved with a smile growing across his face.

Josh was his name, Joshua Hill to be precise. Some would call him weird, others would call him caring, but to his friends, he was one of the nicest people you could meet. Shy to new people but once you got him talking, he wouldn't know when to stop. Not the brightest, but he knew his stuff.

"Well, for one, I'm going to school" Nathan said with a clear hint of sarcasm in his voice.

As the light changed and the signal to cross turned on, the two friends struck up a conversation for the short walk over the bridge, consisting of nothing but internet references. Ending once they got into the school and parting ways as, sadly, they didn't have the same classes.

Nothing of note happened that day in school, the same people did the same thing with the same results. Nothing changed and the only interesting thing was that a kid slipped on a banana peel. Being intentional or not was something only God and that kid know.

Walking home with Nathan, Josh was looking down and soon his friend took notice.

"What’s got you down?" Nathan said, his words pulling Josh's gaze from the sidewalk.

"I guess it's the fact that you’re my last true friend still left at this school." Josh replied, a hint of sorrow in his voice.

"Lia moving got you down?" Nathan said as he rested a reassuring hand on his friend’s shoulder. "Because you know I could plan something."

"Not just Lia, but Mat, Ron, Liam, All of them close friends." Josh said his eyes returning to the ground. "All of them close friends who I shared things with, cried, laughed with, all gone"

Nathan let out a heavy sigh. "Yeah, stuffs rough, but hey, that's just life I guess."

"Would you start it over if you had the chance?" Josh said looking at his friend, them now stopping to have this conversation "If someway or somehow you had the ability to start life over would you do it?"

Nathan looked at his friend with a bit of shock. He could see in Josh's eyes that something was up. "Been having a hard time lately?"

"Is it not obvious? Things get harder and harder in life while my friends grow further and further apart, what the hell would I do if you moved away too?" Josh said. "It’s just hard okay, all the work that piles up, it's just hard for me"

Letting out a heavy sigh, Josh regained his normal composure, "So... would you?"

Nathan just looked back at his friend and smiled. "Look man, I know it's hard but you will get through it, you always have. And you know I won't always be here, but I know that we will never stopp being friends." Nathan said, offering a fist bump to his friend.

"Alright, thank you Nathan." Josh said as he fist bumped and parted ways for home.

[6:45 PM]

Josh was watching the news, while eating his "dinner" which in reality was just some quickly put together Kraft-dinner. His family was out of town on a trip he chose not to go on. Mostly because the Idea of having a 2-day drive from his small Canadian town to the blisteringly hot, Arizona desert to see something he didn't even care to remember. Well, let’s say he would rather not fall behind in school, so he had the house to himself.

"More and more reported sightings of ‘flashing lights’ around the city has caused a stir, but police have issued a statement that it's most likely a case of mistaken identity for cars, teens having a little too much fun at night, or something else. However, police have said that if you see such lights, report it to the proper authorities"

Josh turned off the TV, "Must be a slow news day. Who cares about a bunch of nonsense lights?" He thought.

Taking his now-empty bowl to the sink, he decided to take a late night walk to get some air. It wasn't the first time and he normally found it quite relaxing. grabbing a sweater and a pocket flashlight he headed out the door and proceeded to walk towards the local park. However, something was off. It was a full-moon tonight, but things seemed dimmer. "They didn't talk about any fog tonight." Josh said continuing on his way until reaching the park and taking a seat on the bench. Sitting for a while, lost in his own head, he soon found himself shutting his eyes and entering a state of rest.

Josh was woken by a loud cracking sound that filled the air, "What time is it?" Josh wondered, grabbing his phone. Pressing the home button revealed the time to be 10:35 PM.

"How the hell did I sleep so long?" Josh wondered as he noticed something illuminating the darkness. It was a bright white-purple light coming from beyond an old rusted fence, "Well, well, well. What do we have here?" Josh walked towards the fence, it was not much taller than him, and could be scaled easily. The light was not that far away, judging by the size of it "You know, if I found out what was causing this, I'd probably get invited onto some podcast with someone like Alex Jones" Josh wondered as he looked at the fence.

"Alright Josh, let's have ourselves a little look" With that Josh began scaling the fence. Lucky for him it was in poor condition and he was able to get over it quickly, and he took out his flashlight in order to not trip on a rock or whatever else was littered in that area. Heading towards the light, he noticed that, despite the light getting brighter, everything else seemingly started to fade into darkness, and soon he was in front of… a rock.

"Really? A glowing rock?" Josh stood dumbfounded. He could not believe that instead of heading home to sleep he went out and hunted for a glowing rock. Well, more of a boulder, with a large crack down the middle. "Waste of my damn time, just be a bunch of drunken idiots putting lights everywhere."

As Josh turned to walk away, something caught his attention. He didn't know what, but he felt something calling out for him. Looking around to find the source, the only things he could think of was...the rock, it was coming from the damn rock. He was more dumbfounded than ever, "I have finally lost it, I think a rock is calling out to me."

Josh wanted to leave, but at the same time the rock continued calling for him. He decided to touch it, just to prove to himself that nothing would happen. Wait a minute, prove what? Since nothing would happen, then why not? Josh slowly walked towards it, seemingly becoming entranced. Reaching out with his hand he was pleasantly surprised when instead of cold hard stone, he felt a welcoming warmth. "What is this? It feels amazing." Josh said aloud, not noticing he was moving closer towards the rock.

Then, all at once, he snapped back to reality, following his arm that now seemingly phased through the large rock. "What the hell?" Josh tried to pull back, but it was no use, he felt it pulling him in. He dug his feet into the ground, hoping to hold on, but it was useless. He felt his feet leave the ground and his face go from feeling the cold of night to the same warmth of the stone, the feeling consuming his entire body. He had closed his eyes after leaving the ground but now he opened them up, seeing a wild mix of flashing colors. It was too much at once. He shut his eyes and hoped that this didn't kill him, and somehow the overwhelming feeling of warmth, the colors flashing, and his tiredness, all mixed, causing him to pass out. The last thing felt was his body hitting the soft dirt.