Mathew Gwangwaa
Mrs. Emerson
English
10/4/18
Word Count:1275
The Grown Boy vs. The Masked Individual.
The day that I could say shall live forever in infamy. The 30 minutes of life or death jeopardy for my morals and my life which took place in a vanilla scented ice cream shop turns into eternal anguish in the devil’s palace. What happened that challenged my existence or being you may ask? Well, I’m an 18-year-old with a 10-year-old’s dream to be a hero who also happens to be a coward and not the right, cautious kind of coward.
Mathew Gwangwaa with the nickname “Gwangwan.” Six foot and three inches with not a lot going for me in the way of friends. Decent football player and an extraordinary gift presented as a curse, which happens to be me being invisible to the crowd. With that, I’m also a coward since I run as fast as a rabbit when there’s trouble or distress, due to the fact I’m anti-social and didn’t want to deal with people’s problems if it didn’t help me, but that was something a hero does. So now two sides of an argument wage war in my head not knowing what’s what. I felt like my being and purpose was what people would never understand even if I spoon fed every moment of my life. Thanks to an unlikely source I would get an awakening of a lifetime.
Failing to know myself well, I feel a sick rush of dread and disappointment which feels like Niagara Falls gave me a mighty shower of negative emotions. I went to an ice cream place to drown my sorrows and lie to myself that I’m training myself. On the way, a tall, bald, tattooed muscular guy, who happens to stroll up to me with a serious look on his face, asks me the way to a popular ice cream shop. I was going to point him in another direction, but it would be easier to say the same place I was going to since I wasn’t getting anything out of it. I asked for his name before he left, which happened to be Damien. After he scurried off into his crimson blood red mustang and his face disappeared behind the black windows. I ran through the busy streets fighting the flood of people for a while to get some ice cream. As I got closer, I could smell a creamy invisible hand grab me by the nose to show me the way as I got closer to Nathan’s.
Nathan’s Dairy Bar is home to the ice cream cow in black and red shades with a red shirt, the favorite shop I wanted to go to let go of reality for the moment. For some reason, I see the blood red mustang pull up on the other side of the street across from me. I went inside dismissing it as coincidence so that I could get my blue raspberry and tropical orange twist fusion on a cup. Soon enough I felt uneasy as I thought about Damien coming to the same place I was at and decided to leave.
When I turned for the door, both of us were staring at each other with Damien’s back on the door like we were about to fight it out. He looked different, but I could tell from his voice it was the same person. He whipped out his gun to say to me and everyone to give to give all their money. I thought “robbing 40 people would probably give you a decent haul and if I run I’ll be fine as Damien takes everyone’s money” as I walked backwards while the rush of fear and adrenaline coursed through my veins. Panic, nervousness, and shock also dwelled inside while I started to get inside the crowd of people to hide. He forgot about me while I moved towards the back door leaving everyone behind to figure it out themselves. I was happy enough to be behind the door that would guarantee my safety. I got a similar feeling on why I came here in the first place as I got a handle on my fate, and a vision of myself appeared, two of them in fact: one void black me representing cowardice and the other angel white me representing helping others in need aka being the “hero.” Frozen like ice, the two sides of me started arguing as if someone got accused of cheating. That sadly slapped me in the face back to the reality I desperately ran away from.
I turned to check the scene before I left, my eyes opened to see a short, average looking child in striped blue & red shirt and shorts, who seemed about ten years old, not giving him any money. He started kicking the gunman. I wondered why he didn’t cower in fear like the others, even though I could see his hand shaking from a mile away as if he’d fall apart at any second. The Damien pointed his gun at the kid, and I moved without much thought as to why I did it the first place. I slithered through the crowd and called the cops without anyone noticing. I felt my palms dampen from anxiety with the feeling of a bullet ripping through and leaving my chest, nearly freezing me again. I sprang into action telling myself “There’s no re-dos on this like in video games” over and over. Somehow the gunman didn’t see me, so I punched the gun out of his hand with every ounce of willpower and strength that I could muster. He threw a punch at my face but ends up hitting me in the chest where I imagined the bullet exiting. At the same time, I kicked him in the nuts, and he was stunned for the moment. Everyone surprisingly grabbed and restrained him until the police arrived.
The police busted through the door to find that the crisis was already resolved. The cops took Damien away and thanked everyone for staying calm. The mother teared up and thanked me for saving her child. The little boy gave me a free ice cream coupon to thank me and called me a hero when really, I should be calling him that. I figured out, thanks to him, that it’s okay to be fearful and be a coward. However, it’s not okay for that fear to paralyze you from saving, helping, or doing the right thing. Thanks to the little boy’s act of fearlessness against the danger that was in front of him, I was able to move forward embracing my cowardice but not letting it get in the way of doing what’s right. Thank you, little boy, you were undoubtedly my hero.
Memoir Reflection
My memoir “the grown boy vs. the masked individual” was my story about the boy with conflicting ideas that wanted to be a hero. The story itself was in good shape since it flows mostly well, but I can say some of my word choices made reading the memoir a little confusing. I could easily reword, clarify, or remove it, so it flows much better and the person reading it would understand it better. For example, “For some reason, I see the blood red mustang pull up on the other side of the street, I could have reworded it into something like “I saw the blood red mustang pull up on the street as I walked in Nathans.” There is not much I could change other than my word choice since if it weren’t for the missed peer review, I would have got a 90 and not a 75.