I was safe inside the warm familiar atmosphere of my room. The rain pattered on the window, making dull thuds and trickling down the side of the house. The green trees rustled with each drop of water. I lay on my back on the faded blue bedspread and looked at the ceiling. After all these years, I could still see the Rabbit up there, peering down at me through the thin slivers of cracks in the ceiling, making sure I fell asleep before ten o' clock.

I rolled over on my stomach. Today was the last day of summer vacation before I was to be shipped off to college. At the school, there would be thousands of new students, all potential friends. Tomorrow was a chance to leave behind everything and start anew. Tomorrow was the beginning of the end of my childhood. I was terrified.

I let my arm drape over the side of the bed and realized I could now touch the carpeted floor. I stroked the worn out carpet, once plush and thick, but now reduced to thinness. Smiling, I remembered how when I was six or seven, I was afraid to retrieve my stuffed animals when they fell off the bed onto the floor because I thought the Thing under the bed would viciously attack me.

I looked towards the window, gray with clouds, and remembered how everyone had been so excited about leaving town and going off to college. My own best friend had driven off a week ago by herself saying she couldn't wait till school officially started. She was itching for freedom, as was the whole senior class. Independence! Everyone had raced out of high school ready to face the world and embrace their newfound independence. Everyone except me.

I should've felt the same way, but I didn't. I had so many memories I never wanted to leave behind. I didn't want to leave my town, my home, my room. The prospect of doing things my own way, of having so much responsibility, just overwhelmed me. I wanted to stay in high school forever.

My own family had already accepted my upheaval from home and were making plans for " when she leaves." It was too easy for them. I felt betrayed, like they couldn't care less about what happened to me, or what they would miss while I was gone. Maybe they wouldn't miss anything.

In fact, my sister was thinking of moving into my room. I couldn't even conceive of what she'd do to it, probably plaster animal posters and stickers and cartoons and drawings all over. I couldn't imagine my room, my personal living space, the white walls, the worn out carpet, and the neatly folded curtains and the dusty bookcases and the outdated world map any other way than what I had created out of this space in the house. I looked up. The map. I had forgotten to take it down.

I gently eased the map off the wall. It was very old, and it still had the Soviet Union on it as one united country. I had never bothered to replace it; it had been good enough for me. I traced the outline of the American border with my finger, thinking of the days that I spent counting all the countries in the world. I folded it and placed it on my desk. Glancing towards the empty space where it had been taped to the wall, I was surprised to see the rectangular outline of the map contrast with the sun-bleached walls, in two different shades of white.

The clock read 5:00. There were only twelve and half-hours before I would have to leave. Despairing at the little time I had left, I curled up in the corner with a pillow and waited for the rain to stop. It just kept falling and falling and falling, no matter how much I willed it to cease. My world was spinning out of control. Soon, everything I valued, loved and cherished would be gone. My childhood was racing away 200 miles per hour, completely out of my reach. I buried myself in heartache, and tears streamed down my face like the rain dripping down the windowpanes, plunging to the ground two stories below.

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