Forward: Hey all, this is a story that one of my students wrote. I teach in Lima, Peru, so keep in mind that Alonso is a non-native speaker of English. He wants some comments so please provide them!

The Novice Human
by
Alonso Luna


Once upon a time there was a sadistic teacher named teacher Ben. He was a novice human being with a blind necessity for writing. He had such an obsession that he had even invented a whole world around him. He was mad'�as mad as mad person could be.

He had studied Literature in college but after five years he hadn't made it. Ben had left the school and started to publish articles, many articles. Though his madness he was able to get the attention of the readers. He was a clever crazy person, and a sadistic one too'�but more on that later on.

He traveled around the world only by hitchhiking; the money he made from his articles was not enough and only covered the cost of his food. This was when he started to do other activities in addition to his writing. Years later he would confess in a book about his dirty profession. The profession he called 'fingersmith.'�

Years later he would live in Lima, making a living from his writing and occupying the role of a teacher in a school, or attempting to. That place couldn't be called a school. What kind of institution would accept a mad person in order to have a foreign speaker as a teacher? Ben was not even a stable human being. On occasions he used to collapse, or enter the room in a state of rage. He would hand out punches to every single student in class, cruelly knocking them down.

He loved to be heard when reading a piece of his own work. He felt important, he was mad! Damn he was mad!

It was during this part of his life that he met two other weird Americans; these were not mad but drunk. They were named Spencer and Andrew, or at least, that's what Ben used to call them, there was no evidence to suggest that those were their real names. Ben was proud of his two new pals. They were the ones who introduced him to alcohol a vice he would never quit for the rest of his life.

Even after all this social interaction with the students and the teachers he was still mad. The voices still came to his mind and talked to him, persuading him to write. He wasn't strong enough to stop them. Although he now had the alcohol to calm him, the voices would never stop.

- o -

He wakes up in the middle of the night next to somebody he doesn't know. He hopes she hasn't got any diseases. He stands up with much difficulty, the room moves around him. Now he is on the floor again. Hopefully the woman is still asleep. He tries to move his heavy and dumb body with no success; but the voices keep talking, he needs to write if he wants to calm them. A shadow is moving on the wall and it is not his. A cold wind passes through a small space between the windows. The woman on the bed moves.

He doesn't.

He can't move!

The voices are driving him insane! The shadow! It is moving! It's my head! The voices! The wind! The night! The woman! He was determined to end the voices, but how? They were louder now, some even sounded like screams of pain, of people being flagellated. He could see the people in a hazy vision of blood.

These voices keep talking and talking. They wanted him to get rid of the woman. She was just a piece of flesh. A toy used only to calm the wild instincts of the savage animal that called itself human being. He couldn't stop them'�A shadow is leaving from the room and is it is not his. A cold wind passes through a small space between the windows. The woman on the bed doesn't move.

- o -

Ben acted differently in class; he was kind of worried about something. No one was brave enough to ask him why, he was mad. The voices were calm, but he was still worried. He quit the school, he wasn't able to 'teach,'� or even to speak coherently. All his mind was focused on some other thing: a dream. A bad dream, a nightmare. He was worried. He was tired.

- o -

His eyes opened and he saw nothing, there was no light. He could only hear drops of water falling to the floor. He was naked. He stood up and felt around. He found a chair. He sat down and tried to remember his dream. A bad dream, a nightmare. He was human, a novice human searching for something he didn't know.

He was a writer. He was a teacher. He was an alcoholic.

'Mr. Jonjak'� said a voice, 'please stay on the floor, the personal will enter to give you a bath.'� Two lights appeared from nowhere and white-suited men entered the room. The naked man started to scream. He was mad. Damn he was mad!

The End

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