I can't stop staring at this red light. It's so beautiful. It's showing me a life I somehow once lived and I can't… stop… staring. I have always been Intern Leland. That's who I've always been, but this light. It's showing me there used to be a Leland- a young Leland- who had hopes and dreams. I don't think that he's supposed to have those; hopes and dreams were banned a few years ago. But… it used to be me. I once had a family; and I can't stop staring.

A young me is sitting on the floor and sobbed. I remember this day. It was when I was seven and I had to go live with my grandmother. My parents had just died. There was an accident at the abandoned mine. My parents used to work there. They were part of the team that was renovating it so that the government could use it as a detention center for the people who don't vote properly. But there was a collapse in the back of the mine while they were adding a recreation room. It killed five people, my parents included.

My grandma came over and pulled me into a hug. She was trying to shush me because my tears would attract Weeping Spiders and once you had an infestation of those guys, you were guaranteed to be out of your house for a week while the government fumigated your home. So, I slowly stopped crying and decided that I would never cry again. I signed the appropriate registration forms for life as an orphan and had them notarized at city hall. I was officially an orphan.

Honestly, life as an orphan in Night Vale wasn't too bad. You're assigned to a group with a couple other orphans and that becomes your new family. I gained an older brother named Terry, a cousin named Rob, and a little sister named Ellen. I still got to talk to my grandma. She kind of joined the new family too. I was still teased for being an orphan at school and I still had to do community service doing vague and creepy things for the government.

I was doing that until I got the gig at the radio station.

Oh. I guess my life is kinda, flashing before my eyes.

I wish that you didn't forget your life before your internship. I mean, looking at it now, I liked the life I was living. Why can't I have an internship and a family?

I miss Ellen. She must be at least 12 by now. We used to hang around the Desert Flower bowling alley and arcade fun complex. It was the best back then. I kinda hate going around there these days. I don't really know why.

Terry used to take me around Old Town Night Vale to look for stray desert scorpions that we could play poker with. We were expert hustlers and it always made for a good Saturday afternoon.

Rob and I were closer in age and we used to just hang out and watch TV when it was allowed or we would go out and play pretend for the mandatory 2 hours per day for children under 10.

But now I've just become intern Leland. And the internship is great. I mean, I sometimes get sad for no reason and I know that it's not just the randomly assigned sad days from the government because I get sad way more than that. But the other interns are my family. We help each other out. We spend all our time together because where else are we going to go?

Bringing coffee for show hosts is fun because I like seeing them at work. Plus sometimes they'll mention me in the show and I like that the community knows I'm here doing my job.

And there's a lot for interns to do. On a daily basis I'm making coffee, interviewing citizens, researching dangerous events in town, cleaning the station, operating sound boards, or resealing the gaps in the hole to the underworld that's in the floor of storage closet 3.

So, I really do think I've earned this death. I've learned so much in my short time and I think that this red light is getting warmer. It's nice. It's showing me things will go on once I'm gone and that there's nothing wrong with a simple existence where we only affect a few loved ones and we fade out without much noise. That's okay.

I know that my family remembers me. The light tells me so. It shows me how they're proud to know that the radio station chose me as an intern. They know I'll have a purposeful death. I really earned this death. I think that's the best. They know that I loved them when I knew them. That's all that really matters.

AN: Sorry it kind of sucks. I just really wanted to put something up since it's been so long. I have some other's I've been working on. So hopefully I'll get those chapters up soon and get this going again.