He is alone. Surrounded by friends, yet he is alone. They don't realize that anything is wrong. He doesn't want them to realize. No not until its too late. He has planned this for a long time now. A way to end his loneliness. Suicide will be his escape. A coward's way out? He doesn't think so. He just needs an escape. Better to be truly alone forever surrounded by the sweet silence of oblivion, than face these people who he is a stranger to.

He walks slowly from the house he has shared with his parents for years. He sighs at the thought of his mother's reaction and imagines his poor father attempting in vain to comfort her when they realize that he is never coming home. He cannot deviate from the plan though. It has been forming for far too long now. Years in the making, years trying to find the perfect way out.

Now he has found it. The blue waters come into view as he tops the hill. The lake he has always loved. It would make sense that this would be his way out. His final resting place.

The sand presses under his feet and bleeds into his shoes in the way only sand can do. He begins to shake his feet slightly with each step trying to work the irritant out in vain. Sand does not care. It simply is.

He reaches the water and takes his first step in. No hindrance in his stride. Why should there be? He has come here for a reason. He wades deeper and deeper, the cool rush climbing and squirming it's way into his flesh.

The water is now above his head and he begins to swim, long strong strokes of an avid swimmer. He can see it in the distance, the red point gleaming out over the water like a funeral pyre. His funeral pyre. The buoy. That which is meant to protect will serve his purpose.