A Pack of Wolves(Lucas) “Are we there yet?”
“No. Try sleeping.”
I’d already tried that. I am not a person who can easily sleep. So I just sat there for what seemed to be an infinite amount of time, and for the whole time, the wolves were there, ever-present. Waiting is important but hard.
Why you may ask, am I in this situation? Well, it starts in an airport. I and my family were in Vancouver, so we could take a flight to a city in China called Shanghai. We went to the terminal and waited. And waited. And waited. Eventually, the voice behind the speaker spoke and we began to board the plane. The flight had begun.

After a while of looking out the window and looking at an electronic map of where the plane was, I decided to use the built-in entertainment system.
After watching a movie and playing some games, my dad said, “Stop looking at a screen and take a break.”
I did this, and I tried to think of things I could do. I looked out the window, but soon became bored of it, as the rectangles of farmland and winding roads were uninteresting and the same terrain seemed to stretch on forever. I thought of reading a book, but it was stowed away in the compartments above the seats and I couldn’t get it. So I sat. The flight is going to last forever, I thought. Then I told my dad, “I’m bored.”
“Take a nap.”
As stated before, I am not a person who can lie down and just sleep. So I close my eyes and try to go to sleep, which doesn’t work. Once again, I contemplated the amount of time I would have to do nothing. So I sat there, with my eyes closed, for an eternity. I just gave up and sat there. The plane was over the ocean by now, and there was nothing to do.

Some time had passed, and I looked at the entertainment system. I saw that we were in the middle of the Pacific, the plane’s course was a curve, going north, over Japan, and landing in China. Then the feeling came back. I was bored. Usually, the feeling fades quickly or is very slight, but on a plane flight that took hours, it was fatal (or so I thought in my mind). With nothing to do, I once again sat there forever. But at some point the forever came to an end, for something worse followed. The wolves came.

We had been flying over Japan for a while and the feeling crept into my mind again. Boredom. It spread like a plague, engulfing actions and thoughts until it gnawed at my brain like a hungry pack of wolves. I knew the solution, which though temporary, was still an answer. I asked the question.
“Are we there yet?”
“No. Try sleeping,” said my dad with the usual response a parent gives when the question is raised.
Soon, lunch came. But after the food was finished, the boredom started to sink in again, the wolves returned to feed, disturbing my thoughts even more.
“Are we there yet?“
“I’ve already said it, no.”
This question was asked again and again for the next couple of hours, for it kept boredom at bay for a moment or two at least, but the response was always the same. No.

After a while, the phase passed and I started looking at the screen again. Soon the “stop looking at the screen” parental notification came again, and so I had to stop. And once again, I started to wait for what seemed like forever. The wolves began to gnaw once again, and the feeling returned.
Eventually, I checked where the plane was, and we were not too far off from the coast of China. The last hour or so was the most painstaking. The seconds seemed to take minutes, the minutes hours, and time stretched out. The plane seemed to slow down, as if it wanted the flight to last forever. But despite this, because of the digital map, I thought, I’m almost there! And because of this thought, and of course, because of the wolves gnawing at my brain, the question returned.
“Are we there yet?”

Soon, however (though in my mind it took ages), the seatbelt notification light glowed and the plane dipped beneath the clouds, revealing a sprawling city full of skyscrapers and offices, houses and shops, and buildings of all kinds. Cars and bikes, motorcycles and buses, vehicles of all kinds crowded the streets. People crowded the city like little ants. The pack of wolves was chased off, and they faded into oblivion, though they will always return. Soon, a long grey strip appeared and towers came into view. The plane landed in the airport, and the vacation had begun.

On the flight back to America, in the middle of the Pacific, the question crept back, as did the hungry wolves. It was inevitable. Fated to happen. You can never escape the question. The question is a testament to the fact that waiting is important and that some things are inevitable.
“Are we there yet?”

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