A world without words

We enter a world where every person is limited to a certain amount of words for their life. Fortunately, it starts at puberty so all the mumbles of a child don't count towards the limit. This word restriction is a natural occurrence and not some deranged idea of a control freak. People were still able to live after they ran out of words. They just had to be careful when they spoke.

Patrick finally hit that stage in life. He lived in a pretty lively family. Always going out or have friends over. There was never really a dull moment for him. His parents and two older brothers talked quite a lot as if there was no worry about their word count.

He woke up on a Tuesday morning and noticed a black mark on his arm. As he rubbed the sleep away from his eyes, he realized it was a number. HIS number. He didn't want to believe it. There's no way this could be the number he was stuck with.

He ran to his mom and with the look of worry on his face. Looking up at he and showing her his arm, she gave him a hug and said, "It'll be okay. That's still plenty of words to live a great and expressive life. 10 million words will get you anywhere you want to be in life."

He looked down at his arm and said, 'Okay.'

He watched it turn to 9,999,999 and disappear. The number only showed on people's arms when the start counted, every milestone amount until it reached 1 million. After 1 million it stayed until it ran out. When it hit zero words left, there was a branding of the number zero as a reminder that you'll never speak again.

Being that the average person speaks 5,000-7,000 words per day, most people didn't have an issue when they were given 200-300 million word limits. The people with the most words usually became actors, singers, and politicians. The person that was given the most words at 750 million words let the fame and fortune get to his head and died from a drug overdose when he was only 23 years old. Billions of people didn't get a massive number but were still capable to live a full and communicative life.

Unfortunately, there were millions of people that were only granted less than a million or even 100 thousand. The lowest amount of words someone got was only 10,000. She had very little to say ever. She studied and learned all the words she would never be able to speak.

With the restrictions on speech, people came up with different ways to communicate much sooner in human history. Pen and pads of paper, portable white boards, e-mail and text messages all came to fruition much early in history. Even in school, students had to write down questions or send them through a message board to get an answer.

The world was a much quieter place with not as many people speaking. Most people were afraid of using too many words and losing their ability to speak later in life. Being a quieter world, it allowed people to think and contemplate how they lived their lives. There were less crimes and more love share around the world. There was still issues but not nearly as many as people saying whatever they wanted at any given time.

Patrick went to school and he was very quite. His friend were wondering what was wrong with him. He pointes to his arm and they still had no clue. He got a little upset and pulled out his phone to type out 'i only have 10M words. I don't want to waste anything.'

They were a but shocked and felt bad for him. They were good friends though and comforted him. There was no stigma about it but everyone knew when someone had a low limit, they tended to feel like less of a person. Word spread around quickly and everyone in the school knew by lunch time.

He was still able go on dates with girls and hang out with friends. He spoke when it was really necessary but kept it to educated answers. There was no way he was going to be a great speaker but he use his words wisely. A lot of people thought it made him look much more sophisticated. Even through college, the girls, and boys, thought his intellect was off the charts.

He even published a book about his troubles with deciding when to talk and when to restrict himself. Through his life, though, many people who didn't like him tried to get a rise out of him to force him to waste his words. It rarely happened but he was able to maintain enough of himself that it didn't damage his number too much.

By the time he was old and grey on his deathbed, he still had 500 words left. His family stood around, he told a sweet story and how he cherished them all. The finally words that came out of his mouth were "I love you all."

As he passed away, his great grandson noticed his arm. The number switched over to zero after he said all. Patrick had planned out every word perfectly so he never really rand out until he was gone. He became and inspiration to many people around the world and especially his entire family.