Donald Trump was knackered. But he couldn’t fall asleep.

He hadn’t been able to sleep since about late January, to be honest, but this night was a particularly difficult night.

Rather the writhe around in bed, he decided to get up and go for a wander around the White House. He loved the White House. His favourite bit was probably how white it was. Even at night. ‘No matter how much it tries,’ he thought. ‘The black night just can’t take over the beautifully white old White House.’

Donald was always surprised how quiet the White House was at night. He missed all the noise. ‘It’s just not as fun with no one to shout over,’ he thought. But he still managed to find his own fun during his blurry late-night adventures.

More often than not he’d head to the corridor filled with portraits of every former President of the United States of America. He loved sticking two fingers up at Abraham Lincoln and kissing Richard Nixon. Some nights he’d build a little wall of pillows in front of Obama’s painting and giggle as he nibbled on a burrito.

On this night, though, he just stuck to the classic move of poking his penis out of his dressing gown and screamed the Star-Spangled Banner. As he reached the final line, he heard a cough from behind him. Donald turned – his swinging ballbag shrivelling from the movement – and froze as he saw what looked like himself staring back at him.

Donald instinctively spat at the intruder, convinced it was a previously unnoticed mirror. He rubbed his exhausted eyes as the globule of phlegm didn’t hit glass, but instead connected with the forehead of a very real, albeit waxy-looking, Trump.

“Who are you?!” barked Donald.

The waxy-looking Trump nodded in the direction of Donald’s own portrait on the wall, revealing nothing but a silhouette of a man in a glassless frame.

“What the…?” tried Donald, as the painting of himself grabbed his shoulders. “Get off me! You’re not real!”

The painting dragged Donald towards the frame as he continued to scream. “Let go of me, you fraud! You alien! You may look like me, but you’re no President dammit! Get off me!”

Ignoring every word, the painting picked Donald up and slotted him in to the gaping hole of the portrait.

“You can’t do this!” yelled Donald. “The people voted!”

The painting slid the glass back on to the frame, silencing Donald Trump, before turning its back and walking out of the White House.

Donald Trump looked at his new, painted surroundings, rubbed his eyes for a final time and fell asleep.

© Carl Burkitt 2017

Brief by Seb Baird: “I’d like a story about Donald Trump wandering around the White House at night where he encounters a surprising character.”

This piece was written as a part of a fundraising project for Rethink Mental Illness, where I’m inviting people to set me any writing brief in exchange for donations.

Read all of the details here and if you’d like to get involved, email ca.burkitt@gmail.com or Tweet @CarlBurkitt!