Am I imagining it, or am I too late? The woods slice away before me in stacks of color, of dark grass and dying leaves. Usually I like the way the leaves crunch beneath me, but right now, they have that looming, intrusive hiss as my boots scuff them.
In the last slivers of light, I see a woman curled up by a tree, with something rattling in her hand. The choking, gurgling sound comes from the way she's crying. I breathe a sigh of relief. I'd seen the horrific image in front of my eyes – a boy or girl swinging from a rope, body hitting the tree. I envisioned them jerking like I did, gasping for the air that no longer came, desperate with the stink of wanting to live. Even remembering that awful loss of control makes my ears throb.
The woman's curled up in such a way that her airways are constricted, and she's unaware of her surroundings. A gleam of blonde hair dangles by her right ear. The thudding sound comes from when her left foot hits the hollow side of a fallen tree.
I consider leaving her alone. She's crying, but that doesn't mean I should go up and check what's happening or whatever. She might be drunk, high on drugs. She might scream at me to go away – and I've already dealt with enough today.
The one thing that makes me step over to test the waters, is the thought of returning home to face my mother.
I'm not ready to do that yet. I'm not ready for that conversation.
She doesn't even notice me approach, so wrapped up in her own world of sorrows. I finally glimpse the object in her hands, and see that it's a capped container of aspirin. A bumper box of five hundred, probably from a cheap multi-buy offer from the drugstore.
Well, then.
Looks like she's considering suicide, after all. You don't just casually go into a place like this carrying a container like that, unless you mean business. Judging by her clothes, she lives close by. She's not wearing a jacket, and one of her shoes is missing, revealing a multicolored sock with a hole in the heel. She won't last too long in the evening with that black shirt and tight leggings. I nervously adjust my scarf. I'm not equipped for this. I'm fresh out of an attempt myself. My feet twitch with my thoughts, wanting to turn around and walk away.
My lips curl with tight determination, pushing out the cowardice. Stepping in front of her, I clear my throat loudly. “Ehem.”
The girl lifts her head up, startled. The choking sobs stop. Her face goes from pale to red faster than paint over a blank page.
What do I say? “Hello,” I try, not sure what else to engage her with. The air is heavy between us, as if pressed from above by a giant hand. “What are you doing here?”
She doesn't answer, which fast makes my words awkward, since they drift in the space around us, thinning into nothing.
It's going to have to be up to me to talk to her, I realize vaguely. To prompt her out of her shell for a reaction other than mute, embarrassed silence. But this is already too much responsibility. I'm stupid for being here, for even trying. I should just apologize and go. My mind's already imagining the apology, my lips part to state it, but instead, after a horrible pause, I end up with, “If I didn't know any better, I'd say that you came into these woods to kill yourself.”
Kill yourself acts like an electrifying trigger to the girl. Her eyebrows knit into a frown, and a repulsive sneer comes to her lips. It's the kind of sneer you paste on when you want the whole world to leave you alone. “So what if I do? W-what does it matter to you anyway?” She straightens up slightly. “You gonna pretend to be some do-gooder or something? Give me a speech about how it's wrong to take my life and that I have everything to live for? I've heard it already.”
“Something like that,” I say, sudden rage stoking in my stomach. What a rude bitch. She has no idea she's about to do something she'll regret. I unconsciously touch my scarf, wondering if it's noticeable, if it had slipped down during my blank staring session into the green slime of the pond.
I shouldn't help her. It's not my place. She wants to go and fucking kill herself, be my guest.
“Well, go on, then,” she says, belligerent. She wraps her arms tight under her chest, eyes like burning coals. “Save me.”
I stare into those stubborn eyes, that set jaw. Words won't work here. Everything I say to her will just oust me as a hypocrite anyway. Because I was there. I was her.
I still am her.
So I do the only thing I can think of. I tug down my scarf for the rude bitch, showing her my ligature marks. My tongue feels heavy and large in my mouth still for some reason, as if the air that couldn't get through my windpipe had instead tried to inflate itself through my tongue.
The blonde's eyes snap wide. She definitely knows what these marks are.
“You?” Her right hand trembles, lifting up to her own neck, still clutching the container.
More light bleeds from the clearing. A few more moments, and only the street-lights beyond the park will illuminate us. “Yes,” I rasp. My top lip twitches in spite of itself. I still don't want to think about it. It happened to someone else. Not me. It can't have been me. It can't have.
Her eyes go wider still, before she whispers, “How did it feel?”
There. My attention focuses on her in a different light now. She's not concerned for me. Of course she isn't.
She only wants to know how painful it might be for her to die. I can see instantly that she doesn't want an answer. She doesn't want to think that her way out might be the worst one. You just don't think that when those poisonous thoughts are drowning everything else out.
You only think, please make it stop.
I take a step closer. Her eyes follow me, as if she's a snake watching a charmer.
A part of me wants to share the story of my almost death with someone, and I know it can't be mother. It can't be the “friends” at school because they've drifted away from me, tired of my suicide ideation. Tired of my "L'appel du Vide."
Someone has to know other than me. “Pain,” I say, now crouching in front of her. “Pain and terror.” I show her my fingers, where several layers of skin have been scraped away during my mad struggles to free myself. “I thought I wanted it. Weeks and months I've been telling myself, I want it. I'd pick up the kitchen knife and think how it might feel if I put it through my stomach. I'd think about taking the prescription pills from my mom's bathroom cabinet and taking them all.”
She listens, head bobbing in time to my words. She doesn't say anything, so I continue. A part of me wants to cry, the other part just wants to swallow up the words, stuff them into my stomach and make sure they don't come out again.
But the part enjoying her attention on me wants to keep going. God, even now, a part of me craves the attention, even as the rest wants to pull away. “I wanted to end it all. And I nearly did.” I touch at my neck. So raw and tender. My death necklace, blooming over my skin as a reminder of what not to do. “I pissed myself. Couldn't control it. Realized too late I didn't want to die. I couldn't scream. I couldn't take it off.”
She licks her lips, eyes so wide, it's almost as if she's aroused. She's not, though. Just mesmerized. Perhaps trying to imagine herself in my place, a rope necklace kissing her throat. What I want to describe, though, is the utter helplessness. How powerless I felt to escape, once I'd taken one step too far.
Those words don't come.
“Who saved you?” She says, putting the capsule down at last.
“No one. Luck. The ceiling light snapped.” I tap my fingers together, still wondering if I should just leave her. I'm not one for saving others, after all. Especially if they're going to be ungrateful shits about it. Yet at the same time, I want her to keep looking at me. “No one saves you. No one comes for you.”
Her mouth puckers into an ugly line. A lesson of a lifetime. A lesson when you're looking through the window, watching the lives of others with envy in your breast. “I know.”
I move forwards, examining her expression. She doesn't react as I reach out and take the capsule. I half expect her to scream at me, snarl, try to claw out my eyes. She doesn't. Instead, she appears utterly exhausted, as if every last fiber of strength has left her. Not wanting the silence to overwhelm, I add, “There is one person who might, though.” I tuck the capsule away in my jacket. “You stare at her in the mirror every day.”
She still wears that wasted, haunted expression. Still doesn't react.
My nerve finally breaks. Job now done, I move away. I'm not in the mood to keep talking. I don't want to be burdened with someone else's sorrow. I have enough of my own to deal with, and a loveless confrontation waiting for me at home.
I take about five steps before I hear a low croak. “Wait. What's your name?”
Well, I can give her that much. “Amelia.”
“Willow.”
I nod, heart squeezing painfully. She's likely a pretty girl when she's not consuming herself in self-pity. “Maybe I'll see you around, Willow.”
“You're just going to go?”
I sigh. “It's getting dark. Unless you want to freeze to death, you should get going too.”
The rustle of leaves behind indicates Willow getting up. “You can't just talk to me and leave me. Don't be a bitch.”
“You realize,” I tell her then, “That people who take pills to kill themselves do so because they don't actually want to die?”
She catches up with me, blue eyes scowling. “Fuck you. You saying I wasn't serious?”
I turn, staring at her dead in the pupils. “I'm saying you wanted someone to save you. That even as you sat there, gearing yourself up to take them, a part of you hoped someone would appear. Or you would have messaged someone, telling them what you did. Telling them where you are. All so they can come to you and then you'd feel like someone cared for maybe a second.” I prod her in the chest. “You're nothing special.”
“And you are?” She slaps my hand away, her cheeks red, nostrils flared.
“No.” I continue walking, almost smack into a tree. I realize with an awful, sinking feeling just why I said all that. “It's how I work. I want people to pay attention to me, and I'll tell them about wanting to die. Then they spend the better part of their day trying to convince me why I shouldn't. Doesn't work for long, though. Eventually they get tired of it. And you become the asshole.”
“I don't do that. You don't know anything about me.” Luckily, she doesn't make a move for the pills. I half expect her to. I walk faster, and she keeps up with me, her shorter legs struggling.
“I don't have to.” We both stop at the edge of the street, stretching out into a lamp-lit road, where a few cars wait at red traffic lights. I cross behind the cars, not wanting to take the time to reach them. Willow continues to stick to me like gum.
“The fuck you try to kill yourself for, then? Daddy molest you or something?”
I snort. “Why, did yours?”
I just want to get away from her. I shouldn't have talked to her. I shouldn't have said anything, and just left her to pop the pills and dial whoever happened to be nearest on her mind. What if she starts depending on me to talk her out of it each time she decides she wants to reach that medicine cabinet again, or fill up a bathtub? No. I don't have time for that.
I barely have time for myself.
It's not until I walk down the next street, when I hear her say, “I don't have anywhere to go.”
I roll my eyes before closing them, inhaling deep and sighing light. I turn to face her again. Funny how she tells me to fuck off, and now she stalks me back home.
Can't take her back home, though. My mother doesn't let anyone in. She doesn't want them to see all the empty bottles, or notice the syringes. We stand facing one another, like gunslingers waiting to pop the first shot. Someone has to give.
Such a beautiful face, now that there's anxiety rather than bitterness screwing it up. Oval, creamy, with thicker lips than mine - Willow's got quite the features. She's a little more broad shouldered than I am, too. Must be a nightmare when it comes to trying on tops. They don't make many women's outfits that suit those kind of shoulders.
“How much money you got?” I say, now digging into my wallet, wedged deep in my jacket. “I got about twenty on me.”
Her lips pinch together, but she reaches for her jean pocket, pulling out a messy wad of notes. They're crumpled and damaged, in just the way that makes me want to scream and slap someone. I hate handling money like that. But she's got a fair amount. Probably raided some cash drawer or something, stole from her parents or foster mom or whatever, because you don't go around carrying that much in your pocket without reason.
“Grab a motel for the night. There's a cheap one two blocks away. Not much of a looker, but it'll do. I can't take anyone home, my mom won't allow it. I'll show you to it.”
I point towards the direction of the motel, take about one step, and her hand fiercely grabs onto my left wrist.
“Stay with me.” Before I can open my mouth to protest, she adds in her low rasp, “Please. One night. I'm... I'm not strong enough.”
Fuckity fuckity fuck. I don't want this. I don't want her to say something like that. Hearing those words somehow hurts worse than anything else I've ever listened to.
I picture myself wrenching my arm out of her grip. See her stumbling forward, hands pitching to the floor, eyes springing into tears.
Shit.
I'm not strong enough.
Insides twisting themselves into knots, I stare once more into the kind of face I shouldn't be attracted to.
“Okay,” I say. “Okay.”
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