DARK: One

by ~LillianAlyse

Below, the water seethed.

Icy and treacherous, I could already feel its paralyzing sting, though I had yet to make my final plunge. Around me, snow swirled wildly in the winter wind. I admit, if I were not blinded by the snow and the darkness of the late hour, I wouldn’t have had the courage for such a feat. I leaned over the slick railing of the bridge and vomited. Terror? Vodka? Who could say? And what did it matter? No one but me would remember this last act, so symbolic of the frail human condition. My body ached from the cold. I was gloveless and my leather jacket was worn thin. I lay my head against the railing, and the tears that ran down my wind-burned cheeks fused me with the metal.

I considered this momentarily.

I would love to be a bridge. I would love to have a purpose so certain and so clear. I would love to be taken care of, to have my needs carefully addressed by a team of professionals- architects, welders, urban planners. When I was no longer useful, I would be obliterated to make way for another bridge, my purpose fulfilled.

Oh, how I wanted to be a bridge.

If I were a bridge, I would not have been taking my last glance at New York City, harsh and bright and ugly-beautiful. I would not have bent to untie my ragged sneakers only to find that my frost-bitten fingers were useless. I took the change out of my pockets, and my wallet. I scattered the money on the sidewalk, and pulled out the few battered plastic cards that were inscribed with my name. With my dollar-store lighter, I burned out my name, and the serial bars. It would be better if they couldn’t identify me. I torched the wallet too, and the leather and duct tape stunk abysmally. I pulled out the single cigarette I had brought with me, but it was soaking wet, and so I was doomed to die craving nicotine.

Mulling over the lost satisfaction, I thought of Nadia, and of Kay. Kay would be pissed that I didn’t call her back. She’d be bitter that I’d killed myself four days before her birthday—how selfish of me—but she’d get over it, since twenty-three is not an especially exciting birthday. Then she’d go find someone else to keep her crack habit supplied.

However Kay was recent news, and therefore nothing worth mentioning. The image of Nadia was lasting and infectious. Poor Nadia, I thought. I pictured her as I had found her four years earlier, in a bath tub filled with blood, in a red bra and panties, her short cherry coloured hair falling away from her white, bloodless face. Her Cupid’s bow lips stained red, red candles burned to the quick, a bottle of red wine spilled across the white bathroom tiles. She’d even written an array of suicide letters in red pen. I admired her ability to die stylishly, that tragic friend of mine.

As for me, I would momentarily be plummeting into the East River, to bloat in the polluted waters. There I would remain until I washed ashore, a decaying cadaver, possibly frozen solid by the odd November snow.

In fact, I hoped I would never be washed ashore. Let me be sucked out to sea, I prayed to the God I didn’t believe in, so that I might never be found.

Soberly, I crushed the cigarette in my fist with an apathetic sigh. I sprinkled the pasty wet tobacco over the concrete and smashed it further with the toe of my Chucks. I had really wanted that last cigarette…

…suddenly a pack of Nat Sherman’s was held before my eyes.

I glanced up. A slim figure, wrapped in a black coat, was leaning against the railing, quite close to me. I hadn’t seen her approach.

“Smoke?” she asked casually. “You look like you could use one.”

I eyed this stranger carefully. Heavy bangs concealed the top half of her face, and a dark plaid scarf covered the bottom. All that was visible through her hair, her scarf and the wild snowfall was a strong, straight nose and the gleam of a dark eye. Her free hand secured a black beret atop her head.

I felt an instinctual urge to tell her to fuck off and mind her own goddamn business, but my lonely heart craved nicotine. And here was a generous girl offering me an expensive cigarette well worthy of being my last. Wordlessly, I accepted.

I gingerly pulled out one of the black and gold sticks and lit it with my yellow plastic lighter. For a long minute, the flame struggled against the gale, but it finally succeeded in igniting the tobacco and paper. I inhaled deeply. A blissful moment passed, and I forgot the strange, solitary girl and the suicide that was about to take place.

“Thanks,” I breathed finally. She just nodded and watched me, slipping the pack into her pocket without making a sound. It made me uneasy. Why was she out alone, so late at night in New York City? Why was she sticking around? Was she a psychopath? Was she simply a random passer-by? Or was she meant to distract me while some loser jumped me from behind and robbed me blind?

This last notion seemed unlikely. Her coat looked new, her leather gloves looked expensive and the Black & Gold’s were hardly poor man’s tobacco.

“Do you want something?” I asked, maybe too rudely for her having just shown me perfect friendliness. “I’m sort of busy.”

“How busy?” she asked plainly. It annoyed me.

“Pretty damn busy, honey. I mean, thanks for the smoke, but I’ve got places to go.”

Like down to the bottom of the river.

“Too busy to let me buy you a drink?”

What the hell was this all about?

“I’ve got the whole night ahead of me, you see,” she continued, ignorant to my contemptuous grimace, “and no one to keep me company.”

I thought she might have been propositioning me.

“Whack job,” I muttered lamely under my breath. I turned away from her and made my way briskly to a lonelier section of the bridge. I was now directly under a streetlight and the snow was falling more gently, though the wind had not died down. I hoped she’d get the message.

She did. She strolled past me, brushing against my shoulder.

“Enjoy the cigarette, stranger,” she said, looking back over her shoulder, “and enjoy your life.”

As the facts stand, I would have been dead fifteen minutes later if she hadn’t turned her head at that fateful second. Fortunately, or perhaps unfortunately, she glanced back at precisely the right moment. A sharp burst of wind swept up over the side of the bridge, and sent her beret flying. But I hardly noticed her hat until it skidded across the snowy path to me feet. Unconsciously, I stooped to pick it up before it could fly any further. At some point during those seconds, she ended up standing in front of me, tugging on the beret insistently. Her mouth moved wildly, but I heard nothing, not even the screaming wind.

She was absolutely, positively and infallibly drop-dead gorgeous.

I couldn’t move. I was mute, deaf and numb, but I had never been less blind in my life. God, strike me down so that face can be the last thing I see.

“Hello!” she hollered. It roused me from my enchanted stupor, but it did not lift the spell.

“Sorry,” I replied, my voice hoarser than usual. I handed her the beret, which she pulled firmly over the crown of her wild hair. She didn’t appear to know what to say. She was annoyed with me, I suppose because I’d shot her down, and she gazed at me disappointedly. I felt suddenly nauseous that I’d hurt her feelings.

“Listen,” I began, “that was jerky of me. I’d like to make it up to you. Can I buy you a drink?”

What? No! I had to die, tonight! What was I doing? All the courage I’d built up for this, foiled by a black-haired babe with a pack of cigarettes? For the seventh time in twenty-six years of living, my attempt to end my life had failed.

“Jerky?” She laughed at me. “No thanks buddy. I’ll find someone who’s a bit more appreciative of random generosity to enjoy the night with.” She spun away and began to trudge steadily through the snow.

“Wait!” I begged, racing after her. She was too enticing. I couldn’t die without knowing her. “Come on, kiddo; at least tell me your name!”

She stopped dead in her tracks, suddenly rocked by the most violent non-epileptic convulsion I’d ever seen. With burning eyes, she scolded me: “My name is Hillary. Don’t you ever call me ‘kiddo’ again, or I’ll beat you to death with the severed limbs of your mother.”

This seemed very random, and vaguely confirmed my suspicion that she was not in perfect mental health. But the fact that she had hypothetically given me another chance to not call her ‘kiddo’ meant that my offer for a drink was accepted. I extended my hand. She took it hesitantly, and gave the lifeless, blue appendages a firm shake.

“I’m James,” I replied, trying to sound at least slightly interesting. I must have looked like a bum, a bum with a nasty cold and frost-bite. I had to at least have an appealing personality. “James Archer. Do you have a last name, Hillary? Or are you a one-namer, like Madonna?”

She recognized the attempt at humour, but all I got was an awkward smile and a confused shift of her eyes before she set off through the snow. I hung back, assuming that I had screwed myself over and would now have to go home and prepare for my next suicide attempt, under the disdainful gaze of Kay, the prostitute in denial.

But then she called out, over the building snow drifts: “Are you coming or what?”

I ran after her. I booked it.