We All Fall Down

by Natalie D. Richards

  She shifts the blade, and terrible images cascade through my head, the blade tumbling from her hands, slicing her belly, her thighs. Blood everywhere.

  “No.” My shout is hoarse, barely audible over the roar of the blade, but it’s like Gabriel with the cutters. It’s so real I’m sure it will happen.

  “What?” she asks.

  I reach for the saw, but she holds it out of my reach, so I shake my head. “I don’t want you near it.”

  “I put the lock on this bridge,” she says, and then to my horror, I see her line the blade to the metal. “I’ll cut the damn thing off.”

  It starts before the first contact.

  There isn’t one second to brace myself. I take a breath with nothing but the harsh buzz of the saw in my ears. And when I let it out, I am drowning in every toxic thing that happened.

  The edges of my vision go dark, and Paige’s face is a blur in a sea of voices and shadows. She’s shouting my name, reaching for me, but it’s not her now. It’s her then. She’s wearing Chase’s sweatshirt over a pretty sundress, and she’s shaking her head. God, she’s so angry, and so scared.

  In my mind, I hit her again, the impact soft and hard and stinging me through and through. I watch her fall, and I go down on the bridge like I went down in the dirt that night. I’m reliving it all. There’s a thin, awful wailing. A hurt-animal song that brought me to this bridge the first time.

  It is not an animal. It is Paige on the ground, hands on her mouth and blood spilling over her fingers.

  Chase is kicking me in the side, but I feel nothing there. My chest is ripped open, insides spilling out. Paige is sitting on a plastic chair, dripping blood onto her beautiful feet, and I did that, I did that.

  But Paige is not on a chair, and I see that too. Here and now, she’s standing strong, holding a saw, sparks flying as she cuts us both free.

  I smell blood and dirt and lilacs and rot. The darkness is underneath me, pushing up around my vision and droning in my ears. Paige looks up, her face hard and determined behind the sparks flying off the blade. Blood coats her lips and chin, drips in terrible splotches against the column of her neck.

  She’s talking to me while she cuts, that bloody mouth moving around words that belong to me. And even over the grind of metal cutting metal, those words slice right into me.

  Shit, shit, shit, Paige! No!

  I push myself away, toward the railing. It shudders under my impact, feeling dangerously loose. Paige looks up, no blood on her face and only worry on her features. The lock drops and then catches, the severed arm hooked over a twisting piece of railing. Determined, Paige leans in again, but the power cuts abruptly, the noise and the saw going quiet.

  I can hear my own breath, coming in and out in whimpers. I’m on my hands and knees, trying to get to Paige, who’s stony-eyed and glistening with sweat. Her gaze moves to the distance, to something behind me. Something on the end of the bridge.

  I stagger to my feet to turn to see it. It’s Gabriel. He’s wiping his tear-streaked face with the sleeve of his T-shirt. And he’s holding the unplugged extension cord in his hand.

  Paige

  “You can’t cut them,” he says.

  For a second, I don’t recognize him. And then I do. He’s the boy from Theo’s porch. The one he was talking to. I think his name is Gabriel.

  I still feel the hum of the voices, but it was worse for Theo. He’s bent over double, hands on his knees and coughing like he was being choked.

  “What are you doing here?” Theo asks. “I texted you all day.”

  “It’s not the locks,” Gabriel says. “Cutting them won’t stop this. It won’t, Theo.”

  Theo raises his hands, his voice raspy. “I’m not cutting your lock, man. We’re only cutting ours.”

  “It won’t help because she’s still here.”

  “It’s already done,” Theo says. So gentle.

  “It won’t matter.” The kid sniffs again, shoulders hitching with his tears. “I figured it out, you know? I figured out the source of all this.”

  “Okay, I’m listening.”

  “The locks aren’t the power; they just hold it. They’re not special or magical. They hold pieces of us—our energy. We put these locks on with a promise and that’s the power. It’s our promises. Do you know what I mean?”

  “Maybe,” Theo says softly. He drops his hands, completely serene.

  I feel anything but. The lock glimmers, motionless on the rail, dangling by a broken arm. My skin prickles with the same fear I felt four years ago, when I snapped it shut. Just let him love me forever and the rest of it will be okay.

  “It’s us,” Gabriel says. “People with locks—it’s all our energy, good and bad.”

  “I believe you. My uncle doesn’t think there’s one source either.”

  Gabriel shakes his head. “No, there is. Someone started all this in motion. Even my mom—after so long, she’s talking to me. Can you hear her too?”

  My whole body is tingling now. I see something out of the corner of my eye. A flash of movement. But then there’s nothing. My imagination or paranoia? Isn’t it always fear for me? Fear of this bridge. Fear of the future. Fear that everyone will see how terrified I really am.

  “I don’t hear her,” Theo answers gently. “Is she the source of this, Gabriel? Is this your mother replaying these awful memories?”

  Gabriel sniffs again, shaking his head with a bitter laugh.

  The air is changing, a slow building pressure against my ears. The darkness is coming to feed. It’s under the bridge—Then Theo. The Theo from the past, from that party. He’s down there, scraping at the wood. It won’t stop.

  “Theo,” I say, trying to warn him.

  “Just tell me, Gabriel,” Theo says, still ignoring me. “None of this is your fault.”

  He chokes on a sob. “It’s not my mother, Theo! How can’t you see this? She’s not hurting you, she wouldn’t have… She’d never. But someone woke her up.”

  “Me,” Theo says, defeated. “It was me, wasn’t it? My bad energy.”

  But his words taste like lies in my mouth. The darkness is still coming. I can feel the swell of power now.

  “My mother’s promise isn’t about pain!” Gabriel cries. “She suffered when my dad died, losing the person she loved—the family she wanted. But her lock was for me. Her promise was about love, not regret and pain. The voices, the screaming—her energy wouldn’t bring this.”

  “But mine would. I’m sorry,” Theo says.

  He shouldn’t be. Because he isn’t the one who clamped a lock on this bridge with a fevered wish to hide behind someone else. He isn’t the one pretending that he’s whole and good. I was driven by fear then, and now too.

  “I did this,” Theo says again.

  “No.”

  I don’t know if Gabriel says it or if I do. We both shake our heads.

  “You’re not the one feeding this,” Gabriel says, and his eyes meet mine.

  And I know.

  My promise was to hold on to the boy who would hide my weakness. I wanted to cling to my safety net. The one person who’d always be crazier than me. My lock wasn’t about love, it was about dread. And that dread is here, roiling black and desperate beneath us.

  None of this is arsenic or ghosts or science. It’s what’s inside me. The fear of that row of prescription bottles. The fear of my parents being right. The fear that my crazy will swallow me, bit by bit, until there is nothing left. That’s what’s coming for us now, dark and hungry and wearing Theo’s voice.

  “What the hell?” Theo asks. He can hear it, sobbing and scraping.

  “Theo, you have to go,” I whisper.

  Because it’s coming for him. I am coming for him.

  I am the swirling black shadow, the horror of our past, the panic of our future.

 
“She’s right,” Gabriel says, looking at me. “She’s the source, Theo. It’s Paige.”

  The boards groan and the shadow swells, pushing up on either side of the walkway, oozing through every crack. All around us, wind chimes sing and rotting lilacs cast their sickly scent in the air. Something thumps beneath the walkway, jarring the warped, rotting boards. One pops loose, and Theo stumbles.

  “Stay back!” he shouts at Gabriel.

  Gabriel obeys, but Theo stays. He looks right at me, still desperate to save me. To save us both.

  But how can we be saved? How can we beat away the things that live in our bones?

  “Theo,” I cry.

  Then Theo is no mere shadow now. It pants and gasps underneath my feet. Fingers scratch at the wood, and I hear it struggle. Hear him struggle. Gurgling for a breath. Sobbing on my name like he did on that deck. Reaching for me.

  That Theo is crawling underneath my shoes, his breath whistling through the cracks between the planks.

  “What is this?” Theo breathes softly, looking down in a mix of horror and wonder. “Paige, we’ve got to go.”

  He takes a step, but the entire walkway jerks. Planks ripple like an accordion, and Theo goes sideways. He slams into the rail as I drop to my knees.

  He rights himself and starts for me, to help me. But he can’t help me and I can’t help him—we have to help ourselves.

  I open my mouth to tell him. To explain. Blood rushes over my lips instead, sour and coppery, as real now as it was on the dock that night. The culmination of my darkest hour.

  He calls my name again, but I hear it from below, from Then Theo. The boards thump like his head hitting the ground. His sobs echo off the wood and slither up through the cracks. It’s that terrible night. It is always that terrible night. My jaw throbs and blood drips.

  This is what he did to me.

  Theo’s face is pale across from me. He is flesh and blood and here and now, but the Theo my terror conjured snakes through the planks and around his ankles.

  This is what I’m doing to him.

  A glint of gold catches my eye. The lock. It’s still there, caught on a bottom rung, old promises made for every wrong reason. Maybe cutting it wasn’t enough.

  I kick it hard, and Theo thrashes against the dark tendrils, against Then Theo. The bridge shudders, and Theo’s knees lock together. It’s got him.

  I kick the lock again, and Theo—my Theo—yelps.

  I haul back, my heel slamming into the lock. Metal scrapes and the arm slips free.

  It clatters against the railing as it falls. Then Theo goes still, a voiceless shadow once more. It will fall next, and this will end. This will end.

  “Paige?” My Theo is pale and wide-eyed across from me. I don’t understand.

  Then I see the remnants of the darkness, black tendrils wrapped tight around his legs. The rotten boards splinter and snap beneath his feet. Theo’s body shudders violently. I lunge, but it’s too late.

  He’s already falling.

  Theo

  I crack two ribs hitting a support beam underneath the walkway and land hard, wedged in a corner of metal somewhere in the bowels of the bridge. Paige is screaming and running, and Gabriel is shrieking as they rush for me.

  There is no dark shadow waiting for me. No terrible smell and no voice that isn’t right here and now. Nothing haunted remains, but I’m still screwed as hell.

  I groan and move, but it’s not good. I’m going to slip. I can feel that right away, and as a guy who’s had his share of falls, I would know. I move my limbs experimentally, but my right arm is toast. No pain, just a wet, lifeless noodle dangling from my body.

  Gabriel swears.

  Paige screams for him to call 911.

  And I almost laugh because it’s all so damn ironic. But if I laugh, I’ll slip more. I search with my dangling legs, bicycling wildly. There isn’t a way to get them up. I’m like a letter caught halfway through a mail slot. Sooner or later, I’m going to drop.

  I try desperately to even the balance, but with my ribs and my useless arm, I can’t. There’s no way. The water is slick and dark beneath me. Compared to the metal biting into my skin, it almost looks inviting.

  Footsteps thunder closer and closer, and then Paige is there. She’s sobbing out a litany of apologies and explanations, words coming so fast that my spinning head doesn’t have a hope of sorting them out. God, I just wish I could see her face a little better.

  “Paige,” I gasp out. My arm is pinned awkwardly, and my ribs are screaming with every breath. “It’s okay. I’m all right.”

  Which, yeah, might not exactly be true, and she doesn’t buy it for a second. Her face is mostly lost in darkness, but I can hear the sharp sniff she gives.

  “Gabriel is calling 911. You need to hold on.”

  “That…might be a bit of a problem.”

  “We can still fix this! You will…” She breaks off in a sob, and I struggle again, desperate to shift forward. Not to fall. Because this will haunt her too, and she’s been haunted enough.

  I tighten my jaw, decisions clicking into place. We can’t be terrified or desperate or wrecked or any of the other shit that brought us to this place. Maybe for once, I can do better.

  “Paige, I want you to look away.”

  “What? No! No, you are not pulling this shit with me, Theo!”

  She’s sobbing and it hurts, but it feels good too, because no matter what else we are, we are still us. I didn’t wreck us beyond all hope, none of this did. I smile up at her, hoping I don’t look like I’m going to throw up, though I feel like it.

  “Paige, listen to me.”

  “No, I did this to you. This was my fault. I didn’t mean—”

  “I thought we were going to start over. A fresh new start, right?”

  “Please don’t fall.” Her voice is small and fragile, and God, I’d give anything, anything at all to do this thing for her, to give her this. But my body slips a little more, and I grunt. Looks like I don’t have anything left to give.

  Denny’s words ring back to me. “This won’t end until you let her go.”

  But it’s not just me holding on—it’s both of us. All wrapped up in who we were and what we did, but there’s no controlling what happens next. All we control is how we deal with it.

  I slip again, and I know I’ve got no time. I grunt, and Paige screams at Gabriel to call them again, to get them here!

  I call her name, and my voice is fading, every ounce of my strength trained into the arm trying to hold me in place.

  “Paige.”

  She looks down, steady and good and crying for me. It’s not the worst way to face whatever the hell is about to happen.

  “Paige.” I say it one more time and hear her go still. She’s ready to listen now, so I speak. “Let me go. This is how we do better. This is how we try. Look away and let me go.”

  Her sob cuts me in two, but then her head disappears and I let out a sigh. When my arm slips again, I don’t fight it. I guess I’m ready to fall.

  • • •

  The impact is a blur, but the bastard pounding his fist against my diaphragm is bringing everything into high definition in the worst possible way. Rocks stab into my back, and my left hand—the one I can’t move—is scraping on a patch of thornbushes. He pounds again and I heave, ribs screaming like fire as I puke up what seems like half of the river.

  I push him away with my good arm, the one that doesn’t actually feel good at all, and then I try to sit up, try to speak, but the world goes dark and muddy all around me.

  Paige isn’t there. Not before I pass out or when I wake up in the squad or when Denny bursts into the emergency room. I don’t see him at first, but I’m close to the nurses’ station so I hear them barking.

  “Sir, you can’t be in here with that!”

  �
��My nephew’s in here! Squad took him!”

  “Sir, this is a nonsmoking facility!”

  I hear him slamming open the doors, and then slamming them open again twenty seconds later when he comes back in apologizing gruffly. A sour-faced nurse admits him into my little partitioned area, where I’m sitting in a scratchy hospital gown, ribs wrapped in ACE bandages and arm in a sling.

  I lift a hand and wince. Every damn part of me hurts like hell.

  “What’s the damage?” he asks me, visibly relieved.

  “Two broken ribs and a shoulder situation.” I look at the sling on my arm. “I’m supposed to see an orthopedic surgeon soon in Columbus. They think it’s a nerve thing.”

  He snorts, looking wide-eyed. “What’s that going to cost?”

  “More than Mom’s going to want to pay.”

  He waves a hand. “Figures.”

  He looks down again, then glances up at the TV. And hell, I’m still pissed, but he’s still my uncle too. I nod at the remote. “You could turn on the TV if you want. Check the weather.”

  “Don’t be a smart-ass,” he says. Then his face softens, his voice going quiet. “I’m sorry, kid. I never… I’m just sorry.”

  “Me too.”

  Denny pulls out his phone and clears his throat, looking awkward. “Your girl’s been calling. Texting too. Your phone’s lost somewhere in the water, so she’s been blowing up mine.”

  “She hasn’t been here?”

  “She stayed until they loaded you up. She was with you, but maybe you don’t remember.”

  Not one bit, and I wish to hell I did. I want to know if she’s all right—if we’re all right.

  “Did she say anything in the texts?”

  “She wants to know if you’re getting discharged. She wants you to meet her on campus tomorrow morning, which I thought was crazy. You’re not going to want to walk around.”

  I’m already getting out of bed when his hand lands gently on my shoulder. I wouldn’t call it my good shoulder at this point either. There isn’t a part of my body that feels anything to close to good.