by Stella Noir
Because I have nothing else to do.
If I didn’t have that damn body in my trunk, I would have turned the car around and driven away. But I need to finish this job. I can’t return to the city with the asshole still in the trunk of my car. He needs to go, and he needs to go here.
So, I’m just waiting. Waiting for her to do what she came here to do.
I check my watch again. Forty minutes.
“Oh, for fuck sake,” I hiss.
I look over to her. Her head is even lower now, and her body appears to be shaking in violent spasms.
She’s crying.
At least that’s what I think is going on. She’s still far enough away from me that I can barely recognize her features. I have only seen the profile of her face, her long hair covering most of it as it flies around in the wind. She might be a young girl or a fifty year-old woman, fuck knows.
One thing I do know, and it’s that this is getting ridiculous.
I let out an irritated growl and unfasten my seatbelt. Maybe all she needs is a little push.
She doesn’t even flinch when I noisily slam my car door after stepping out of the driver’s seat. Either she really didn’t hear me because she’s too absorbed by her own anguish, or she chose to ignore that someone else is here.
That someone is marching up to her now. I approach her with wide and deliberate steps, turning around to scan the street behind me. Nothing. No car, no random stroller or cyclist. A 360-degree rotation reveals nothing but the vast and empty wasteland that surrounds us. While the canyon itself is a beautiful sight, the area surrounding it couldn’t be uglier or more uninviting. Maybe that’s why no one has ever built a lodge here or dares to bring busloads of tourists to scope it out on a daily basis.
As I get closer to her, I realize she must be rather young. Younger than me, that’s for sure. She could even be a teenager. Oh, fuck no. I’m not pushing a kid off this bridge.
I’m only about ten feet away from her when she finally lifts her head and turns around to look at me.
Strands of blonde hair are sticking to her face where it has been dampened by tears. She looks up at me through dark, hollow eyes, her mouth partly opened as if she was about to speak. Her eyes connect with mine, but she doesn’t seem to react to my presence or even act as if she knows I’m here. For all I know, she looks at me with the same facial expression that she’s been casting down into the canyon.
As soon as we make eye contact, one thing is obvious. She’s devastatingly beautiful.
My heart literally skips a beat when I’m faced with her crushed expression. She looks so fucking vulnerable, so sad. She looks to be in such horrible agony, and it cuts into me like a cold dagger.
I freeze mid-motion when our eyes meet, locked onto each other for a few seconds with nothing but the wind whipping around us. I fucking don’t know what to do. She’s young, but not a kid. She may be eighteen, or twenty, in her early twenties at the most. Younger than me, but not a kid.
Fuckable. So damn fuckable. And so overwhelmingly beautiful.
Oh, for God’s sake! I need to get a grip on myself. I have things to do, and she’s keeping me from doing them.
She needs to leave, and it would be best if she left the way she intends to. Who cares about those eyes? Those damn beautiful eyes that are way too dark for her ash blond hair.
I shouldn’t care. I can’t afford to care.
I clear my throat.
“A jumper, I see.”
She doesn’t react, but just looks at me, watching me with those freakishly dark eyes.
I avert my gaze and nod toward the abyss beneath us.
“Here to end it?” I ask, speaking with a soft voice, as if I was afraid that my words alone would make her jump.
She should jump, damn it. Now that she has seen me, she has become nothing but a troublesome witness. It would make things so much easier for me if she just jumped. Beautiful or not, she just needs to jump.
I look around, scanning the area once again. We’re still alone, miles and miles of vast nothingness around us. If a car were to come by now, I’d definitely have to come up with another plan. Every minute that passes increases the risk of that happening. I have to speed this up.
But I’m not prepared to console a suicidal girl. I have no idea what to say to her because I don’t even know what I want the outcome to be.
“Look,” I say, still not looking at her. “I’m not good at this comforting stuff. If you want to kill yourself, go ahead and do it. I don’t care. But could just go ahead and do it already, would you? You’re putting me in a difficult position here.”
I pause, waiting for a reaction from her that doesn’t come. My gaze wanders back to her and I’m met with the same tearful expression I saw before. You’d think that my lack of empathy would push some buttons with her, confuse her, make her angry. Instead, there’s nothing. No expression, no reaction.
I don’t have time for this.
It seems I have to dig a little deeper if I want to stir something inside of her. The sick and twisted part of me takes over, as I come up with my next line.
“Or - since you’re going to die anyway,” I continue, “how about the two of us have a little fun before you go? One last good fuck. Is there a better way to die?”
Finally. Her eyebrows shift into an angry furl. Her grip tightens around the rail behind her, and she pulls herself back, away from certain death, as she hisses, “What the fuck, you sick bastard!”
I smirk at her. “Is that a no?”
She contorts her face and looks at me with utmost disgust. “That’s a hell no!”
I shrug indifferently, hiding the fact that my heart flutters behind my broad chest like a trapped insect. It’s too late for me. If she jumps, I fucking care. If she doesn’t jump, I have a problem on my hands, one that I was trying to avoid today.
It’s that damn dilemma that leads me to follow up by saying something that causes her to inhale with shock.
“Oh well,” I say. “I guess I’ll just have to wait until your body washes ashore then.”
I add another little shrug and look at her as if I just proposed to go for an innocent drink, while she stares at me with wide eyes, gasping for air as she tries to process what I just said.
“That’s so…,” she stutters.
Disgusting. I know. But it did the job. Her hands are tightening around the rail, and while she stares at me as if I was the creepiest person alive, she seems to have forgotten about her initial intention. Her agony is replaced with shock and distaste for this odd stranger who suggests fucking her dead body if she dares to jump without granting him one last fuck.
And curiosity.
“Either way,” I say, now daring to take a few steps closer to her, “I don’t care what you do, or how I’ll get a taste of you.”
I pause, taken by the striking sight of her fright before I continue speaking and walking cautiously toward her.
“Just make up your fucking mind. This is getting ridiculous.”
She bites her lower lip as she looks up at me. I am now within arm’s reach of her. Even if she decided to let go of the rail now, I could probably catch her before she plunged to her death. However, I’d prefer not to be put to test on that.
“You’re disgusting,” she hisses. “And cruel.”
“Cruel?” I ask, raising my eyebrows at her. “How’s that?”
“Don’t you think there are better things to say to someone in this position?” she wants to know.
I shake my head. “Maybe. But I told you, I’m not good with this whole comforting stuff, and I’m no therapist. If you think your life is not worth living anymore, who am I to judge? Maybe you’re right. Some people are better off dead. For their own good - and that of others.”
That may not be true for her, but it certainly is for the garbage that is currently rotting in my car’s trunk. That terrible excuse for a human being didn’t deserve to live one moment longer than he did.
But
her? She doesn’t seem to deserve that fate, and I hate the fact that she’s still standing on the wrong side of the rail. I take another step toward her so that I’m standing almost right behind her, close enough to wrap my arms around her fragile upper body. If she doesn’t decide to climb back to safety within the next few moments, I will force her to.
A sob escapes her lips as she finally seems to find herself confronted with making that dreadful decision. My distraction could only work for so long. She closes her eyes shut as her body starts shaking again, rocked by violent tears.
Her hands are loosening from the railing.
Everything happens within a split second. I see her right hand slide off the rail and her body slowly start leaning forward. She’s still holding onto the rail with her left hand, but I don’t want to risk anything. I leap forward, wrapping my arms around her upper body, grasping her from behind, strongly grabbing into the pale flesh of her arms as I pull her back, pinning her against the rail. I quickly readjust my arms, and hook them under her armpits to lift her up.
She doesn’t fight me, but lets out a yelp in pain as the rail violently pushes into her back. The sheer speed and force with which everything is happening causes me to lose my balance once I manage to pull her back to safety. I tumble and barely manage to soften my fall while still holding her in a tight grip.
We land with a thud on the hard ground. She turns around, burying her face in my chest as she breaks down into harrowing tears.
I’m officially fucked.
CHAPTER TWO
Meadow
I’m such a loser. I don’t deserve to be alive. I don’t want to be alive.
Where did this guy come from? How does he dare just barge in and pull me back into this life that I was trying so hard to leave behind.
I let go. I finally let go. It could all be over now if it wasn’t for him. He still has his arms wrapped around me. He’s strong, I can feel the weight of his hard muscles pressing against my small frame. He could crush me without much effort, but his embrace is surprisingly tender.
Still. It’s his fault that I’m still here, faced with the horrid truth I tried to abandon. The truth about my failure, my biggest loss.
I’m not one to weep easily. The heavy cries escaping my body shock me all the more. I don’t think I have ever wailed like this, not even at her funeral. Never.
The desperation of it all took over. The knowledge that I cannot bring myself to go back up there. This was my one and only chance to jump. I knew that before I came here. I knew I would have to be strong enough now - or forget about it forever and face the life that’s been laid out for me.
But what kind of life is that? Alone. Guilty. A failure.
He’s still holding me in a tight embrace. I clench my fists, slowly lifting one of them as if I was pointing to the heavens. But instead of cursing the gods, I unleash my fury on him. I start punching him as hard as I can, but I’m sure the strokes hurt me more than they do him.
He doesn’t even flinch as my small fists strike his buff arms again and again. Neither of us speaks a word, and eventually, my wailing starts to die down. I’m exhausted, so freaking exhausted. Sleep has been my enemy for weeks. I’ve fought it every night because I was scared to be confronted with those horrible dreams that have been haunting me for so long. I’d rather be awake and face the emptiness and sadness of my life than to experience the horrors that afflict me during sleep.
But his embrace seduces me. The warmth and affection in his touch have a soothing effect on me unlike anything else I’ve ever known. He doesn’t stop my tears, but the violent cries ease and my breathing slows. I succumb to his tender touch, and gradually I’m sobbing quietly, no longer howling and gasping for air. Fatigue takes hold of me, and for the first time in weeks, I don’t want to fight it. I want to sleep. I need to sleep. Right here, right now.
“Calmed down, have we?”
His deep, husky voice pulls me out of my impending slumber. He’s still holding me, and we’re lying on the ground in an awkward embrace. I suddenly realize that I don’t know this man. He’s still the creep who pulled me back onto the bridge after saying those disgusting things to me.
I struggle to get out of his arms and distance myself from him. He lets go of me immediately, and even pushes me aside, so that he can get up on his feet before I do.
I feel oddly naked without his arms safely wrapped around me, and I am suddenly reminded that I’m not properly dressed for the cold weather. It didn’t matter to me before. I didn’t even realize I was freezing because my mind was elsewhere.
But I’m back now, and I’m freezing.
I hurry to get up on my feet so I’m no longer kneeling in front of him, and I wrap my arms around myself in a vain attempt to stay warm.
“Where are your shoes?” he asks.
I look up at him, unable to hide an indignant frown at this question. There are a million things one could say or ask in this situation - and he wants to know where my shoes are?
My shoes are where I should be right now.
Down in the canyon. Gone.
“It doesn’t matter,” I say.
I was too preoccupied before with my own torment to really have a look at him, but now that my mind is painfully clear, I take inventory of his looks for the first time.
He is very tall. I barely reach his shoulders and feel like a midget standing next to him. The size difference is only enhanced by the fact that he is so broad, so muscular. He looks as if he could easily break me in half. His hazel brown hair is cut short and tousled as if he just got done with a fight, and the dark hazel tone of his eyes match his hair color almost par for par. Just like his entire stature, his jaw is strong and dappled with the shadow of five o’clock stubble. He’s undoubtedly a handsome man, but he sports a certain ruggedness that you wouldn’t find on an average office employee. A thin, two-lined scar adorns his left cheek, making me think of a dueling scar, which it probably isn’t.
I notice that I’ve been staring at him, creating an awkward silence between us, but he’s not doing much better. He’s scanning me with the same curiosity, and when our eyes meet, we seem to mirror the same expression.
Neither of us knows what to do.
“How will you get back?” he asks me another stupid question.
“Back to where?” I ask in a voice hoarse from crying and standing in the chilly wind.
He huffs. “Home. Or wherever you woke up this morning.”
I have no home and I woke up in a motel room a few miles from here. That’s what people do when they intend to disappear, they leave everything behind, sell their possessions, cancel the lease on their apartment, their phone connection, mobile service, health insurance.
It’s insane really, the bureaucratic ties that entrench you in living. You can only stop existing if you make sure to first cancel your insurances, internet service and social media accounts.
“I have no home,” I say in all honesty.
He sighs. “For fuck’s sake, stop being so melodramatic.”
“Shut up!” I hear myself shout in retort. It was supposed to put him in his place, but my words come out as barely more than a whisper. I’m so fucking pathetic.
He growls in frustration at me and lifts his arms, placing his hands at the back of his head as he audibly exhales. I can’t help but notice the way his jacket is stretching around his upper arms. He’s wearing a black leather jacket over a dark grey sweater, and black jeans with equally dark boots. He looks dangerous, like a man that would cause me to cross over to the other side of the street if I was to encounter him under different circumstances.
I wonder if he looked like that. The bastard that took Sonya.
“Look,” he says, lowering his arms in defeat. “Is there any place I could take you to?”
He pauses and looks around, scanning up and down the road and the surroundings on both sides.
“I don’t see your car anywhere,” he adds. “How the fuck did you get here?”
I walked.
I ordered a cab and asked the driver to let me out at a lake about fifteen miles from here. I know that the lake is a popular destination for visitors on the weekend and hoped that I wouldn’t raise too much suspicion by asking him to bring me there, even though today is a Tuesday and the weather is too cold for swimming. When he tried to make small talk with me, I simply said I wanted to take some pictures and walk a little and I would call another cab later to pick me up. He gave me his card, hoping that I would call him.
But of course, I never intended to call a cab for a ride back home. I don’t even have a phone with me.
After I got out of the car at the lake, I waited for the driver to drive off and then started walking. I walked for half a day until I got here. I wanted to end things as quickly as possible, finalizing a decision I had come to weeks ago. I took off my shoes, put them inside the small back pack I had with me, and threw everything over the ledge of the bridge with the intention of following immediately behind.
“It doesn’t matter,” I whisper, lowering my head.
I hear him sighing with annoyance. I should tell him to go away and leave me alone so I can finish doing what I came here to do.
But a part of me doesn’t want that. I don’t want him to leave me alone. I want him to wrap his arms around me, like he did before.
I’m so pathetic.
“I swear to God, girl,” he mumbles, clenching his teeth. “I’m going to ask you one more question, and if you answer “it doesn’t matter” one more time, I will fucking throw you down there myself. Understand?”
I lift my head to meet his stare. He regards me with a serious expression, narrowing his eyes as he tries to read my face. Whatever he’s seeing, it doesn’t please him at all.
“Don’t look at me like that,” he hisses. “Like you actually want me to grab you and throw you over the ledge.”
I didn’t know that I was giving him that impression. But he’s not completely wrong. It would make everything so much easier.