Escaping The Shadows Anthology: Shenanigans'19 @ The West Midlands Book Signing.

The End.

  Staring Into The Abyss

  By

  Paula Acton

  Blurb

  In the darkness of the longest night, a stranger's words might just be the light needed to guide the way home.

  Chapter One

  He pulled the coat tighter around him, another glance over his shoulder confirmed he was alone on the bridge. Pulling the bottle from his pocket he took a swig; the brandy burned his throat as he swallowed it. One for the road he thought to himself before replacing the top and returning the bottle to his pocket. He gripped the barrier and pulled himself over. He had been preparing himself for this all day, waiting for the footfall of pedestrians to ease.

  He had considered all the different options. All the ways to die, but he had remembered hearing once that drowning was like going to sleep and, right now, he was tired. So tired of everything. This was for the best, best for everyone. He looked around to check he was still unobserved and climbed onto the girder. For a minute he thought about just plunging straight over into the darkness, but instead, he sat down. There were still two-thirds of the bottle of brandy in his pocket, even at this point, the thought of waste gnawed at his consciousness somewhere in the back of his mind. He would just sit here drink a little more and smoke a cigarette, then he would do it.

  He reached into his pocket searching for the packet of cigarettes and lighter. Fruitlessly groping around for a few seconds before he remembered, he had stopped smoking six months ago, when his son was born. He let his head drop back and looked up at the stars, his son, the reason he was doing this. One day he would understand, he would know how loved he was, that he had been protected.

  Pulling the bottle out he opened it, then lifting it to his lips allowed another stream of liquid to his coat his throat. He was so tired; he had not slept since he left home two days ago. Home, a word he had spent so many years searching for only to realise he was the problem. He had always been the problem, they had all been right.

  He had left with only the money in his pocket, he had no right to more, he had used his phone to book a ticket on a coach to the capital after all wasn’t this the cliché, the place all runaways headed for. The phone was dead now, he was glad, he couldn’t see any missed calls or messages begging him to return, not that he really believed there would be any. No, that life was done and finished, he had spoilt it all as usual.

  Chapter Two

  The first night he had stood in this spot, but it had been a Friday night, too busy with late night revellers passing by constantly both on foot and in taxi’s he had not even bothered coming back on Saturday knowing that it would be the same. Instead, he had disappeared down the back alleys, keeping his head down and doing his best to be just another of the anonymous homeless. They kept their distance from him too, he was too clean, not desperate enough, though he knew that he was being watched by them constantly. Despite his reasons for coming here he did not want to end up a victim of theft or assault, first, there was no guarantee of the results he wanted and, secondly, he wanted it to be as painless as possible for those he was leaving behind.

  Looking down there was only darkness, the moon was hidden behind the clouds, and the streetlights did not reach the river flowing beneath him. He wondered whether it would be easier launching himself into the abyss, or if seeing the water waiting to welcome him, would be preferable. He doubted it would make a difference once the time came and he leant his weight forward, there would be no changing his mind, no chance to turn back. Once he made the move there was only oblivion awaiting, and that was exactly what he wanted.

  Strange he thought, he had spent so much of his life searching for a way to escape it and only now, as he faced the end of his existence, did he really appreciate that he believed in nothing after. He would finally be free from judgement, shame and all the other baggage he had carried for so long. He took another drink and checked the amount left in the bottle, it was almost half empty, not long now, and if he was honest, this was the most peaceful he had felt in a long time. The decision was made, there was no one here to disturb him, he was a little surprised how little traffic there was, but it was a cold night, and the rain earlier had probably ensured fewer people were out and about. He looked at his watch, three am, another half hour then he would be gone, leave it any later would risk those heading to work early in the morning spotting him and not allow enough time for his body to float away.

  He did not hear the footsteps approach nor did he hear the sound of anyone climbing over the barrier. It was only as the man leaned against the girder on which he sat did he realise that he was not alone. He started, and for a second, almost toppled forward, just managing to keep his balance then inwardly wondering why he had stopped himself.

  “Easy, there mate. Don’t mind me, am not gonna grab you or anything like that, you have your reasons no doubt, this is the anniversary of my own turn to sit where you are right now. I like to stop by just to mull things over, you know what I mean?”

  “Yeah, sure. Don’t suppose you have a cig on you?”

  The man pulled out a packet, they looked like they had been there a while, but he didn’t care, he reached out and took one, moving his weight back a little as he did so. He wasn’t sure what to do now, he didn’t want a witness, but he didn’t want to put it off another day or worse another week. He placed the cigarette to his lips and flicked the lighter until the orange flame shot up, the first pull gave him a satisfying feel along with a brief wave of dizziness, he passed the lighter back.

  “Thanks.”

  “Don’t mention it. Do you mind?”

  The man gestured to the girder, he shook his head and the man proceeded to climb over and sit a few feet away from him. The man lit his own cigarette, and the two of them sat there in silence watching the amber tips glow as they both inhaled deeply before gazing at the smoke dissipate into the darkness as they exhaled. He took out the bottle and took a swig before offering it to the stranger, he shook his head in refusal.

  “Don’t touch the stuff anymore, wish I could but… well, that’s part of my story. Am sure you don’t want to hear it. After all what good does talking about anything do? We all have our stories, how can sharing it help anyone?”

  He sat for a minute, the silence looming between them suddenly. Everything the man had said was true, he had said the same words himself so many times through the years but right here, at this moment so close to the end he had an urge to purge it all to tell this stranger everything. Was it vilification he was looking for?

  Chapter Three

  Anyone who heard his story would surely agree with the course of action he was taking, but he had to admit he wanted to hear the man’s story too. He had no idea why he had never been one to sit and listen to others share their woes, he thought it better to suck it up, keep it in, keep your head down and get on with it. He could not believe he had spoken the words even as they left his mouth.

  “I got time, if you don’t mind telling your story then I think I’d like to hear it, might even tell you mine.”

  The man extended his hand towards him, after an initial hesitation he reached out and shook it. He worried the man might try to keep hold and restrain him, if he did and then he tried to pull away there was a risk they would both plummet into the river below. His own life meant nothing to him, but he did not want to take anyone else’s that was why he was here after all. The man’s hand was like ice, he knew it was cold, but the clammy feel of the man’s grip made him feel uncomfortable, he was glad that his hand was released after a brief handshake. Then the man began…

  “First, let me introduce myself, my name is Dave, no need for full names here. I remember the night I ended up here, was very much like this one, not quite as cold and it was a full moon so I could see the water, but I imagine I felt pretty much how you do now… may I know your name or just a name? If we are gonna sit here and talk then it will be easier if we can address each other”

  “Call me Steve,
it’s not my name but it’s as good a name as any. You said it was your anniversary? So, how many years since you sat here?”

  “Five, five very long years, deciding to live or die, well it all takes some coming to terms with but let me tell you my story, it started a long time ago. Back in my late teens, boy, thinking back now seems like a whole different life. I was a geek, a nerd, had my nose stuck in a textbook the whole time, well most of the time, occasionally there was a comic tucked inside it hidden so no one else could see it.”

  Dave paused smiling at the memory, he looked over at him, it was hard to work out his exact age, late forties, possibly early fifties but it was hard to imagine the man sat next to him as a geek. He was dressed in a way that would be described as smart casual, his jeans had the look of expensive denim, certainly not a pair you would climb under a car wearing, he wore black leather shoes rather than trainers and matched his jacket. The leather looked so soft that it could have been as supple as silk, it was hard to guess the length, but it was fastened to the top button with what appeared to be a cashmere scarf peeking out from the collar. He couldn’t understand how a man who looked like this could end up here but then would anyone looking at him have suspected what lurked inside. Dave looked at him as if he could read his thoughts and began speaking once more.

  “Yup, I don’t look like a geek now, but at heart I still am. No one ever knows the real person unless you let them. But, back to my story, I was the geek, straight A student all the way through school and college, never kissed a girl, hell, barely managed to say hello to one without turning bright red and stammering. Wasn’t that I didn’t notice them, or had no interest in them, but couldn’t believe they would ever be interested in me. University was easier though, you pick your degree and then you know at least that the people in the room with you have similar interests, there were two girls on my course in a class of forty. Neither of them was interested in me as more than a friend.”

  “Bummer!”

  “Yes and no. I ended up with two incredible friends one of whom became my business partner for many years the other became my sister-in-law.”

  “How did that happen? The sister-in-law obviously not the business partner.”

  “The fact I accepted they were not into me and didn’t keep pushing my luck, meant whenever we had a group assignment, they would automatically invite me to work with them. Let me tell you, the field we were studying in is very egocentric, everyone wants to outdo each other the whole time, I mean yes, we did as well, but not in the same way. We became study buddies, did presentations together, helped each other brainstorm ideas, there were four in our group, and eventually, the others paired off together. Helen, who became my business partner, hooked up with James, who she would go on to marry, they will come back into the story later but that left me and Susan hanging out studying on our own more.

  As I said she wasn’t into me, to be fair she wasn’t into men at all, so we hung our studied and then her sister came to visit.”

  “What was her sister like?”

  “Totally out of my league! She was the sort of girl that when she walks into a room everyone else stops existing.”

  “Love at first sight. I know exactly how that feels, you meet your soulmate and time stands still.”

  “Well, it was more like lust at first sight on my side, on hers I was another of her dorky sisters’ dorky friends, she only noticed me to the same extent rich people notice the help. She threw her car keys at me, told me which her car was and sent me to fetch her luggage up. She was supposed to be visiting for a week but stayed for six months. I watched from behind a book cover as she toyed with one good looking guy after another. Never thought I stood a chance if I had seen her for what she was then…but I am getting ahead of myself.”

  “So not still happily married I am guessing?”

  “Definitely not! What about you? Wife? Kids?”

  “Both but you finish your story, I want to hear it, then I will tell you mine. Once I tell you mine, you might not want to finish telling your life history to someone like me.”

  “Okay, but I will hold you to telling yours before, well before whatever happens after we finish. Deal?”

  “Deal.”

  Chapter Four

  “By the time Susan’s sister left I had decided that I did not like her one bit, she was stunning, could have graced the pages of any fashion magazine but she was shallow and superficial. I put her out of my thoughts, and we all carried on studying. The final year of the degree rolled around, and we had to create a business model for practical applications of the stuff we had been developing...”

  “What did you actually study? What is your business?”

  “I would rather not go into that, Helen and I were working on similar projects, so we began to work alongside each other more, James was busy working on his own thesis, as was Susan, but Helen and I began to realise that between our two projects we potentially had a real business plan. I still hung out with Susan socially along with the girlfriend she dated through the final two years. Then her sister came to visit again.”

  “Was she the same?”

  “No, it was like a different person came to visit. She showed up with her luggage in hand, brought it all in herself then disappeared to her car and returned with bags full of groceries. She was polite to me and Susan’s girlfriend, made dinner for us all, listened while we talked, appeared to be listening. It was as if she had been taken over by someone else. When she left the room, I asked Susan what had happened, she just shrugged and said she didn’t know, maybe she grew up. It was our final year, so we were pulling a lot of late nights studying but Sarah, that was her sister's name, was there with coffee refills, dishing up hot food and snacks, nothing was too much trouble. There was the occasional date but not the string of boyfriends, most of the time she seemed content to spend her time with us.”

  “Why had she changed?”

  “I found out later she had been involved in a scandal back home, an affair with a married neighbour had resulted in a termination, I don’t know how much Susan knew, she swore right till the end that she honestly didn’t know the full story.”

  “Did you believe her?”

  “Susan is as honest as her sister is a liar, so yes I believe her, she probably knew there had been a fling but not the rest. It was a long time before I know the truth myself. But at that time, I had no reason to question what had happened, I was falling in love with the person I thought she was. Nothing really happened though, until the day I graduated.”

  Dave stopped and took out another cigarette, he offered the pack across, and both men sat lost in their own thoughts as they smoked. He could see the pain etched on Dave’s face, he hated seeing others hurt but he also had a morbid curiosity that needed to know it all. What could this woman have done to this man sat beside him to bring him here?

  He knew from counselling that one person’s pain is just as valid as the next persons, it was not a competition but looking at this guy he looked like he had everything going for him. He tossed the cigarette butt away, this one had not given him the same sense of satisfaction as the first, he watched the glowing ember disappear through the darkness and then realised Dave had begun speaking again.

  “During the last few months of university we were busy, even if I had been interested in her I would not have had time, but I had started to think of her as a friend. She joined us more as we hung out, then, once final papers were handed in, we relaxed more, film nights out to the cinema, trips to the theatre, she joined in with everything. I didn’t see any of my friends for the few days before graduation as my parents had come to visit, they were excited to see me in my cap and gown, especially my dad.

  My parents were well off, my dad was a successful businessman, but it was all self-made wealth. Helen and I had been working on formalising our ideas into a practical business plan, all we needed was the capital or a backer, and that was where my family stepped in. My dad was w
illing to loan us the money to set our business up, on the condition everything was set up legitimately right from the start.”

  “Did he think that you were gonna pull a fast one?”

  “No, but he knew the pitfalls of setting up a business and though having a partner can halve the workload and ease the pressure it can also add extra complications. Unfortunately, it was one of his conditions that would come back to bite me at a later date, though not in a way he could have foreseen.”

  “What happened?”

  “I will get there but I need you to understand how I got here, how I ended up sat where you are and to do that you need to hear the full story.”

  “Okay, sorry, please, continue.”

  “The day I put that cap and gown on was the greatest day of my life, my parents stood beside me beaming at the photographer as we had our photos taken. Helen, Susan, and I all got firsts with distinctions, James got a 2:1 but it didn’t matter to us, as far as we were concerned, we had all made it. Helen and I had our business ready to go more or less. We had both agreed to have a month summer break after graduation before we started looking for office space and getting everything set up, we knew, once we began, we would be working round the clock getting set up, but it was an exciting adventure to us.

  Susan’s parents showed up just before the ceremony, clapped as she stepped on stage then left again, as each of us was only allocated two tickets Sarah was not there in the hall but she was waiting outside. We all thought it strange they did not stay to get a family photograph, but Susan explained that an acquaintance had passed away and they had to get back for a funeral, instead she had a photo taken with her sister and then we had a group one of the four of us. Bright, young things about to take the world by storm.