CHAPTER 1: Look At Me Look At You • As told by Mathias, a human
I woke up, as I did every single night, at 03:33 AM.
My bed was a mess, and even though it was winter and my apartment was chilly, I was covered in sweat from head to toe. Even my sheets were soaked and tangled around my legs. It was disgusting. I pushed them away from me. The worn-out duvet fell on the floor.
I sat on the edge of my mattress, shivering. I was freezing from the cold sweat, but I couldn’t find the strength to go take a shower. I couldn’t find the strength to change my sweatshirt.
And then I knew it.
That was it. No more.
I couldn’t go on anymore.
I stopped thinking. My body moved on its own in a sort of numb haze. I didn’t even put on my shoes. I just walked to the door and left.
I knew where I was going, in the instinctive way an old horse goes back and forth from the farm to town and from town to the farm without questioning why, or how.
I could not feel the cold. I knew I was cold, my body reacted to it, but my mind was indifferent. I did not look around. I guess the landscape must have been quite something to admire, with the old suburban buildings and pine trees covered in snow and all. I don’t know. My eyes were set on the pavement.
I got to the bridge.
It was a pretty high bridge, with enough room for two car lanes and a pedestrian footpath. It connected the suburbs with the main office district of the city. In a couple of hours, early workers and joggers would crowd it.
But then, I was all alone.
No noise at all. The world was sleeping. Only the hushed murmur of the almost frozen river below me disturbed the quiet. I felt drawn to it. The grim ripple sounded almost comforting.
I climbed on the parapet of the bridge. It was almost as tall as me, so I struggled a bit. I cut my right foot with the old stone. I didn’t care.
I stood tall before the abyss. I looked around me, in a daze. I knew those were my last moments. I guess that, in a very, very deep and dark part of my heart, I hoped to see her.
But she was not there. Nobody was there. As always, I was alone. Only a tiny bluish bird stared at me from the twisted branches of a nearby bush.
That was it. No point in delaying it. I closed my eyes.
I took the one, last step.
Bye, Mia.
The uncomfortable vertigo of the fall hit my body. I hoped it would stop soon.
It did.
Suddenly my sweatshirt strained itself and wrapped around my throat and upper arms, choking me.
I coughed and gasped, entangled in my own clothes, unable to move and confused as all hell, swinging from one side to the other like a bag of flour hanging from a hook.
I instinctively looked down, and I saw my bare feet dangling creepily above the river. It looked as if I was levitating.
Was I dead? Was this what dying felt like?
I heard a groan above. With great difficulty, I managed to turn my head up.
“Hey, buddy! How's it hangin’?”
A stranger was precariously perched on the parapet, holding the hood of my jacket with a trembling hand.
I stared at him in silence, my mind blank and mouth open.
He smiled widely at me.
“Chilly weather, uh?” he observed, nonchalantly, faking a shiver. “I bet your balls are frozen. I know my ass is.”
I could not tell. I could not think. I could only look at him, completely bewildered, as he casually tried to make small talk after interrupting a stranger’s suicide attempt.
“This is one hell of a hoodie, by the way!” he continued. “Great fabric, you’re swinging over the abyss and all and it barely ripped.”
The hood of my sweatshirt chose that precise moment to tear. I whined as I plunged down a couple of inches.
“Whoa, better not push it, though,” he yelped, alarmed. “Let’s see… up we go!”
He grunted and pulled, but he wasn’t strong enough to hoist a fully grown man. I looked up, shaking my head to get my messy hair out of my eyes. I gasped again. His whole body was hanging from the edge of the parapet. Was he holding himself and me with his feet only?
He tried again and failed. He looked up over his shoulder with a guilty smile.
“Hey, love! I know you’re not supposed to meddle, but can you give me a lil’ pull here? My arms are kind of numb,” he grunted, as the fabric slipped slowly from his hands. “For such a scrawny fellow he’s heavy as fuck.”
I heard no answer, but a few moments later a prodigious force pulled me up, and before I had time to process anything, I landed on the footwalk.
I looked around, startled. There was nobody there but the two of us. I had no idea who had hoisted us up.
The strange man clutched down before me and beamed the brightest smile I had ever seen on a human being, right in my face. Why on Earth was he so joyful?
“That was something, uh? Scary as fuck, but you gotta admit the view was great,” he prattled cheerfully. “Now, that’s a bit of a cliché, ain’t it? The whole dramatic jumping to your death thing, I mean. Just sayin’.”
He leaned even more. His face was so close to mine I crawled back and pressed myself against the stone of the parapet.
“If you ask me, bridges are boring,” he declared, shrugging. “I would have gone for a skyscraper. Or maybe some cool-ass skydiving. Without the parachute, of course.”
I did not fully understand what he was saying. I couldn’t. I slowly began to regain control of my limbs. My body quivered violently. I felt the winter cold in all its violence all of a sudden, and the pain of the bleeding cut in my foot became unbearably noticeable.
I understood I had almost died.
Almost. Almost free.
I understood I was still alive.
And I wept.
The tears came on their own, I felt them down my neck. My eyes were blurry. Even though I did not sob, the guy was startled.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa. Easy on the waterworks, buddy,” he urged, raising both hands.
I said nothing. I shut my eyes. The tears burned them. I began to feel the same, old knot of despair and anguish hollowing up inside my chest, and I hated it. I hated being aware of my own desolation.
I whimpered miserably. The guy got closer to me and patted my shoulder with visible awkwardness.
“Ugh, I suck at this part,” he muttered, irked. He shook his head and forced a smile.
“Now, don’t cry, come on. I’m sorry, I really am. I was just joking. Trying to lighten up the mood. Which clearly was a spectacular failure on my part.”
He clumsily tried to dry the tears from my cheeks. I was too startled to stop him.
“You’re freezing,” he said, with that sweet undertone of discreet pity I hated so much. “Let’s go get ya a big cup of coffee and talk. I know you can’t see it right now, but this doesn’t have to be the end for you. You do have other options, I–”
I felt the rage burning in my throat.
“Don’t touch me!” I barked, slapping his hand away from my face. “You don’t know shit! There aren’t other options, okay? You think I’d be here if there were?”
He didn’t respond to my outburst. He stayed still, at a distance, serene and grave. The chirpy facade was gone.
I was riled up. The cold, the pain, the sense of loss, and that ever-present feeling of being trapped choked me and I was incapable of controlling myself.
“I just… I… I just can’t take it anymore,” I stammered, doing a great effort to form coherent sentences. Every morning, when I open my eyes– every morning– when I open my eyes and I understand that I’m alive and that I have to keep living–”
I rubbed my eyes with my arm. I noticed the snow for the first time. I was covered in it.
“It hurts. Every moment hurts. I can’t take it anymore.”
I looked up at him. He listened, politely, with an inscrutable expression. I felt guilty. He meant well. Of course he did.
“I appreciate what you did for me, I do. But please, believe me,” I said, at last, trying to get back on my feet. “There is no other way. Not for me.”
I slipped and fell. My left foot hurt like hell. I tried again and managed to regain some balance. I stood there, undecided. Where do you go, when you have no one to return to and you don’t give a damn about going anywhere either?
“If you say so… but if I may, though, there is another way. You just can’t see it,” retorted the guy, leisurely sitting on the frozen pavement. “But I could show you… Mathias.”
I fixed my eyes on him. He smiled at me with a certain wickedness that deeply unsettled me. Who the hell was this man?
“How do you know my name?”
“I know so much more than that, sunshine.”
The pet name sent shivers down my spine.
“What– sunshine– how do you know about– who are you?!”
He smiled smugly. Out of the blue, a small bird landed on his shoulder. I stared at it. A turquoise hummingbird. Was it the same bird I had seen before? He nuzzled the tiny creature.
“Time to work, Bird,” he announced, walking towards me. The hummingbird ruffled its feathers.
“Stay away from me!” I screamed, trying to run. The floor was nearly frozen. The open wound in my feet stuck to an icy patch. It hurt so much I could hardly move, least of all make a hasty retreat.
He reached me and rapidly grabbed the back of my head with a hand. He forced me to look up, right into his piercing gaze. I froze like a deer before headlights. I could do nothing but stare at the clear green of his eyes.
Look at me. Look at me look at you.
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