A Lighter Step

One foot in front of the other, her heart beating out of her chest. In and out; inhale and exhale. She walked to the center of the bridge and looked up at the sky, a single tear fell down her cheek. “Are you sure you want to be doing this?” Aria looked down at her feet and closed her fists beside her, trying to ignore the voice of her best friend. “What do you want me to do Jenna?”

 “I want you to talk to me. Tell me what you’re thinking so I can figure this out with you.” Aria let out an exasperated breath, digging her nails into her palms. She turned around to face Jenna, “And what do you want me to say?!”. 

“Anything. Everything… Say something Aria!” Aria’s eyes were shut tight, but she could still feel the tears rolling down one after the other. 

“I don't know what to do! I don’t know what to say, but I can’t do this right now! I just need to breathe, I- I can’t breathe.” She leaned against the railing of the bridge and focused on the rush of the water below her. The sound of crashing water against the rocks fell in tune with the beating in her ears. 

“Aria…” 

She opened her eyes and looked over the railing. It was dark, only the moon lit the night in its pale white embrace. 1,2,3,4, she counted the beating in her head taking deep breaths every two counts. 1,2, inhale, 3,4 exhale, 5,6, inhale,7,8…. no exhale. She held her breath for a few counts before swinging her body over the railing and standing on the edge. Her grip on the railing tightened and the tears fell harder and faster than before. 

“Since when have you not been able to talk to me, huh?” 

Aria looked up at the sky, biting the inside of her cheek in an attempt to think about anything else than the moment she was in. She tried to blink back her tears, starring at the stars above her, 

“I feel lost, and I don’t know what to do. I feel like a failure, like I don’t know what I'm doing here, like I'm not supposed to be here. And after everything I have worked for my entire life, it just makes me feel weak… and I hate that, but I just don’t know what to do.” Her chest rose and fell between breaths as she struggled for air. 

“I’ve put up this façade that my life here is great and I’m having a blast, and though there have been good moments it has also come with these periods of emptiness and loneliness…” 

She took a moment to try and catch her breath, “But it’s a loneliness I can’t bear anymore.” Her breathing was ragged, and you could hear her cries over the rushing water beneath her. 

“I don’t recognize who I am anymore, this isn’t me and it’s pissing me off... I'm so angry at myself because I should be capable of so much more and I don’t understand why I haven't accomplished anything! I feel stuck I feel like a fucking failure and that’s an awful feeling! The motivation isn't there and I don’t know what I'm doing all I know is that I don’t belong here, but I just don’t know what to do!” Her voice echoed through the river valley, howling as the wind carried it through, almost as if it would reach someone who would listen. 

“There is no escape, I feel alone, and I never don’t feel alone anymore. It’s not that I don’t feel loved, on the contraire I know damn well I am loved. But I'm scared that if I tell them that this is how I'm feeling I'm letting them down and proving to everyone who didn’t believe in me that they were right, and I hate that they were right! I don’t want them to be right!” 

The steady flow of tears matched the rhythm of the water below. Her raging breathing synchronous with the crashing of the water against the rocks. Every time she spoke her breath would fog in the air. Her eyes burned and she felt light on the ledge. 

“I feel pathetic! I’m standing here crying and because I can’t go to my room. She's there and she's fucking infuriating and she hasn’t made this any easier! She isn’t you Jenna and it’s like that's all she wants to be. She makes everything worse, and I can’t even stand being around her anymore!” 

Her voice kept rising, travelling farther and farther. Building up to what she wanted to release from inside her, “God I wish I weren't here; I wish I weren't here at all! I can’t do this I can’t, I just, I-” 

She was hyperventilating, eyes shut tight and grip hanging on so strongly she could feel the splinters of the wood piercing her skin. She pivoted her body around, so her stomach was against the railing. The air was so thin, the water loud, but nothing compared the drumming in her ears as her blood pumped through her body. She let out everything and more knowing no one was there to witness her break apart on that bridge. She creamed, her cries carrying through the valley. It left a ringing in her ear, but she was finally able to catch her breath. 

“I should be stronger, I know , I know, I know, and I know.” She let the tears fall again, but they fell slower this time. She laid her head against the railing, the cold wood cooling her scolding forehead. 

“I'm fucking pathetic that’s what this is… And if my mom were seeing this, I know she wouldn't know who I am right now. She would tell me to stop crying about your problems and just look for solutions,” Aria let out a dry humorless laugh. “I know that that is what she would say. She looked up in front of her, finding Jenna leaning against the railing across from her, arms crossed against her chest. Her eyes were warm and calming, but she couldn’t read any message behind their stare. 

“I tried. I’m trying, I’m still trying…. but nothing, nothing, nothing is going the way it was supposed to be going and I've never had this much trouble with anything!” Aria kept that line of sight with Jenna as she nodded along, showing she was listening. Aria closed her eyes again letting her head fall between her shoulders. She shifted her weight back and forth, swaying on the ledge of the bridge but still holding onto the railing, 

“I just, I miss having somebody to talk to. I miss you Jenna and I miss my mom and I miss my house,” her voice was hoarse, but she kept going, “I miss being a part of something and I miss feeling like I knew what I was doing, like I was successful at something like I was good at something!” 

She looked up again and found Jenna now leaning against the railing she held onto, “But I just feel alone and that’s my own fault because I thought I was capable of doing this, of succeeding here. So here I am. I did it, I got here, I made it this far!” 

“So why do I feel like this? Look at me! I'm standing on the edge of a bridge screaming out into the void! Why don’t I know who I am?! Who am I here because THIS, THIS IS NOT ME?!” She gripped at her chest, pounding at it in the beat of her heartbeat… willing it to do something other than ache and weigh her down. 

“What does that say about me?! What does that mean?! I'm so tired. I'm just so tired and I don’t want to do it anymore! And if I admit to someone that this is how I feel that I couldn't do it. That I want to go home... I'd be proving them right; I’d be letting everyone down and I hate that more than I hate myself right now.” 

“So, what am I supposed to do, what am I supposed to say! I thought I could do this, I thought this is what I wanted!” 

Aria pivots her body around again to face out into the crushing water, “Who do I talk to? Who would understand? They are there and I am here! Everyone is there and I'm here!” She looked up at the sky yelling out to her best friend, “Even you are there! You’re thousands of miles away six feet below ground! You’re not even actually here and I’m begging you to tell me what to do!” Aria slammed her palm against the railing before pushing up to stand on it. 

She cried and cried, mourning the loss of her best friend, “Please tell me what to do.” she whispered into the air. Aria went deaf for a moment, completely tuning out the wind, the water, the crashing, the beating the ache as she counted her breaths: 1,2, inhale, 3,4 exhale, 5,6, inhale,7,8…. 

“You’re right,” Jenna’s voice filled the silence inside Aria, “I’m not here to pull you off this ledge myself. I couldn't deal with the ache and the loneliness.” Aria’s heartbeat steady, and her tears fell through her shut eyes. 

“I took a step forward Aria because I didn’t talk to anyone. I couldn’t even do what you are doing now and just talk to myself out loud. Maybe if I had, I would have felt less... heavy. I didn’t talk to Aria, but you needed to. You still do.” Aria opened her eyes looking at the stars, and felt the wind as it shifted her balance on the railing.

“I jumped because I didn’t talk to anyone. You don’t have to do that Aria; you don’t have to feel so heavy.” She took a deep breath and looked forward to the void again. The sky wasn’t as dark and the waves beneath her had slowed. The wind was no longer howling through the valley but whispering sweet nothings through the trees. 

Aria took a deep breath and closed her eyes focusing on that feeling, her last tear sliding down her cheek. She balanced her weight on one foot and felt the difference in her weight as she took a step… 

She felt lighter.