How it Feels to Fly

A Story by ctwood

A guy runs into a girl in a very dangerous moment in her life.

How it Feels to Fly

I felt the broken red brick, gently brushing my fingers against its rough, uneven surface. The sun was warm on my cheeks. The gentle breeze lightly lifted my hair from my face. It was a gentle breeze that caused the chasm in the brick railing I was standing in. The hurricane had somehow managed to knock apart just enough bricks to allow a person to stand on the edge of the rooftop without any barrier between themselves and… I was actually surprised when the hot tears burned my eyes. I had thought I was all cried out, but I guess that’s how the song goes, wrong again.

It was quiet. The only sounds came from the ground below and I felt I was already no longer of that world, until a loud release followed by a suction cup slam brought me back to Earth with such force that I wavered on the edge. I attempted to turn to see what had caused the loud sounds which still rang in my ears and who was causing the ridiculous giggling which had followed. I nearly fell, but I grabbed the railing just in time. Why had I even reached out for that stupid railing? I could have fallen then and been done with but no. It was only pebbles that flew to the earth then.

The intruders were some guy and a girl. I noticed first the girl’s giggles and how she pressed her small frame against the guy, how she attacked him with her hands. It was not until I looked above her head that I first really saw the guy. He was staring at me. He was no longer engaged with the game the girl was still determined to win. He was just staring at me. He knows, I thought. I don’t know how, but he knows.

“Hey, Brittany,” the guy said, trying to break free from her. The girl’s name is Brittany. Of course it is. “Brit, stop.” She didn’t. She still didn’t realize he was no longer playing. She still hadn’t noticed me.

“Seriously, Brittany, cut it out.” He had to raise his voice, but she finally ceased her full throttle pursuit.

“What? What is wrong with you, Alex? You’re hot and then you’re cold. You’re yes and then you’re no.” Brittany yelled which got the guy to stop staring at me and turn his gaze on her with a disbelieving face.

“That’s a song,” he scoffed. I laughed inwardly when I realized he was right. Apparently, miss priss Brittany couldn’t think of any original lyrics because at that point she just stomped off. Stomped off and didn’t look back. Stomped off and never even noticed me. Inwardly, the laughter died.

The silence that followed Brittany’s departure was unnatural. It seemed as if even the people on the street below had gone mute. The guy, who Brittany had called Alex, didn’t watch Brittany’s exit, but instead fixed his gaze on me. He had blue eyes, really deep blue eyes, which stood in great contrast to his jet black hair that was just long enough for the wind to catch. Finally, he sighed and turned his face away. It was obvious he was trying to act nonchalant, but it may have been more effective if that sigh had not sounded as if he had been holding his breath since he set those deep blue eyes on me.

“So… Now that we’re alone…” he tried to laugh, but the sound was out of tune and just left us staring at one another once again. He took a decisive step forward.

“Don’t.” I warned. He stopped.

“Ok, ok,” he said. “I’m just going to walk over here. Ok?” He took my silence as an approval, but I eyed him carefully as he moved to the wall railing that the hurricane had not crumbled about three or four feet to the side of me. He would never have enough time to react and grab me from that far away. Good.

“Alexander Acres, by the way,” he said. “That’s my name. Alex, for short.” At first I didn’t say anything. Was this guy really trying to make small talk?

“Leave.” It was all I could think of to say, but when he didn’t the burning returned to my eyes and I added, “Please.”

“Sorry,” he said, still trying to act lighthearted, but the tension in his shoulders gave him away. “I can’t do that.”

“I’ll jump.” There. I said it. Now leave, you idiot. Go find bottle-blondie and leave me alone. He laughed. He actually laughed. I don’t mean like the little fake laughs from before, but a real laugh. Although now that I look back, it was a painful laugh, a sad laugh.

“If you were going to jump, or at least if you were ready to jump now, you wouldn’t be talking to me. You would be… well, where you think you want to be.”

I stared at him in disbelief, my mouth actually open in shock, but I guess he was right. A moment passed and I looked at the street below once again. There was a girl down there, or at least it looked like a girl from six floors up, wearing some sort of bright, neon yellow jumpsuit. As soon as I noticed her, she took off at a sprint only to stop a few feet later to look around. I wondered what on Earth she was doing. I still wondered…

“Tristan.” I looked back at Alex. He seemed genuinely startled that I had spoken. I cleared my throat and gave him the first full sentence I had spoken aloud in quite a while. “My name is Tristan Gates.” So it was a short sentence, but it was out there.

“Tristan? Interesting name for a girl,” but he shrugged off the fact that my name was usually used for a boy and continued with what he thought was charm. “Nice to meet you, Tristan.” He gave me what I could only assume was his “player” smile. I don’t know why, but that stupid smile was like a hot iron running down my spine. It infuriated me. I rolled my eyes and shook my head.

“It’s not so nice for me, so why don’t you just go track down your girlfriend and leave me the hell alone.”

“Oh, she’s not my girlfriend.” Then he smiled again, that ridiculous “I’m so hot” smirk like that was suppose to somehow impress me.

“That makes it so much better.” Why the hell was I getting so mad? Why did I care? Why didn’t I just jump? Fly for a few brief moments and then peace? Jump! I begged myself in my mind. Just let go.

“Is that why you’re here?” I looked at him confused. Lost in my own thoughts, I had forgotten what we had been talking about. “A boyfriend,” he clarified. “Or rather an ex-boyfriend.” For a second time that day my jaw hung open in pure disbelief.

“Are you insane?” I asked him. This time he looked at me confused and shocked.

“Did the girl standing on the edge of a building, threatening to jump, just ask me if I was insane?” He had a point, but so did I.

“You really think I’d kill myself over a guy?” Of course, he didn’t know me, so how would he know. My gaze went back to the world six floors down. Ireland was the street’s name, so far from the country of the same name. Scattered along this little street there were at least a dozen or so students or teachers or other persons in my sight at all times even this late. It was that time of day when the sun shared the sky with the moon like the people on the ground shared their lives. Some only for the day, others would from that day on. I knew loss. I was all too familiar with that particular brand of pain, but could the loss of a boyfriend, the breakup of one relationship bring someone to the very ledge I stood at?

“Honestly,” Alex’s voice broke into my thoughts. “I don’t know of any good reason for someone to want to die. Things definitely can’t get better if you’re dead.”

“Some things can’t get better if you’re alive either.” Stars were becoming visible along the darkening skyline. “I’m not here because of a guy. While I’m at it, let me cross off all the other clichés in your head as well. I am a freshman here at the great Texas A&M, but I’m not homesick. It’s not grades. I have a 4.0. It’s not money. I got a near full ride, and I have a job. And… no I think that’s about it, unless you have one.” When I looked back at him, the sarcasm seeped out of me. He was just looking at me, watching me. He was really trying to figure me out I think. Maybe he was just as confused as to why we were talking as I was.

“Why then?” he asked. It was a simple question, but I had no simple answer, not for him, not even for myself really. I’m sure he couldn’t tell, but I truly tried to answer his question even then.

“Do you know who John R. Blocker is?” That was my answer.

“John R. Blocker? No. Should I?”

“No. Why would you?” It was a sad fact. “Where are you standing?”

“On a rooftop.” Man, he was being dense.

“The rooftop of what building?” I was getting impatient.

“Blocker.” About time it dawned on him. “Oh, I get it. John R. Blocker.”

“The Blocker Building was named after John R. Blocker, who despite having his name plastered on one of the most important buildings on campus, is long forgotten by everyone, as you have just proven.” That was my answer. “I mean, you are standing on top of his building and you couldn’t even tell me that much about him. You didn’t even know that John R. Blocker was a man who had a building named after him. No one remembers him.” I turned away from him then and whispered to the wind. “And no one will remember me.”

He didn’t hear me. We were standing in silence once again when a bird intruded into our little rooftop world. The bird landed about the same distance from me as Alex was but on the other side of me. It only stayed for a moment before it flew away. I watched it go and go until my eyes could no longer detect it. Where was that little bird going?

“Why jumping?” he asked. “Why not a bullet to the head, or a fist full of pills, or one the other million other ways? Why fall to your death?”

I really didn’t know why when he asked me, but as I pondered his question, I found myself staring at the diming sky above. Staring up, not down. I felt the wind once again caress my body.

“It’s not falling. It’s flying. In my last moment, I want to know how it feels to fly.”

We were quiet for quite a while after that. He watched me and I watched the crowd below begin to thin. The Sun sunk lower and lower in the sky. The cars turned on their headlights. The cars seemed to drive faster and faster, so fast. The cars were so loud to me. It was the cars that made my breath get jagged, my heart squeeze, and my eyes burn yet again. Would it never stop? Alex noticed the change in me.

“Tristan…” he started.

“Tell me about you.” I still don’t know why I made that request, but once it was out, I had to know more about Alex, about this guy who had spent hours staring at me, trying to talk me, a girl he had never met, off the edge of the stupid Blocker building. “We’ve been talking about me since we met. Let’s talk about you. What’s your major?”

“Tristan.” He was confused, I could tell.

“Please, Alex.” I begged. “Distract me. What’s your major?”

“Art History.”

“Age?”

“21.”

“Hometown?”

“Houston.”

“Family?”

Silence.

I turned and looked at him.

“What about your family?” He looked uncomfortable. Usually, family was the last thing I asked people about, but as soon as the words were out of my mouth I knew that it was the only question I really wanted to ask.

“My family…” It was his turn to look away into the distance. “It’s a family, plain and simple. Mom and dad, still together. Little sister, Jane. Littler brother, Randy.”

“Are ya’ll close?” I knew his answer from his previous response, but I asked. I had to ask.

“No.” I stared at him until he continued with a sigh. “I haven’t really talked to them in about a year. When I decided to go art history instead of nuclear engineering, my parents got pissed and stopped paying for school, which got me pissed and-“

“SHUT UP!” I yelled. I screamed it at the top of my lungs. His eyes snapped back to my face, those damn blue eyes. “You stopped talking to your family because you changed majors? Because they stopped paying for your college, when some parents never start? Did you talk to them about it? Did you tell them why you wanted to change majors? My God, changing majors!” I looked at the ground six floors down. Down instead of up.

“I’m ready now.” I mumbled to myself and began to lean forward, but still holding myself back with my hands on the rough railing. I closed my eyes.

“Wait!” Alex screamed. “What about your family?” He was grasping for straws. “What will your parents think if you do this? How will they feel?” It was then that I laughed. It was then that the tears finally escaped. It was then that I said it.

“They wouldn’t care. They can’t care. They’re dead. Both of them. And Lacy, my little sister. God, my twelve year old little sister. I was 16. I was driving. It was dark. It wasn’t my fault, though. It wasn’t. It hit us, the truck. It hit us. It rammed right into us. Out of nowhere. It was dark. I lived. They died. They died, but I… I lived…”
“Tristan…”

“No!” I turned on him. The pain swelled to rage. “They were stolen from me. You gave yours away. You don’t know what it’s like to really be so absolutely alone. You think of being detached from your family as freedom. You do or else you would do something about it. When you really loose them, though, it is not freedom. You have no connection to anything around you anymore. You’re not a puppet with no strings. You’re a tree with no roots. Do you know what happens to a tree with no roots? It falls.” I shook my head, but the emotions stood their ground. “You, you Alex, are not just one person in a crowd. You are a son. You are a brother. Me? I’m nothing. When I let go, who will remember me? Who will care? Who-“

“I will.” He took a step towards me. “If you jump, I’ll care. Look, you’re right. I’m an idiot, but I’m an idiot who for some reason spent the entire evening watching you teetering on the edge, so I’m a string. I’m a root. Let me tie you to here. Tomorrow, wake up and share the day with someone else. Grow your own roots. It won’t make up for your family, but, you were wrong on one point, your family, they are still roots too. You remember them. As long as you’re here you give them roots here on Earth.” The tears in my eyes receded once I witnessed those deep blue eyes surrender to his own tears. “Don’t jump, Tristan. Just… don’t” So, I didn’t.

“Ok,” was the only thing I said, I mean what else could I say? I pivoted on my feet to turn toward him, but a pebble rolled under my weight and I slipped. I fell. I flew.

That fall could not have lasted more than a few seconds, but it felt like a lifetime. I remember seeing Alex lunge at me, but like I said earlier, he was too far away. The one thought that gave me comfort in respect to Alex was at least he knew I didn’t jump. The image of him in front of the full moon reaching out was then replaced by my family in my mind’s eye. I saw Lacy and I playing dress up, Mom writing little “I love you” notes and sticking them in my lunchbox, and Dad coaching me in tee ball. The last thought, though, that ever crossed my mind was so this is how it feels to fly.