Prologue
“At great
periods you have always felt, deep within you, the temptation to commit
suicide. You gave yourself to it and breached your own defenses.”
--Cesare Pavese
I can’t take it
anymore; it’s just too much.
The wind howled like a wild beast at my back and blew my
unruly curls across my face in tangled wisps of flame. Lightning flashed and danced,
illuminating the dark, stormy sky like fireworks on the fourth of July,
exploding in bursts of silver and bolts of purple. The thunder shouted its
wrath in my ears with the sound of a thousand canons firing at point-blank,
echoing throughout the bay. Rain came down hard in near horizontal sheets,
stinging my skin, leaving both my long sleep shirt and the shorts underneath soaked
through in minutes, but I didn’t care. Soon it wouldn’t matter.
“No matter what you
do,” my mother always told me when I was a child, “Never, ever, go swimming
during a storm.”
No.
I
couldn’t think about her right now. I began shivering from the cold, my teeth
chattering uncontrollably—I hadn’t had a chance to change clothes or grab a
jacket, I had left in such a hurry after my parents broke the news.
“This doesn’t mean
we love you any less, sweetheart,” my dad said, doing his best to smile through
the pain, “Your mom and I—we’re just not working right now.” His emerald eyes,
the mirror image of mine, begged me to understand.
Separated. Wasn’t that just divorce without the dramatic,
paperwork filled mess? The word ricocheted through my mind like a bullet off of
steel. I couldn’t understand. Why? My parents always seemed like the happiest
couple, sure they’d been having some hard time recently after my dad got laid
off, but certainly not enough to warrant a split—at least I didn’t think so.
That was the last straw; the one that broke the
proverbial camel’s back. After they’d broken the news, I went to my room
telling my parents that needed some time alone. I’d locked the door with a soft
click and crossed the room. Silently, I eased my window open, cautiously
removing the screen, and slipped out onto the roof, not even bothering to slip
on a pair of shoes. I slipped over to the big oak that made for the best escape
and, within seconds, I was racing off into the woods like I had done so many
times before, only this time I wasn’t sneaking off to meet Liam. This time I
had no intention of going back.
I had stumbled through the foliage, my shirt catching on
branches and twigs as they sliced my exposed arms and legs while stray rocks
bit into my bare feet, until I reached it, reached here—my special place. It
was the place I always went to think, where I could be alone with my thoughts
because no one ever went up there. It
almost seemed like the entire town was scared of this place, they all thought
it was creepy and cursed.
Who cared what everyone thought anyway? To me, it was
truly beautiful. The trees opened at a clearing about fifty yards from the edge
and wildflowers grew all over. The old lighthouse that resided there had been
long since abandoned but still managed to withstand the test of time, leaving
me a perfect place to relax and think within the tower. It was the perfect place to watch the sun
rise or set—I had done so, so many times before. If you went to the edge of the
cliff on a clear day, you could look out and see the light reflecting off the
crystalline blue waters for miles, it was breathtaking. But none of that was
visible now.
I looked down from the edge and saw the angry gray water
beating against the jagged rocks just over eighty feet below. I could almost
see the headlines now: “Superi Sound Teenager Leaps”, or maybe “High School
Swim Team Captain Drowns”, possibly “Rhode Island Teen Falls to Her Death”,
something like that.
When they find me, my mother will scream and cry, my
father will wrap his arms around her to hold her up while fighting back his own
tears—or maybe he wouldn't, they’re separated
after all. They’ll call Nash and he’ll probably do something stupid, not to
mention completely unpredictable, that may or may not get him expelled. When my
best friend Lily is told, oh God, so soon after Faythe, she’ll loose it. She’ll
scream and throw things, she will curse my name and cry for days, but she, like
everyone else, will be okay eventually. Liam, bless his heart, will wonder if
it was something he did, if he could have done something to stop it, hopefully
then, he’ll realize that I broke up with him for his own good. Then there’s
Jordan, that disgusting son of a bitch, he’ll comfort Liam and say that it was
my own doing, but in private, he’ll smile because he will know that it was partially
because of him, and the bastard will be proud of it.
At that point, I wasn’t sure if the wetness on my face
was from the rain or my own tears—probably both.
“I’m
sorry,” I whispered.
Suddenly,
before I could change my mind, I jumped. The wind rushed by me and I relished
in the brief sensation of complete and total weightlessness as I felt my clothes
billow out around me. It was surreal, both thrilling and terrifying.
As
it turns out, when jumping off a cliff, the fall isn’t the worst part—it’s the
sudden stop at the bottom. Before I knew it, those crashing waves were rushing
up to meet me and I braced myself for impact.
I
must have only missed the rocks by inches; there was a loud thwack as my body struck the surface of
the stormy water. I plunged down as the icy coldness surrounded me, the weight
of the built up carbon dioxide pressed and burned in my chest. I opened my
mouth and let the water pour in. I guess it was a little uncomfortable at
first, but it was over before I knew it.
The
feeling in my chest seemed distant and my vision began to grow fuzzy. I had
always been skeptical of the stories I had heard about drowning being an
extremely peaceful way to go; now I had proof they were right.
It won’t be long now and then it
all will be over, only a few more minutes, I thought
dreamily.
Then,
he was in front of me, appearing seemingly out of nowhere. A boy about my age,
a year older tops, but I didn’t recognize him. Which was strange, I knew
everyone, let’s face it, Superi Sound, Rhode Island isn’t exactly a hot-spot on
the map, not to mention that tourist season was still a good few months off. He
grabbed my arm in a firm grip and started to tow me up, his inky hair floating
around him.
But
I resisted, I struggled and pulled, fighting him every bit of the way. He
faltered slightly, surprised at first, but he must have just written it off as
panic. In desperation to get free and continue my descent, I beat my hand
against his toned, shirtless chest. Had I not been so determined, I might have
enjoyed it. Hell, I still did on some level.
Startled,
he looked down at me and our eyes locked. If I’d had any oxygen, I would have
gasped in surprise. They were the exact same
color as the ocean, a silvery blue, beautiful yet tormented by some unseen
storm.
Please,
I silently begged, let
me die.
Understanding
flashed across his face, but he ignored my plea, crushing me against his chest
and propelling us up with strong kicks. The world was growing darker by the
second as we rocketed to the surface. My head broke above the water line and I
sputtered and coughed up at least part of the sea. I immediately started to
shiver as the brisk air brushed my wet body and I realized the storm was over. Blinking
the water from my eyes, I noted the way the moonlight cast an eerie shadow on
the sun-kissed skin of my “rescuer” as he wasted no time dragging me to shore.
When
we reached the beach, the same one that I had spent long summer days laughing
and playing on with my friends just several months before, he laid me down on
the sand. As he dropped to his knees beside me, the moon projected a glow onto his
toned chest and slightly reflected off of a silver pendent around his neck,
immediately catching my attention. It kind of looked like a dog tag but shaped
a little different, but it was too dark to make out the rest.
The
boy took my face in his hands, their warmth soaking into my cheeks, and forced
me to look at him, then he spoke to me in a low, deadly serious tone, “Never
try to pull some crazy stunt like that again! Do you hear me? Don’t hurt the
people who care about you like that! No matter how hard it gets, no matter how
bad others make you feel, that is not a reason to end your life. Your life is
worth living. You are worth it. Things will get better, even if it doesn’t
seem like it, I promise. Never forget that,” His voice was captivating;
slightly rough yet soothing, like the gentleness of waves brushing the rocks on
a warm summer day, speaking with a light accent that I couldn't place, yet
there was a tinge of desperation in his words, begging me to understand.
It
was almost like he knew, knew how bad I was hurting—knew me. Something in my mind just clicked; he was right, I had been
through hell these last few months with everything—Faythe’s death, my parents’ separation,
what Jordan did… But in the midst of it all, I had almost made a terrible
mistake and hurt everyone that I loved. And he’d stopped me. He’d rescued me—twice—once
from icy waters of the Atlantic that were dragging me down, and once from
myself, who had put me there in a moment of desperation.
I
was so extremely tired and cold, I was just lying in the sand, trembling head
to toe, my thin, now, thanks to the water, see-through, white t-shirt clinging
to my soaked body, and sleep was begging to claim me, but I had to know.
“Wh-
what’s your name,” I chattered. He had saved my life, so I owed him mine; I was
damn well going to know his name.
He
removed his hands from my face and looked like he wanted to laugh, his lips
twitched into a smirk, but he answered anyway, “Niko,” He said, barely
containing his amusement, “My name is Niko.”
A
hundred other questions swirled through my mind. Why did you save me? Where are you from? Do you have a girlfriend?
As
if sensing the puzzlement brimming in my eyes, Niko gracefully stood from his
kneeling position at my side, the wet sand clinging to his equally soaked
jeans. “Take care of yourself, Rae,” he advised, giving me one last lingering
look before taking off down the shore.
I
felt my eyes widen in shock, “How do you know my name,” I called feebly,
struggling to sit up, but he was gone, and his footprints on the beach were
already disappearing with the tide.
My
arms shook from the effort of holding me up and I collapsed back down onto my
back. I was exhausted, both physically and emotionally, freezing to the point
of popsicledom, and confused beyond belief, I finally let the darkness steal me
away as the sound of approaching sirens reached my ears and red and white
lights flashed in the distance.
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Here's a teaser from my newest story, any feedback is appreciated, so what do you think? If you want to keep it going, vote "yes" on the poll on the main page or comment on this post! Thanks!
~Jade Night
