Falling backwards.
I was thankfully falling backwards. Not that it was any less scary in those brief moments I was through the air but I was not falling off the bridge, I was falling back onto it. And when I landed boy did it hurt.
The force that had pulled me backwards was sitting on top of me and holding my hands to the ground. I blinked several times and looked up to the man sitting on top of me.
He looked to be twice my age and half my weight, his hair appeared to have greyed prematurely and his large glasses took up the majority of his face. Beads of sweat were gathered around his forehead
I could relish in only a moment of joy in noting that he certainly didn't belong to any Mafia before the headache in my head caught up with my realization of safety and won over my attention.
"Don't do it. I know you've fallen on hard times but there's always a way. The sun will come out tomorrow, for every dark night there is a brighter day, happiness is a journey not a destination, say yes to happiness! Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem!"
I was rendered speechless as I ran through everything in my head. I suspected he had posters hanging on his wall that said all of those thing. "W-wha?" I finally managed.
"I know it may seem hopeless sometimes but you are here for a reason. You have a purpose. You have people who love you even if you don't realize it. Focus on those people, find your purpose. Don't kill yourself no matter how dark things may seem." I opened my mouth to speak again but he yelled out "Stars!" As if he'd had a sudden epiphany. "The darkness never stops the stars from shining. Be your own star!"
"I wasn't going to kill myself!" I finally said quickly for fear he would interrupt me.
"You have people who want to help you but they can't do that unless you ask and accept it."
I wondered how I could explain that no, I wasn't going to kill myself, I was just going to climb hundreds of feet into the air on top of the bridge. With my face damp with tears and a desperate insanity in my eyes I knew I looked the part of someone who was ready to give up. But I wasn't going to give up, I was going up to find the strength to keep going. And suddenly.
I started laughing.
I laughed so hard that he sat up, releasing his feather light grip on my wrists to give me a confused stare. I wiped the back of my hands across my eyes as I laughed until I cried. "I wasn't going to kill myself." I managed through giggles.
He gave me a doubtful look.
"There's a ladder. On that pillar. I was trying to reach the ladder. I wasn't trying to jump." I assured him.
He glanced to the pillar and back to me. "Y-you weren't going to kill yourself?" He sounded doubtful and I could offer little more than more laughter.
"No. But this concussion you gave me could."
He blanched and was suddenly on his feet and dragged me to mine. "I'm sorry." He frantically patted me off, wiping dirt I didn't see nor care about away.
"No, no." I laughed. "I'm fine, it's fine. Honestly, I needed a good laugh. And I mean, how sweet are you! Not many people would go to that extreme for a stranger."
"I, well, I work at a suicide hotline. Not work at, I run one. Started from the ground and brought it up. You have no idea how many times I've wished I could reach through the phone and pull someone back from the ledge. I saw you and I just thought-"
"And I thank you." I said with an ear to ear grin. "I'm Kate."
He wiped his hands frantically off on his pants and then took my hand and gave it a feverish shake. "Norman." He said quickly.
"Well thank you Norman. That was a very noble thing to do."
"I, uh, if you don't mind my asking...if you weren't going to kill yourself why were you crying?"
My smile quickly dropped. "I don't know Norman..." I looked down to my feet and then back up to him. "Life just isn't what I thought it would be lately."
"Life is a result of the choices you make, if you don't like your life it's time to start making better choices."
I smiled. "Do you have a poster in your office that says that Norman." His cheeks flushed and I knew he must have. I laughed. "Alright Norman, what else do you got?"
**
I talked to Norman for over an hour just standing on the bridge. The sun was down and the air growing crisp. Norman was full of inspirational quotes and random statistics. I laughed, I cried, I looked at my life in a different light at times. I opened open to Norman the way sometimes you only can to a complete stranger.
"Okay so the man I'm in love with he, well he hurt one of my friends pretty badly. Physically, not emotionally. Now I'm not even allowed to see my friend. Where the heck do I go from here?"
"So you haven't seen this friend?"
"No."
"And this friend and your boyfriend, they aren't friends?"
I shook my head and he frowned.
"The only people who are really capable of hurting us are the people we let in. The people we care about. You abandoning him is probably more painful than whatever you boyfriend might have done to him."
"You don't know my boyfriend." I grumbled. "You really think that? That what I'm doing is worse?"
He shrugged. "Well, has your boyfriend ever liked your friend?" I shook my head. "Has he ever pretended to like him?" Another shake. "Then why would your friend expect anything more from him? He's expecting more from you as his friend than he was your boyfriend who hates him."
I frowned. "And what am I to do about my boyfriend, huh?"
"Well, it seems to me like you're letting yourself suffer an awful lot over the things that's he's done. My honest opinion? Just let it go. Not saying that he deserves forgiveness but you deserve peace."
"That on a poster too?"
"It's a quote from John Lockwood Huie." He smiled.
"This is just great. He shoots him and I'm the bad guy." I grumbled and then looked up sharply to Norman.
"He SHOT him?" He yelled. He dug through his coat pockets until he found an old receipt and a pen and scribbled down a number and address. "Here, a woman's shelter-"
I laughed. "He'd never hurt me. I'm fine its...its complicated." I finally decided. "You're right though. What I've done is so much worse...Norman I hate to ask, but can you please give me a ride?"
That's how I wound up pounding frantically on Nash's door. Rather than a polite knock with my knuckles I smacked hard and fast with the base of my hand.
When the door swung open Nash had one arm in a sling and the other holding a gun to my head. His stern face relaxed immediately when he saw it was me and I threw myself into him.
Startled he stumbled backwards and wrapped his one good arm, still wielding his gun, around me. He inhaled deeply. "Kate?" He breathed. "Kate-pie, calm down, just breathe." He said gently now. "Sit down, just breathe."
He peeled me away from him and he shut the door slowly, he lowered the gun onto the end table beside the door with keys scattered across the top. "Kate what-"
I threw myself at him again. We stumbled again and he pushed me away, taking my cheek in his one hand. "What's wrong? What happened?" He looked so concerned, worried about me. After I abandoned him. I didn't deserve this.
Oh no. I was sobbing. That was not part of my original plan in coming here. "I-I-I-"
His concerned face turned into a scowl. "What did he do? I swear to God-" He pulled away and reached for his gun. I grabbed his wrist quickly. "N-nothing." I blubbered out.
He looked at me with a hard expression and then it softened. He put his hand to the back of my neck and pulled me into him. I threw my arms over his neck and sobbed.
"Kate. Talk to me." He pleaded. He sounded so desperate. Desperate to help me, after I left him alone and injured.
I tried to choke out a string of pathetic apologies but they all came out choppy and incoherent.
Nash who had been begging me to talk to him only moments ago tried to shush me as he rested his cheek on my head and listened to me go on.
"Sh, it's okay Katie. I'm here, it's okay." He said occasionally into my head. "It's okay."
Finally I ran out of tears and we collapsed onto his couch where I immediately curled into him with a severe fit of sniffles.
"It's okay Kate-pie." He continued.
After a good long twenty minutes of sitting like this I pulled away to be able to look him in the eyes. "I'm sorry, so sorry." I whispered and put my hand on one of his shoulders. "And I'm sorry again for coming in here like this. Like a hot mess oh my God."
He brushed the hair away from my face. "I'm glad you came, but never glad to see you upset. What happened?"
"Nothing." I shook my head and rested it against his chest. I was exhausted, how late was it? Alessio would be having a cow if he found out I still wasn't back. "I just-"
"Daddy?"
We both looked up quickly to the owner of the voice. We knew of course who she was. Ellie stood in the doorway of the room in her ninja turtle footie pajamas, her hair stuck up in fifty different directions and the purple stuffed bear she held against her chest looked like it had definitely seen brighter days.
I sat up, putting distance between Nash and I. "Ellie!" Nash stood up and speed walked across the room to her. He crouched on the floor in front of her. "What are you doing up sweetie. Come on, let's go back to your room." He ushered her.
She rubbed her eyes a few times and then turned her eyes to me. "Kate came to visit?"
Nash picked her up flawlessly for having only one hand and she instinctively wrapped her arms and legs around him like a spider monkey. She kept her large blue eyes on me as he carried her back down the hallway she'd came.
"Is Kate sad?" She asked her father as they moved from my sight.
It was perfect, granting me a few moments to compose myself. Ten very long minutes later Nash came back out rubbing the back of his head. "Sorry about that."
"It's fine. I always love seeing Ellie."
"She's got me wrapped even tighter around her finger than you do." He sighed and sat down beside me.
I flushed. "Nash-"
"Kate." He said sharply and turned sideways to face me on the couch, I bounced and did the same. "I nearly died. I mean, really, actually, died." I took his hand. "I mean, I thought that was something I was ready for. I've known for years now that it was a risk when I joined the force. Hell, even before I joined the force I knew I could die at any moment."
"But you didn't." I said quickly and shook my head. I didn't want to hear this. I refused to face it, to face losing anyone else.
"I thought I was ready to die. And then I got shot. I've been shot at before, and it's shaken me up, but also filled me with adrenaline. But I actually got shot this time and I realized for the first time how short life is. I got shot and I realized there were so many things I needed to take care of! So much I had left unfinished. No one is more important than Ellie to me, no one."
I smiled. "Of course. That's the way it should be-"
"But when I opened my eyes and I was on the ground with blood coming out of my chest and gun fire filling the air as everyone tried to shoot the men who shot me, there wasn't a single moment I wished Ellie was there. I'd never wish that on her in a million years, to see me like that. I called out for you."
I wanted to take my hand away from his but I couldn't.
"I wanted you to hold my hand, I needed to know that you would make sure Ellie was okay. I needed you. But I wanted to take care of you too. I know, that sounds stupid. I was laying there reciting the last rite bleeding out and I had someone who dropped out his second year in medical school trying to save my life and I was worried about you. I needed to tell you, you needed to know that you are too good. You're just too damn good Kate. For all of this. Do you know that?"
"I'm not." I croaked.
He smiled slightly but it looked haunted. "Yeah, if you knew you were too good you wouldn't be the person I think you are. You are humble, and kind, gentle, and beautiful. You're too good."
Oh Nash, if only you knew. You will.
"I wanted to take care of you. In what I thought were my last moments, I just wanted to make sure you knew." He hesitated, closed his mouth and swallowed hard. "And then I realized I didn't just want to make sure everything was taken care of. I didn't want to know Ellie was going to be okay, I wanted to see it. I didn't want you to know how good you were I wanted to show you."
"Nash I-" I can't.
"Life is too short Kate. I know you're with Alessio. And I respect that. I really do. I'm not going to try to pull you apart, I'm not going to try to kill him or get him arrested, I won't try to break your relationship. But life is too damn short for me to lie, to hold back from saying what I want to. Should I be on my death bed I don't want to lay there thinking she needs to know. Not again. You need to know how I feel about you whether it changes anything or not you need to know I-"
I felt tears running down my face as I put my other hand on his. "Alessio is the one who shot you." I said barely above a whisper.
------------------------------------------------
Hey readers!
So sorry about the cliff hanger from the last chapter and a little bit of one here again (;
I want to hear it guys. Who is tugging on the string to your heart? Get on twitter, follow me, (atRaFranc0 or) https://twitter.com/RaFranc0 or under the username "ObsceneIrrationality" and tweet #teamnash or #teamalessio
Also, be aware that next month is National Novel Writing Month! Nanowrimo for short, nano for short short. I participated last year and will be doing so again this year. So for the next few weeks it's very unlikely that you'll get more than one update from me. I will be throwing myself into my nano and won't be doing any writing on any of my other novels. I do have the next few chapters already prepared so it won't interfere with your weekly updates, but there won't be any extra updates or bonus updates for this or for WDC.
For those of you who don't know what Nano is it's something that occurs every November. The premise is simple. One month. One book. 50,000 words. You have from November 1st-Novmeber 30th to complete a 50,000 words or more book. No revisions, just writing. It's intense. If you're a writer I seriously suggest you give it a whirl. Check out their website for the official rules, to find out how to track your word count on a day to day, connect with a community of others who are participating and to see a list of published books that were started during Nano. Please do remember that just because you are done WRITING a book does not mean it's finished and should you choose to submit to agents, self publish, or shared on a website like this you should run through several rounds of revisions before sharing your work. Always put your best, most refined, closest to perfect work out as you can (:
Fun fact, I started the midnight mafia trilogy just a few days after I completed my Nano last year (with two days to spare, seriously was sooo proud of myself!) So I'm almost ready to celebrate a one year anniversary with this series! Woohoo!
Anyway. Don't forget to vote and comment.