The World's Name

His scream ripped through my gut as I plummeted towards the earth below me, I lost my footing and slammed against the dew covered leaves. I couldn’t breathe, it was stuck at the base of my throat and it couldn’t escape. Sobs wrenched from my gut were his scream was still sitting, patiently waiting for me to listen. I stayed on the ground, the wetness soaking through my shirt as if the ground was crying with me. It was selfish of me to cry. I didn’t deserve to. I had done this, every choice had been mine.

I didn’t expect to fall in love and I definitely didn’t expect for someone to fall in love with me, but I did and he did. That’s why I had to leave. A little while longer with me and everything that made him human, every ounce of humanity inside of him would have disintegrated. I do that to people, I don’t mean to but I do. The others had started to get impatient, angry. A year was like a hiccup in our lives, but it was a long time to wait and they were getting tired of waiting for me. If I had stayed they would’ve tried to get to me through him. I couldn’t put him in danger like that. He didn’t even know the truth. I almost told him it. The night before I jumped, I was looking at him and I thought maybe I could, maybe I could live a normal life with him, maybe we could make it. Then the phone rang and it was one of them, and I knew I couldn’t do it. I knew I had to go.

He looked at me, his features somehow got softer whenever he looked at me, “Where’s your head, those wires and threads look like they’re making a masterpiece.” He always said that, wires and threads pulling the strings in my mind.

“It just went away for a little while.” I responded, flicking my hand into the air. He smiled wrapping his arms around me and kissed the top of my head before asking if it went to the moon. He made me laugh, that was the thing I loved about him most, and he kept me on the ground. It was so easy for me to fly so far away from the world. I’d been in it for so long it was hard to find reasons to stay, but he had become one of them. I shouldn’t have let him, but he nestled himself firmly under my skin and trying to get rid of him would have been like trying to forget something when you’ve tied a string around your finger to ensure you wouldn’t forget.

I hadn’t been sure that I was going to do it until we came to the bridge. I had been looking at the birds and he had been looking at me. I loved it when he looked at me; it was so familiar, like he was reading the favorite part of his favorite book for the thousandth time and it was still as good as the first time he had read it. While I was looking at the birds, I felt my heart drop to the pit of my stomach and I knew that this was going to be it.

“I want to fly.” I didn’t take my eyes off the birds, I couldn’t look at him, “I want to never feel the weight of the ground beneath my feet.” I could feel him tense, his muscles stopping as I stopped walking. I leaned against the guardrail. “I want to fly and I want to be free and I want to feel.” I don’t know how it happened or why, but I felt my mouth slide into a smile and I laughed. I could see every moment that we had shared right in front of my eyes. “What an idea.” I whispered as the last image faded out. I looked at him and I think it might have been the first time I ever truly did. There was nothing else going on in my mind, I had nothing to worry about. It was just me and him and it was the most magnificent moment in my entire life. I didn’t look for more than a second, but it felt like years to me. I studied his face, committing it to memory. The little lines forming too early around his eyes were my favorite part, they were happiness and all I can hope for is that they get deeper and deeper with every smile and every laugh he has.

I laughed. I jumped.

I hope I gave him the right ending.

They’ll never find a body, there won’t be one to find.