The Gift

Prologue

I never thought about how I would die. I mean, aside from it not being a very good conversation starter, it's a thought most people would rather avoid... since you know, most people don't have a say-so in the whole ordeal... but I do.

I have a choice, in the last few seconds that I choose to give myself, to make one of the hardest decisions I could ever make: whether to be selfish and bare the cards that I've been dealt to dwell in the moments I have left with him... or to save them all the heartbreak in the end and just get it over with.

No matter how much I'd rather take the former, I can't bare to let myself be selfish. So, no, I guess I really don't have a choice.

But then again... maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm not being selfless by giving my life up for others. Maybe I'm being selfish to him, to my family, to the world... and to myself. What do I want?

The answer is simple. To be happy. To make others happy. To end all this pain I've caused by just being born. To be... normal.

I scoff. Normal. The thought seems ridiculous. Like debating whether my right shoe looks better than my left or whether a zebra is black with white stripes or white with black stripes... a waste of time. Stupid. Pointless. Pathetic?

I gulp, trying to swallow all the lies I spilled over the past few months. More lies to fill the bottomless pit below me. A chasm big enough to engulf me... a chasm big enough to finish me.

All I have to do is jump. I close my eyes as the wind ripples through my t-shirt, the smell of the water below hitting my nostrils. All I have to do is jump... then everyone can be happy. It's simple. Easy. A one-step move.

So why can't I do it? I know it's not because I'm afraid of death. I'm not afraid of anything. I can't let myself be... so what is stopping me from ending everything right here, right now?

"Alyssa, don't do it! We can find another way if we just... if we just trust each other!"

I look over my shoulder. The answer was simple. It was him. I couldn't jump because I was afraid... afraid of letting go of the only thing that truly mattered anymore: him.

I gave him a tight smile, a reassuring gesture that I knew what I was doing. "I'm so sorry..."

And then I let the wind swallow me up for my ultimate death that lay below. He can't fix everything like he thinks he can. It was only a matter of time before... it was too late.