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TW: mentions of suicide
Marcus's POV
"SAYA!" I scream down the stairs praying she will hear.
"Shhh!" Jun squints her eyes as if in pain. "There is no need for all the yelling."
"Would you get down from there?" My anxiety peaks as the girl leans down to look at the street that lies further. "Please."
"Sorry, I like being up here." She drags her words.
Crap. Her pupils are dilated and her breathing is unever. She's still very high.
"SAYA!" I call again.
"Can you see that?" She gazes at the multicolored sky, grinning like a child. "Doesn't it look so peaceful."
"Jun, for fucks sake, just take my hand and I'll help you down." I take a few steps, extending my hand to her. I can't stand to see this anymore.
"No!" She exclaims, suddenly mad. "Stay back."
"Think about it, ok? You are high. You are having a really bad trip." I back off slowly. "We just need to get you to bed and it'll be okay."
"I might be high, but my mind is as clear as it's ever been." She looks back at me and her expression terrifies me. Blank. No fright, no anxiousness. No doubt."You know, I've heard people sometimes call this a 'leap of faith'. If you think about it, it's quite the weird expression. It's almost like whoever came up with it was ready to jump off a bridge."
The wind blows on her dark hair as she looks forwards into the everchanging sky. A beautiful scene that I would've enjoyed much more if there wasn't an assassin trying to off herself in front of me.
"If anything, what I am is faithful."
I say nothing.
Why am I so bad at this? I've been in her place a thousand times before, I should know what to say.
I try recalling things that lingered in my head at times I was ready to quit, the very specific memories that I would lose forever. Back then, I had no one. My family, dead. My friends, threatened to kill me with screwdrivers. However, as I stood over the city, I knew there'd be no utopic afterlife. What waits on the other side isn't better.
That was what drove me to stay and I am glad. But, since, I have found much better reasons to hold my ground. Now, my friends and my family are one in the same and no box six feet under is worth more than this.
But I can't stand here and tell her her life matters. I can't say, truly, that Jun's existence is worth more than the lives of the ones that died by her hands.
If justice ruled above violence, she would not be here today. She should not.
I will try to stop her, I decide, but I won't lie.
"You'll regret it, trust me. Not for yourself. But, if you care about anything," I tell her. "You will stay to avoid the goddamn mess you'll leave behind. Your problems won't be fixed, they'll just fall into someone else. Into the shoulders of every single person that matters."
It is not that I would miss her, but I know what abandonment tastes like. I have never seen Saya mourn, but this, surely, won't be the reason I do.
Jun has caused enough damage.
"I can't." It's a small thing to come out of her. Quiet and weak within the expanse of the night. "You don't understand, I can't live anymore."
"What?" Something heats up my insides as I watch tears fall down her cheek. "You're goddamn right I don't understand."
She lifts her eyes to meet mine. Jun flinches at the raw anger that she finds. Good, I think, burn.
"Why are you crying?" I ask. "Genuinely, what is your reason to feel sorry for yourself?"
Her lips open and close, and I wait for her to prove me wrong. I want her to say I have been nothing but blind this whole time, that Petra was right.
For Saya's sake, I want her to be innocent.
She looks down.
"There you go again. Don't try to look ashamed, you are pass the point of that." I drag a hand down my face. "If you really regret your life and what you've done with it, go on and deal with it."
Jun sighs. "I am."
A tired smile hints at her lips. It tells a tale of loath dressed as peace, heavier than a falling building.
It was the smile of someone who knew their sins like their own name.
"That boy. That kid was murdered because of me." Her hands curl around the wall. "It's my fault they took a knife to his arm and cut it over and over again."
"No one said that."
"They don't need to."
"And what if it is your fault, huh?" I scoff. "You said it yourself, he was a kid. Even if it was your name written on his arm instead of Saya's, is it any different from the five children you killed?"
"Yes!" She shouts.
"How, Jun? They were all lives taken with the same objective, protect a goddamn mob. The five and this one might as well have been done by the same person."
"They are different because tonight is not about tying loose ends, it's about punishment. And justice." Her lips tremble. "I have been disobedient. I need to die."
That level of devotion, delusion, scares me. Perhaps, I will never understand how a person can equal obedience to justice. Those are oceans apart, if anything, but so, so dangerous when compared.
"Be better." I tell her. "Don't run away when you still have time."
Her head whips around when the door creaks open, and I don't know if she heard me or not.
