It hurt. Badly. As if my head was simaltainesly missing and on the brink of exploding. There was a ringing in my ears, my cheeks felt hot and my throat was collapsing into itself. How much longer? When does the darkness set in? For a moment, I could've sworn I heard someone scream. Was I screaming? Is that possible when you've hung yourself? Why was this taking so long?
I felt the pressure lighten around my neck and opened my eyes, expecting to see heaven.
Instead, I saw a girl.
Her mouth was moving, she was definitely talking, but I couldn't make anything out.
She was lifting me up and struggling to cut the noose with a knife.
"What the hell? What's wrong with you? What are you doing in my house? Do I call the ambulance? God what the FUCK!"
The words finally shape themselves into something comprehensible once I'm no longer hanging, but I still can't focus on them. I'm too busy taking her in. I know she's my guardian angel, nothing from this world can be as beautiful as her.
Her eyes were a deep brown with golden flicks around the iris, they sparkled like the golden glitter covering her eyelids. I always thought the perfect nose would be narrow with a slight downward slope leading to small point but after seeing her, I know an aquiline nose is the only one that could make me give a woman a second glance. I had never seen freckles so beautifully spread across someones face, the same way the stars always seem to be perfectly placed in the sky by God himself. Her cheeks were rosy and her lips were full with a prominent cupids bow, I was worried they'd find a way to stab me if I dared to kiss her right now.
Right now.
What's happening right now? This doesn't seem like the right time to kiss someone.
"Are you listening?"
Her voice interrupted me.
"Yeah, yeah, sorry," I mutter.
"So why are you in my house?" She screams.
Her house? I look around the room. It's my room, I'm almost sure of it.
Almost.
Everything was... different. The bed was in the corner with pink sheets, I saw a bookcase filled with trinkets and books. While my walls are plain, hers were filled with posters and frames, either containing art or photos of herself alongside more people I couldn't recognize. There was a bass next to the bookcase and a vanity cluttered with makeup.
I started to second guess if this could be my room, but I vividly remember every moment leading up to this. There's no way I would wonder into a strangers house to kill myself.
"I, I thought I was in my house.. this doesn't make sense..." I whisper, pinching myself to make sure this was real.
"God, and why the hell would you hang yourself? You know you could kill yourself like that?"
Tears begin to fill my eyes. "I know," I softly let out.
"Oh, oh, I'm so sorry, I -I didn't mean- Is everything okay..?"
I began to cry. "I don't know. I don't think so. Does everyone feel this way? Everyone tries to kill themselves at some point, right? This is normal, right? Please, please tell me you've felt this way too?" I was balling at this point. It felt so ridiculous to even wonder if someone so perfect could ever feel so rotten. Of course she's never thought about killing herself. If she dies, the sun doesn't shine tomorrow, the moon stops going through phases and while I don't know much about science I do know that would somehow effect the oceans tides, thus either flooding us or sending the world into a drought. I don't know much about anything but I do know if she dies, the earth stands still, and lives are ruined.
"Hey, calm down, just breathe," she coos, taking the noose off and dropping it to the floor.
I felt her wrap her arms around me.
In that moment, I felt serene. For the first time since, well, since I sat in my room and decided I would actually follow through with killing myself. This felt a different kind of serene, a comfortable one. Not "this is finally ending so I should be happy about that," but "for the first time since I was a child I see beauty and hope in the world and while this life is scary I know it will be okay."
I felt as if she had, somehow, been alongside me this whole time. Just out of view, just out of reach. How could I feel so comfortable with a stranger?
She pulled herself away. "Tea?"
I nodded my head and she reached for my hands, helping me up.
As I followed her towards the kitchen, I realized how similar the layout of our houses were.
"Do you want to talk about?" She asks after a long silence. "What's there to say?" I answer.
She sighed and made her way to the stove while I sat on the other side of the wall at the table. I could hear her fill a kettle with water as I fiddled with my fingers.
Suddenly, I felt a vibrating come from inside me as everything began to blur out. I've experienced panic attacks before but this was different, like I had been shoved into a wormhole that began to tear lasers through every molecule in my body.
It took every bit of strength in me to mutter out a single word: "Name?"
"Daphne. Daphne Fletcher. And yours?"
Before I could even answer, a bright light filled the room and I heard buzzing in my ears. The awful feeling intensified as the buzzing grew louder. I had never felt anything so painful. All I could think was "I had died, was waiting in purgatory, and just as I met the lady of my dreams, I am being sent to hell."
But I wasn't sent to hell.
Everything went quiet, my body felt normal again, so I slowly opened my eyes.
I was sitting in the same spot as before, only instead of being at Daphnes table, I was sitting on the floor, my own kitchen table a few feet away.
It was just a dream. It had been a few days since I got any real sleep, I must've been so exhausted I collapsed on the floor.
I got up and made my way to my room.
Multicoloured lights from my disco ball spun around the room, sticky notes with a single name covering objects, in the center of the room was a chair, with a piece of rope hanging just above it on the ceiling fan, cut by a knife.
