A Tribute For Tia

Chapter 1.

It all started with that bridge.

See, I wasn't planning on jumping. Heck, I wasn't even planning on climbing the damn thing, but one thing led to another and I found myself standing dangerously close to the depths of my own demise. Don't get me wrong- I wasn't suicidal. I used to laugh at those people, the ones that claimed to have their lives all muddled up like the cords of earphones- but as the cars all rushed past under me, and I heard someone screaming as loud as their lungs would allow for me to get down, I realised that they were right.

The thing is, I was not depressed, despite the wide belief that I was. My parents –both lawyers, constantly working on separate cases that were always too important to stop when I asked for something- decided I was a risk to myself when they found me huddled in a cave of blankets, watching the video clip to the same song over and over again -the day after they found me at the foot of the bridge- so they sent me to a shrink. There was something about that specific therapist that made me want to scream; maybe it was the fact that he was so tall it hurt my neck to look at him, or maybe that it pained me when I saw the small picture that he once forgot to place down against his desk so I couldn't see. The picture was in a frame, but the photo itself was ripped and folded. It was of a girl, a teenage girl, who I could only assume was his daughter. She was a beautiful person, something I knew I'd never be, or never deserve to be with. Her hair was like golden silk, her eyes like blue glass. Flawless skin and perfect hands, she was leaning on her intertwined fingers in an intelligent pose, eyes not focused on the camera. When the girl's father had seen me looking with a dumbfounded look, he picked the frame up delicately and placed it in his drawer.

My little sister told me once that I looked like a constipated Oscar the Grouch. Keep it in mind that she had only been seven years old at the time, and couldn't even draw a straight line- not that I could judge her. She was still a better artist than I. Art was never my strong point, and I wasn't that smart, either; so I really had nothing except for music. Sometimes, I would sit in my room for hours on end with sheets of music in front of me, trying to make up something that had not been already done. My guitar was small, as my father –on one of the three times he had actually done something nice for me- had bought it when I was ten. It was nice then, but seven years and two and a half foot later, it was a little on the short side. I never had lessons, never tried to enrol in any extra-curricular musical activities; it wasn't because I couldn't do it- I was just socially awkward. People usually left me alone, and me, them- everyone except Troy. He was the definition of stalker. With a mop of strawberry blonde hair and red –yes, I mean red- eyes, he was persistent in being my friend. I never accepted his friendship though, as I had no desire to be even lower on the social ladder than I already was.

That was my life. Just seemingly endless days consisting of school tests and exams, things I knew I was going to fail; and being home without my parents until all hours of the night, never relying on my mother to cook my dinner. There was always the lingering thought of just ending it; my parents wouldn't find out for days, oblivious to the fact that while I may look asleep from the doorway, I was no longer breathing; the fact that if it was late at night and nobody saw me leave, that they wouldn't find my body until it washed up on some far off land- like Romania, or somewhere exotic, maybe Hawaii.

But the girl always brought me back. The girl that the shrink was so determined to hide from me.