She wanted to die.
He wanted to live.
•••
A hand grabbed onto my wrist, yanking me back just as the train rushed past, before I'd even had time to comprehend whether or not I'd carry out the action. I stumbled back into the person's chest, my hear...
Here's the ending of the previous chapter since it's been a while:
Within a few short minutes I was nearly at the train station, the entrance doors within sight when my eyes strayed back over to the graffiti, admiring it's breath-taking beauty before confusion fluttered across my features when I saw that it had been altered. A tag had been added in the corner written in distinctive typography, spelling out the name: Romeo.
Perplexed I glanced back towards the image, seeing that the boy was still trying to catch the girl, and she was still trying to reach out to him, but now her hands were tied with a rope, fraying as the threads trailed down to the bottom of the picture where they morphed into words.
"You're scared of falling," a familiar voice spoke beside me, causing me to jump as I turned to see the stranger stood a few feet away, reading the words off of the graffiti, "But you're also scared of being saved." My gaze travelled to the spray can held loosely in his left hand before flicking up to his dark brown eyes, a small smile on his face as he watched the realisation sink in. "Does it all make a bit more sense now?"
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"No," she drawled out, her hazel eyes flicking between mine, "No it does not make any more sense – if anything I'm even more confused..." she muttered.
I chuckled weakly, ignoring the stabbing sensations in my chest with each breath I took. My body had been screaming in protest as I tried to run after her, but when it came to Cassie no opposition would be valid enough to stop me. I couldn't just leave her, full well knowing that she had been about to kill herself a few minutes before. I couldn't watch her fall and make no move to try and catch her, even if she didn't want to be saved.
I hadn't necessarily been planning on meeting her again, but a small part of me had hoped that she would stop and pay attention to the graffiti – or rather the amendment I had made to it.
"I had cans in my bag," I clarified, taking a hesitant step towards her as I spoke, "Spray cans, because I do-"
"-Graffiti, yeah, I've figured that out by now." She finished off, her curls lightly bouncing as she turned her face away from me and back to the image. Her eyes lingered on the rope, trailing down to the words I had read aloud. "It's beautiful."
"It's us."
Her gaze snapped towards me. "Initially, it wasn't." One night I'd felt relatively uninspired and just drawn whatever came to mind; a cliché story of a boy trying to save a girl. I'd left it untagged since I didn't feel like it credited my name, and hadn't returned back since. "But then tonight, you inspired me."
"I- I don't understand," she murmured, her voice drifting over to me as I held her gaze. "How is this us?"
"What do you see when you look at it?" I flipped the question back to her, curious as to where her mind went. She turned back to the image, her eyes trailing past the girl falling and straight to the boy. "How is this us?"
