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...
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Hope was a mirage: a paradox, a mere fantasy, a delusion.
It seeped its way into your mind until it clogged up your lungs, diffusing through every cell and infesting every breath you took. Hope gave you a pair of rose-tinted glasses, urging you to forget everything that protected you and to trust in the transient feel of positivity that soaked into your every thought. It started off soothing and relaxing, like a drug slowly infusing into your bloodstream, until you finally felt happy – and then the high crashed down, leaving you reeling in rue and reminiscing on the better days that seemed to have drifted so far away.
Hope was poison.
But at this point, call me Romeo and pass me the bottle because I was going to drink it all anyway.
I was the most cynical person I knew: jaded and sceptical, I chose to stay in the darkness because I was scared of the light, scared of the feeling of freedom and happiness which was so unfamiliar to me. Romeo had told me the harsh truth, and despite his overbearing positivity, he did have a point: I had to at least try. Even though I knew the hope would fade, and the potential happiness I might feel could leave me even more shattered than I was before, I was going to try.
Right now it was all or nothing, and whether my journey to healing lasted two hours or two days, or whether I reached a level of mental stability or I became more suicidal than ever, at least I would know that I had consciously tried. At least I'd know what fate had destined for me: to be confined in my own mental prison or to be someone who was in love with life and herself.
As much as I hoped it was the latter, I had to be realistic, and know that years' worth of childhood trauma and mental health struggles wouldn't be magically cured in one night, one week or even one year. Finding a source of light to clear out some of my darkness wouldn't be an imminent change, and even though Romeo had set alight a small candle, it would burn out eventually. Change took time, and I was going to have to learn to be patient instead of running away the second I felt uncomfortable.
Without Romeo's help, I doubt I would have come to the decision to try and alter my mindset, but ultimately I wasn't doing this for him. I wasn't trying to heal because I felt obligated to listen to his words, or because he wanted me to, but rather because I wanted to - and I needed to.
I was doing this because I owed it to myself to try.
And so I was going to attempt to untie the rope from my hands and to save myself from the fall. I was going to allow myself to be everything I was afraid of – hopeful, carefree, and possibly even happy - and hope that I wouldn't die trying to fight for a lost war. I was going to indulge myself in hope, soak in the bittersweet poison of its promises, and hope that I wouldn't make the fragile pieces of myself even more broken.
Zoning back in to my surroundings after being lost in my thoughts, I recollected my bearings as I glanced down at the boy stood below me, after having torn my transfixed eyes away from the sleeping city. Romeo's gaze was focused out into the distance as a somewhat comfortable silence had fallen between us, the air swarming with something unknown yet tangible to the both of us, an unspoken agreement to let the wind carry away Romeo's words and allow the implications to simply fade into the slight breeze.
