Author's Note: This was somewhat of an experiment – an incoherent jumble of incomplete sentences and angst. Hey, what can I say? It was late, I was bored, and Higher Ground was showing on WAM!. OH! And this little ficlet takes place before the series.
Disclaimer: I don't own any thing affiliated with Higher Ground. And godammit, I don't make any money off of this.
Scott must have been insane. Irrational, strange. What was he doing, anyway?
The road was dark and a blur. It climbed the mountain, spiraling upward at acute angles. It had been a gloriously clear night when he left the house, but now it was dark – so dark, and the redwood trees with their sprawling, thick branches blotted out the full moon until all he could see were flashes of pale, shimmering silver. The steering wheel jerked in his hands. His eyes jumped to the speedometer, just for an instant – he was going forty in a twenty-five mile-per-hour zone.
Someone arrest him, please. He wanted it so bad that it burned in his stomach like a dying emergency flare. That's right – catch their attention. I think it's a plea for help. Yes – help. He wanted to be arrested so that someone would notice.
He didn't even have his license yet. He was only fifteen, but of course he'd driven before. Let's take the car out for a joy ride – my dad won't find out; he never finds out. He's always so preoccupied with something, whether it be an urgent business call, or an impatient client, or even – Elaine.
The car swerved to the edge of the road, dangerously close to a hundred-foot drop. He heaved the steering wheel in the opposite direction – for now.
How easy it would be – just a few more feet, and he'd have nothing to worry about anymore.
It would be impossible to miss; all over the news and in the newspaper would be the tragic story of a teen who sent his father's car over a cliff in California. He could just see it. They'd write a wonderful little eulogy in the back of the newspaper. Scott Barringer was a friend, a son, and a kind, compassionate human being, they would write. He was the captain of his high school football team who inspired everyone around him. We will miss him dearly.
They'd chalk it up to poor road conditions. Or maybe the problem was in the brakes. Whatever it would be, they wouldn't write in the papers that he'd killed himself, partly because his father was a prominent business executive and they just – couldn't understand it.
The part that they wouldn't write about was the absurdity of it all. He'd like to hear them whisper about it afterwards, fitting himself between the hushed words. We will miss him dearly – but we don't understand it. He had everything, and so why would he give it up for nothing?
Oblivious, oblivious.
His eyes flicked to the passenger seat, to a pristine white envelope that lay across the beige leather upholstering. A letter – he had written a letter. He wouldn't dare say 'suicide note' because he hadn't come to terms with it yet. Wait 'till the next turn. The road is curvy – you'll always have another chance. The mountain roads didn't always have guardrails. It wouldn't take much. Just keep going straight instead of turning at the next curve; the tires would sail over the pavement, then over the gravel of the narrow shoulder, and then over nothing at all. Oh, how easy it would be.
It took him five tries to write the letter. Somehow, he couldn't get the emotions into words – not with his tenth grade vocabulary, and probably not with any vocabulary. He smoked a cigarette and wrote a sentence. The letter was eight sentences long and said everything. He didn't have much to say, and he didn't want to repeat himself – for some reason he could think of nothing sadder than explaining his death more than once, because it would be like dying again and again.
Like every night.
He didn't want to cry, but the tingling behind his eyes was inescapable. Inevitable. Unwanted, but there. The tears began to pool near his lower eyelids, spilling over and dripping from his chin. Onto his jeans and onto the sleeves of his shirt, leaving dark little ovals in their wake. He took a hand off the wheel to swipe at his eyes and then turn on the radio, because he had begun to sob and didn't want to listen to the sound.
He turned the music up, loud. So loud that he could no longer hear the words, and it was just noise. Thundering. Thunder.
He thought about rainstorms and lightning, and squeezed his foot onto the accelerator harder. Go faster. Don't stop. Scotty, are you up? Don't stop, Scotty. Promise me - tell me that you love me.
He could just do it now. Really, he could, and he would. The yellow lines of the road wavered under the headlights. The next curve in the road was approaching. Just keep going straight, don't stop, don't turn, don't think. Just do it. He willed his arms to stay steady, overcoming the instinct to turn – that dread, that sick anticipation of that final moment and the fear that made him want to be sick. Like fallingthe wrong way,telling yourself to not throw your hands out to catch yourself. But this was so much simpler, gloriously simpler – just keep going straight instead of turning – and oh, how fucking easy it will be –
So easy
So, so, sosososososo easy and -
Godammit
Now
RIGHT NOW
JUST DO IT
Fucking -
Do it, do it, doitdoitdoitdoit nownownownownownow -
He couldn't do it. At the last possible, infinitesimal moment, he pulled the car away from the edge of the steep mountainside, watching the brink approach and then slide away. He didn't know why or what stopped him. He couldn't think – straight or otherwise. He stopped the car and got out, and he smoked a cigarette on the side of the road near the woods.
The forest was perfectly still, quiet in comparison to the sound of his own heart pounding. It was a crisp night. He could smell the gasoline and smoke and the cold. It took a few moments for his hands to stop shaking and his mind to stop reeling.
When he composed himself, he fetched the pristine white envelope from the passenger seat with the cigarette dangling limply between his fingers. There was a slight hesitation where he wasn't sure what it was that he regretted; but then he lifted the burning cigarette tip to the corner of the paper. It ignited. The paper blackened and a tenuous orange flame appeared. He watched the ashes flutter to the ground and the smoke unfurl into the night air. Watching the redwoods, he let the letter fall from his hands and burn itself out on the pavement.
The woods are lovely, dark and deep
but I have promises to keep
and miles to go before I sleep
and miles to go before I sleep
-- Robert Frost