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S-Isabelle — L'Appel Du Vide
#falling #heights #shortstory #writing
Published: 2017-04-12 06:49:44 +0000 UTC; Views: 944; Favourites: 1; Downloads: 0
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Description I am afraid of heights.

But here I am, standing on the margins of this 6-story building.

I am not wearing any form of footwear. I can feel the cold cement and the gentle breeze under my feet. My feet are sweating. Not because I’m scared, but simply because I have sweaty feet. Well, maybe, I am scared. Or more like, nervous. My feet is always sweating when I’m nervous.

I am alone. Physically alone. Everybody’s downstairs. I can hear their constant chattering, their sequenced footsteps, and their loud laughs. It feels so good watching them live. It feels like, this is how a proper human lives and I’m happy because they live that way. It’s just so satisfying to watch it. Like a good life well lived. It feels as good as watching how puzzle parts connect with each others and no extra pieces left. Sometimes I wonder, how can something so simple feels so good, how can something we don’t feel or even taste could feels so proper. It’s something I can never think of why. Nevertheless, my mind keeps on feeling it. The feel is so real you can compare it up with eating good food. It’s something so palpable, so visible, and yet at the same time. It is not.

I can see them clearly, but they can’t see me up here. Not because they can’t, but they don’t. No matter what, they will not see me. There is this one rule, one law, working for the whole human society. It is undeniably true and on point. It is so accurate sometimes it’s terrifying. It sounds like this.
“You see what you want to see.”
Yes, only what you want to see. It doesn’t matter if it’s right in front of your eyes. If you don’t have a will to see it, even if you do ‘see’ it, you don’t. Something as simple as that is a universal law nobody can get away from. It’s something you’re born with and stays with you permanently. Some of you may now refuse to accept the fact. But hear me out. One day you will understand what I mean.

Fortunately (or unfortunately), I am not something they want to see. Their life is too busy and too crowded for a nobody like me to slip in. I am invisible, but I am not. I am here, but nobody knows. Do I even have to exist if nobody realizes my existence?

I am alone, but I am not. I am not alone. Mentally. I can feel them around me. The man, waiting for me to jump, waiting for me to let go. He stares at me with something between great intensity and not giving a shit at all. No. Let me correct it. Not between. It’s a fusion of both. Something I (or maybe nobody) can’t explain clearly with words. I can’t even describe the man itself with the available words.  How am I suppose to explain the way the looks at me? But, wait. Let me try. He’s wearing a black hat, black coat, black pants, and black shoes (yes, everything visible is black except for the white pair of gloves he’s wearing). It’s kinda safe to say that he looks like somebody out Rene Magritte’s The Son of a Man. Well, of course, with minor differences. And no apple.  His face is visible, but I can’t seem to describe it. It’s something so close to empty. So close to a professional poker face, yet it speaks. His face is flat but it speaks to me. I can see how his face muscles is perfectly unused, but his looks is overflowing with words and emotions. That’s the best I can do in describing him. Very vague, yes, I am aware. Then there’s the crowd, watching me from afar, emitting no noise (they will though, if I do unexpected movement. They’ll criticize me in a way I can never forget). I hope I can describe these people, but they’re not visible just yet. They’re in front of me, but I can’t see them. I can perfectly sense and hear them though. Also the audience, examining me from an-inch distance, not breathing (as if their breath will leave dirty oily marks on me, their thin glass figurine and yes, they will). I never like these audiences. They ­do what the want freely and offend my privacy, but they never give anything in return. They examine me, take pictures of me, but not doing anything of profit to me. Fuck these fat plump oily men in white spandex body suit with bad tobacco teeth and tobacco breath. Fuck you all.

Regardless of all this, I feel nothing (yes, even with the existence of the audience I dislike so much). I can only feel this void in front of me, pulling me in. No, not the void. More like the ground. It’s calling me. It’s pulling me down like how magnet attracts metal. They’re embracing me with their gentle membrane. Pulling me in with a certain softness where there’s almost no power. The membrane its selves is enough to put these pressure on me though. I want to give in, I want to smile at how welcoming it is.

“But I can’t”, says my brain. Why are you even here, brain? You’re not supposed to give a shit about things as simple as this. But, well. I do appreciate your goodwill. Thank you.

Everything is calling me. The view. The wind. The ground. The void. I can see how it embraces me softly, how it ruffles though my hair with the utmost care, how it looks at me with that gentleness (it’s such a lovely thing, really. Tears are literally rolling on my cheeks. My eyes are literally producing these liquids. My lips are literally trembling with emotions and curving up like this is the greatest thing that has happened to me (which is true). My heart just cannot take this up anymore, my soul is pouring out of me)

It calls me.

“Come back home, My Dear,” it whispers.

“Jump.”

It says.
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