“Life is a tightrope,” she said in April.  “Jump before God snips either end.”

During a Californian summer, you can’t always tell if it’s night.  The sky becomes a hive for ash, stinging our dry eyes and seething the stars.  Grey is the colour of death somewhere.  Pray and shut your lids, kids.  As cinder snow haloed my tipsy Aya, I was glad she wasn’t burning right now, despite the Fireball in her hand.

“Don’t drink that crap,” I muttered.  “Please.”  I scootched my bucket closer to hers, plastic against flaky asphalt.  Aya’s cracked driveway was a spiderweb, illuminated by blinking sconces in the tongue-tied darkness.  I didn’t know who was caught in it.

Her gaze was dazed and fearless, drifting lazily from my acrylic nails to tear-stained cheeks.  “And?  What’re you going to do about it, Yael?”  Her bottle-bearing hand drooped, revealing a fresh slit on her wrist.  Like bracers, those cryptic children have kept us all at arms length since she got out of the hospital last week.  Today’s my shift.

“What the f*ck are you going to do about it, Yael?” she repeated, waving orange in my face, peacocking the dull shades of her slashes.  “Shut up and let me breathe for once, god.”  Aya’s head lolled back, grasp shaky around the glass as she clawed for another drop.

Xshshshsh!  The Fireball shattered against the spiderweb, seeping through the cracks and charring the Earth.  California liked it hot.  Aya looked at me, stunned, my hand still hovering over her empty palm.  “What the hell’s your problem, dude?!” I half-shouted into the aether.  “Do you want to go back there?  Stop.  It.”

In a flash, her confidence sloughed away and she curled into a ball, balanced on the bucket.  From the now-shuttered muddle crept a muffled “why?”  Her sobs sliced the lacuna.

I gulped down an ashen puff.  After all of this, she gets to ask why?  Three deep breaths.  My growl steadied into a purr.  “Look, if it were my way, then you’d still be in.  But it ain’t.”  I scootched a little closer, but Aya recoiled.  “This is the kind of stuff that made you do it, right?  The drinking?  Dr. Martin told your dad to contact her in case you started back up.  I love you so much, and I swear, if you don’t knock it off, then I’ll…” my voice wavered, “…then I’ll do it again.”

The sconces flickered.  I could hear a cricket coughing.

Aya’s head poked out from under her arms, salt freckling her brown skin.  “You wouldn’t.”

I averted my eyes.  “Y’know I just want the best for you.  Let’s just go inside, how ‘bout that?  This doesn’t have to be a big deal.  Besides, we have a lot of catching up to do!  I want to hear about all those Joan Didion books you read in there, smartiepants.  We can dish about that numbskull Marissa calls a boyfriend—I’ve certainly got some saucy goss for you.  It’ll be like old times.  C’mon, Aya.”  I stood up and extended a hand, attempting a smile.

She blankly stared at my invitation for a solid five seconds before sealing her eyes.  “Stop breaking everything, Yael,” she mumbled, slumping back into a ball.  This is pointless, just let her… 

Three deep breaths.  “If this is about the bottle, then I can get you a Pepsi or so—”

“THIS ISN’T ABOUT DRINKING, OKAY?!” Aya snapped, unfurling to her feet.  Her stance was wild and loose, more awake than I’ve seen her all week.  “This isn’t about the drinking, or the cutting, or the drugs, or any of that crap.  It’s about you.”

I squinted at her.  “What?”

She started laughing.  “Oh.  My.  God.  Of course it’s about you, Yael.  It’s always about you.  Perfect princess Yael with her open heart and her immaculate record and her f*****cking grandiosity.  While you were so focused on math, do you know what I was doing?  I was talking to the f*cking voices again.  You told me that you’d be there when it happened.  You promised me.  And while you were acing your SATs, I was fighting for my life.  I drank, yeah, but only to silence their screaming.  You said you’d understand.”  Her body was coiled.  “I loved you once, Yael.  But then you called the cops and put me in that place for three goddamn months.”  Each syllable was laced with venom.  I knew who was trapped in the spiderweb.  

“They only told me what I already knew,” she continued, panting harder and harder.  “I’m better off without you.  You were the one choking me.  I regret every time we kissed, every midnight confession, every time I believed you would rescue me.  Don’t worry, I’m under no such delusions anymore.”

My hairs were crawling.  “Did… did they tell you do kill yourself?”

Aya stopped laughing.  “No, you moron.”  Her eyes welled up.  “It was my choice.  I needed to get to them before they got to me.  When your life is burning around you and no-one seems to care, burn brighter so they’ll notice.  I didn’t plan to.  I just had a knife.  I’m sorry, okay?  Jesus.  I like living.  I simply didn’t want to live in a world with you.”

My sight was marred with summer ash and tears.  I surged forward, wrapping her in a hug.  “I’m sorry, Aya,” I sobbed.  “I’m so sorry.  You meant everything to me.  I love you.  I’d do anything to feel your arms around me.”

She leaned in real close, lips to my ear.

“Then you should’ve followed me.”

I fell to my knees on the carpet tile, hugging myself, feeling the Earth dissolve to cinders.