Ashes and Goodbyes

In the end, there was nothing she could do. Years of work and effort, of pretending, false smiles hiding bruised cheeks and hurt limbs. All for nothing. The urgency that boiled through her veins, the panic that crept forward in her every waking moment, the restlessness that plagued her sleep. Gone now. Left her body empty, veins hollow, and mind blank. Everything she’d worked so hard for, every single precious thing she’d known, slipped through her hands, through her fingers, grains of sand from a broken hourglass.

She had worked so hard, sacrificed so much, had given every bleeding part of her. And it had not been enough. She looked back, going over her every action, her every choice, and wondered if there was anything more she could have done. If she’d been stronger, if she’d been smarter, quicker, better, maybe things would have been different. Maybe she would have been enough. Maybe she would not have failed so entirely, so completely. Maybe. Maybe. Maybe.

She stood there, bare feet on craggy rock, blistered and dirty, inches away from the edge of the cliff. Cool wind blew, rustling the grass beneath her feet, beneath her toes, rocking her body forwards and back, teetering between the darkened endless sky and the unfathomable abyss below. Her dark, damp hair whipped against her face, and the salty air lingered heavy on her tongue. And she stared. Stared across at the inky black sea. Stared at the waves, they were hypnotizingly dangerous as they danced on the surface of the water, hiding permanent calm underneath. She watched for hours and hours on end until light hints of dawn began to peek over the horizon.

Some small, anguished part of her still hoped. Wished. That all of this was some twisted dream, some feverish, wicked nightmare. But the more time that passed, the more the finality of her choices, her deeds, and her past seemed to be. She was set now, in harsh, cold, unmoving stone. No matter how desperately she pleaded with the sky, with the sea, the universe, herself, nothing changed. The hands of time moved steadily forward. No amount of hopeless wanting would undo what had been done. Nothing would rewrite what had already been written.

The waves lapped up against the base cliff, water clinging to the side of the jagged rock. The wind picked up, blowing stronger now, but she was not bothered by the cold. Could not care about the sharp, icy air that dragged against her clothes and stung her skin. She was more focused on what she was carrying in her grasp. In her arms, she held the weight of all she had ever held dear, her hopes, dreams, and all of the goals that she had labored and toiled towards, that somehow slipped away.

She held the ashes of her past, of her mistakes in hand, inside an ornate wooden box. Her fingers gripped the sides harshly until her fingers lay bloodless against the dark, glossy finish. She could hardly feel the sharp edges digging into her palms, but it was almost a relief. To feel the pain that ravaged her mind and heart on her body. It was a distraction, but a small one. Still, it was enough to steel her, to sharpen her in the way she needed in the moment. Despite her failure, she still had one last thing to do.

She stepped closer to the edge and threw them away into the deep below. She said her final goodbyes and tossed everything she’d ever known away. She watched the ashes of her failure sink away, the box slowly disappearing into the depths, swallowed by the crashing waves. Vicious sea foam and angry waves, violently pushing and pulling until even the memory of that box was no more. No more. No more and nothing more forever.

She did not feel lighter with her burden gone. She did not feel a weight off her shoulder. No relief at having literally drowned the core of her in the sea. She felt inflamed. The pain in her heart left a gaping, bleeding hole in her chest. The bloodied raw edges, the shattered pieces of herself, bitingly sharp against her skin. In the end, it was too much. She could no longer stand there and watch the restless ocean, no longer watch as the sky brightened and chased away what was left of the night. She could no longer even hold herself up, knees buckling, falling, bitterly to the earth below. Hands clawing at cold dirt and wet grass, scratching and digging in desperate rage. She screamed, head pressed to the ground, and let out every pain she had been feeling for so long, in furious agony. She screamed until her voice went hoarse, then screamed even more. On and on until not a sound could be produced, until she was breathless, and boneless, collapsed in a tattered heap on that windy cliff’s edge.

She knew, with great certainty, that she would never be the same. She was unfalteringly convinced, as sure as every ragged, broken breath she took, that she would be forever changed by those events. That the future would never be as bright or as hopeful as it had been in those blissful days of Before. That the innocent and easy happiness of the days before everything fell apart had long passed. She knew with everything that she ever was, from the very ends of her hair to the tips of her toes. Down the depths of her wretched, ragged soul, she knew.

The crashing of the ocean drowned out all other noise, the sound of her own breathing, and the torrent and violent thoughts that tormented her mind, faded and dulled to nothing. She was left with deadened senses, curled up, and covered in dirt on the surface of the cliff.

She lifted her head and let the biting wind dry the salted tracks on her face. And as she took one last look below at the morose, wine-colored sea, she knew she would never again feel whole.