The Bridge

by Ali Mehdi

  Chapter 3

  Robert

  He tapped the driver lightly on the shoulder, “Could you please drop me off here? I was coming here for my afternoon walk.” they were now on the bridge.

  “sir, you must be joking, I just hit you with my cab. I am taking you to the nearest hospital so that they can check on you.” The cab slowed down behind another cab picking up a passenger, so Robert took the opportunity to open the door and leave the cab, all while profoundly thanking the cab driver for his time, and setting his mind at ease due to the accident. He felt that he had broken a couple ribs, and his insides were burning inside, but he was not going to tell that to the poor chap driving the taxi. He slammed the door behind him, waving towards the driver.

  He decided to cross the street to get a better view of the sunset, but that wasn’t such an easy feat. Brooklyn bridge was composed of six individual lanes, and crossing them was illegal. He decided that that was what he was going regardless of the dangers or consequences. This was going to be his last day on earth, so why shouldn’t he live it on the edge? And anyways, even if he was stopped by a cop, he wouldn’t have to think about the fine. He set his eyes on the opposite side of the road and started walking, crossing the first lane, he gave a few quick glances to his left, realizing that the street was pretty empty. That had never happened in the past twenty years of him crossing the bridge every day to get to work. Weird. He started jogging across the street and started to have a bad feeling. This wasn’t such a great idea. He crossed the yellow line separating opposite traffic directions and kept running, he heard cars start to honk in his direction, a red honda narrowly missing him and skidding to a stop a dozen feet ahead. The angry driver was out of the vehicle and thrusting his fist in Roberts direction, insulting by every name in the book, but he didn’t see the man, because a large transportation freight liner truck was only a couple yards away, blowing his airhorn while slamming on the brakes, but drifting on the wet asphalt towards him. He scurried towards the pavement, putting every last bit of will power into his movement. He didn’t want to die like this, his brains scattered on the windshield of a trucker, probably traumatizing him for the rest of his life. His bad leg gave way underneath him just as he jumped and collapsed on the other side of the street, while the truck zipped past him.

  He sat there for a few moments, regaining his energy, then stood up, stretching out his arms while yawning. He had a busy day and couldn’t wait to rest. He started moving slowly, enjoying the smell of the East river while dragging his arms on the rusty railing. He used to come here a lot when he was troubled or after a fight back at home. He would take out his pack of cigarettes, pick one and smoke while the fumes clouded his thoughts. It was a peaceful pastime that kept him busy most afternoons. This was also the spot he walked by the day of his father’s death, a hardened man that fought in Vietnam. And being a lieutenant in a squadron in the middle of hostile territories was not an easy task. The war changed him, he would wake up sometimes in the middle of the night screaming and hitting his pillow screaming names of his deceased friends. He wouldn’t tell us the details of how he was able to be shipped back home before the war had ended, but it involved a mine that narrowly avoided killing him. He was a great man, he would sacrifice everything he had for his children, but his main problem was drinking, which he passed on to his son Robert.

  He looked over the railing, watching the sun slowly caress the Statue of Liberty while it set. He could see the Staten Island Ferry carrying passengers between Manhattan and Staten island, its yellow hull reflecting the light from the dying sun. Cuddy cabin boats were slowly going back to the port, while cruisers and deck boats zipped passed. It reminded him of his friend Johnny, he used to go up north to Burlington in Vermont to spend the weekend fishing trout and cod, having a barbecue every time they made a big catch. Johnny owned a small dinghy, around ten feet long that he nicknamed the flying trout. Burlington bay was a beautiful hideout to get away from the busy city, it was quiet and had a nice lakefront cabin that they would rent for almost nothing. But that changed when people started visiting the spot, and bringing in their cruisers to the bay. It became just like the place he was trying to escape from. Thats around the same time Johnny was diagnosed with fourth stage lung cancer, his state started deteriorating pretty fast, and within a couple of weeks Robert was attending his friends funeral. He didn’t like to talk about his friend's final days, but it was like torture. He would scream throughout the night, wailing and begging for more pain medications, while the nurses followed the morphine quota. That was when he decided he was not going to go out like Johnny, he would die with dignity, on his own terms. And that day has come, he still felt pretty well, and knew that he could probably last another couple months, but the way things were going with his job and his family, he saw no reason to continue.

  A small blue sign caught his attention as he approached the middle of the bridge, it read: “CRISIS COUNSELING: THERE IS HOPE, MAKE THE CALL. THE CONSEQUENCES OF JUMPING FROM THIS BRIDGE ARE FATAL AND TRAGIC” it was a new sign that wasn’t there a couple days ago, but he didn’t recall hearing about any new suicides on the bridge. Strange. But what he did remember was a TV program talking about bridge suicide, that he watched on his old set from the early nineties. Two balls of aluminum foil rested on the top two antennas for it to be able to receive any signal. The program interviewed medical examiners that brought up the gruesome deaths of jumpers off the Golden Gate Bridge: the bodies hit the water at eighty miles per hour, causing severe organ damage and organ rupture, in addition to broken necks and pelvises. But he didn’t see how that would help, because he didn’t planning on sticking around long enough to find out what ruptured organs and broken bones felt like. He was going to go out with a bang and hope that he would make the evening news. Robert was not going to be stupid, he was going to jump headfirst to assure the fatality of the jump, but he would also drink half a bottle of booze to keep him down under the water, on the off chance that he survived the jump.

  He was getting very excited and pumped up, when out of the corner of the eye he caught a small teenage girl, she couldn’t be over fifteen. She was leaning over the railing staring downwards, her thin brown hair blowing madly with the wind. Just as he was going to approach her to warn her to keep back, she started climbing the railing and swung one leg over it, then just as she was started to lean backwards, he rushed towards her screaming with his burned out lungs and reaching towards her. Just as she started to raise her second leg he grabbed her torso, surprising her from behind. She began to wail and and scream, begging the man to leave her fall, that she didn’t want to put up with her misery any more. She fought like a mad beast trying to escape him, but his powerful arms wrapped around her and prevented her from moving. Sensing that she didn’t have a choice, she crumbled to the ground and leaned her back onto the railing, resting her head between her knees. Sobbing, she grabbed her hair with her hands and covered her ears. Robert, feeling dazed after what just happened, sat down (not as quickly as her because his old bones wouldn’t thank him for it), and put one arm around her shoulder, sitting on the cold pavement and thinking about how he was going to approach this situation.

  Never in a million years would it ever cross his mind that such an event could happen. The worse he predicted was that a cop would stop him from jumping, or that he would get into an accident before the fateful day, but for his path to cross another bridge jumper, who just so happened to have decided to commit suicide on the same day, same hour and same spot as him, that was too good to be a coincidence. How could it have happened? What was he supposed to do now? He couldn’t leave the girl alone, he wasn’t that much of a heartless bastard. No, he would find out what was wrong with her, he would take care of her, maybe bring her in to the nearest police station, and then come back to the bridge to resume his mission. He would not allow this situation to stop him from his goal. He brought his mind back to the topic on hand, putting his other hand under her chin and trying to l
ift her head up, she protested with a murmur that sounded like “leave me alone” in the tone of a teenager. Great. This was all he needed. He had enough with his teenage son, Brian, whom he hasn’t seen a couple months. Brian was the wild one in his home, always carrying his skateboard around with him, a pack of girls hounding him like wild dogs whenever he showed up in the park. Jessica was his eldest daughter, and his most treasured prize. She was a successful novelist, working on a series of love novels, which were critically acclaimed and won a couple awards. She was living in Paris with her fiancé Joseph, a man whom Robert didn’t particularly like, but also didn’t particularly dislike. He was an aspiring artist, who saw inspiration in everything, he always wore the same tight black pants, while the color of his t-shirts changed each day to reflect his mood. Some days he would wear a blazing pink top, sometimes a deep purple and even a sky blue when he felt light hearted. He seemed weird, always smelling of indian herbs and talking about reaching nirvana. The most interesting thing about Joseph was that he walked barefoot wherever he went, he would take his shoes off before leaving his car, putting them in a box that he kept on the seat next to him. He believed that keeping his shoes off cleansed his soul and purified himself. It got on Robert’s nerves to no end, but like most things in his life, he had no say in any of the decisions his family made. That was the reason his life was crumbled apart.