Pay It Forward

by Catherine Ryan Hyde

  There’s a trick, she thought. Me small. Apparently her therapist was right. She was so accustomed to making jokes, she couldn’t stop if she tried. Even in her own head, even when everything was terribly unfunny. It would be just like her to think of a joke about falling on the way down.

  She looked over the reddish bridge railing. Beneath her in the moonlight she could see land. She wasn’t over water yet and there was no platform beneath this part of the bridge. It would be easier here, she thought, with no platform. But no. Not here. Something about that hard ground. Not here.

  A van came by. She turned to assure herself that it would drive on in spite of her, convinced that anyone who saw her would understand her purpose. That’s when she saw that she was being followed. He wasn’t close behind her, but he was definitely following. She’d thought about this. Going out at night, even if it was for the last time. It wasn’t safe in this city at night. Splattering herself against the icy surface of the bay, that was one thing, but life held worse surprises than death, and she of all people should know it. She glanced over her shoulder again. He hadn’t gained any ground.

  Little guy, she thought. What was she so worried about? At five ten, carrying forty extra pounds on her already considerable frame, maybe she could take him. Unless he had a knife. Or a gun. Last time the guy had a gun. Little guy, but well armed.

  She glanced again. Maybe she’d been wrong. Maybe he was just walking over the bridge, oblivious to her. Yeah, right. I should be so lucky.

  There was only one thing to do. And it was exactly what she’d planned to do all along. She leaped up to the railing and pulled herself over.

  There was a platform under the edge of the bridge, that much she already knew. She’d staked out this spot in advance. It wasn’t far down. But now, in the middle of the night, with a potential violent rapist’s footsteps clicking on the pavement behind her, it looked a lot farther down than she’d remembered.

  She tried to turn around, to climb down, but a great fear of falling hamstrung her movements. Good one, Charlotte. Fear of falling. The first fall is the easy one.

  He was getting closer. She could almost make out his face in the darkness now, his footsteps coming faster. Dirty and seedy. A real lowlife. Okay, think fast.

  She pushed off the rail and jumped kamikaze style to the platform below. Remembering to bend her knees on impact was not enough. She landed too hard. Overbalanced forward, grabbed on to the edge, seized by that sickening feeling like falling. She felt a twist in her ankle, felt something give. Not bad enough to be a broken bone, she thought, but it smarted, and she sat rubbing it, wondering why it should matter now.

  When she looked up he was leaning over the railing, looking down at her. Don’t come near me, she thought. I know the perfect escape.

  “You okay?”

  “I think I hurt myself.” Oh, smart, Charlotte. Good. I’m injured prey, come get me. Good thinking.

  “You think that’s a bad fall, the next one’s a killer.”

  “Very funny. What makes you think I’m going to jump?”

  “What the hell you come out here for?”

  “Well, you’re out here. Were you going to jump?”

  “No, I was going to try to talk you out of it.”

  “You were? Why?” He didn’t answer, and Charlotte’s insides leaped and froze to see him start over the railing after her. “Don’t come down here. I’ll do it, I mean it. If you come down here, I’ll jump.”

  “I ain’t gonna hurt you. I just want to talk about this.”

  He didn’t fit the pattern. His voice, his manner held none of the implied violence she’d learned to smell. Still, she didn’t exactly trust him.

  He did much better than she had, turning around and shinnying down to the bottom of the rail. Then he went limp and dropped lightly onto the platform beside her, not five feet away. Easy for him, she thought, skinny little guy. Probably didn’t weigh more than 120 pounds.

  He must have seen her panic. Too bad. She thought she had a damn good poker face. “Hey, look, lady. I didn’t come down here to give you no trouble. I just thought we could talk about this. I mean, what do you got to lose? I try to convince you life is worth living. If I don’t do so good, you jump. Nothing ventured, right?”

  “How did you know I was going to jump?”

  “What else would you be doing out here in the middle of the night? A lady out here by herself, San Francisco in the middle of the night? I mean, that’s suicide. One way or the other.”

  “What were you doing out here?”

  “Waiting for somebody like you to try something stupid. I been sleeping in that park over there. Mostly during the day. Sitting up at night, waiting for a jumper. Sooner or later there was gonna be a jumper. Tonight’s my lucky night. I’m sorry. I didn’t introduce myself. Jerry Busconi.”

  He held one dirty hand out. She shook it anyway. “Charlotte Renaldi.”

  His face lit up. “Oh. Italian, huh? See, we got something in common.”

  “Why do you care if somebody jumps off the bridge?”

  “That’s a funny question. It’s a life. A human life.”

  “Not yours.”

  “No, not mine. Gosh, it’s pretty out here tonight, huh? Real clear night.”

  It had never occurred to Charlotte to look, until he said that. He was right. It was beautiful. Clear and clean smelling from the recent rains, which had moved through, headed south, leaving the stars out in numbers. Enough moon to see Alcatraz. And the lights of the city pressed together, cluttering the hill. Moon on the water. Sausalito on the other side, the dark shape of landmasses in the night.

  She looked straight down at the dark water, and something came out of nowhere. A huge something right underneath her, monstrous in its size and suddenness. It startled her and she stumbled backward.

  Jerry laughed. “Ain’t that a kick when that happens? That’s one of them Norwegian ones, I think. Freighter. Dutch, I forget. Wallenius Lines, I think. Big puppy, huh? Kind of scares you, popping out of nowhere like that.”

  “Why are you trying to help me?” She didn’t look at him as she asked this. She leaned forward to watch more and more of the deck of that monstrous freighter appear underneath. The platform felt terrifyingly narrow.

  “Good thing you didn’t jump right then. Make some deckhand mighty unhappy.”

  “Very funny.”

  “Sometimes you gotta joke. What else can you do?”

  “That’s what I always say. And people tell me I’m being inappropriate. My therapist says I’m minimizing my own trauma.”

  “You want to go get a cup of coffee and talk about it? On me.”

  Charlotte shook her head. The freighter had moved forward now, and away, completely visible, leaving dark water just underneath.

  “You know, that’s the prettiest part of the view,” she said.

  “What is?”

  “That black water. Right down there. That is a very comfortable darkness.”

  “Ah, now that’s where you’re wrong. Just wait’ll you get down there. That’s a very ugly darkness. Very cold. Unforgiving. You won’t like it one bit.”

  “Better than where I’ve been. But how would you know?”

  “Hey, I been down. Don’t I look to you like a guy who’s been down? I mean, just about every bad thing could happen to a person has happened to me. My life is shit.”

  “Well, thank you so much, Jerry. For coming down here to convince me that life is worth living.”

  “See, that’s just the point, though.” He pulled his dark, ratty coat tighter around himself against the cold. A piece of torn lining hung down onto his jeans. “I mean, if my life is worth living, then yours has gotta be better than you think.”

  “You don’t know anything about my life, mister. You have no idea what I’ve been through.”

  “No, that’s true. But the offer still holds. We go get a cup of coffee, you can tell me all about it.”

  Charlotte didn’t answer.
Tears began to flow now, running down her face, tickling slightly as they dripped off the end of her chin. They’d been away for as long as she could remember. She leaned forward, allowing them to drop into the dark water. So far down.

  “I’m gonna tell you a little story, Charlotte Renaldi, whether you wanta hear it or not. A few months ago I was, like, at the lowest place I’d ever been in my life. Even though I been lower since. And somebody I didn’t even know came along and tried to help me. Just outta nowhere. Gave me money to eat and buy new clothes, and get a job. Didn’t want me to pay him back. I was supposed to do something that big for three more people. That’s called Paying It Forward. Just think what could happen with that, if people really did it. Let’s say you don’t jump. You pay it forward to three people. And they do nine, and they do twenty-seven. And then two more people I might find to help, they do their bit. Think about it. After a while nobody could jump off a bridge anymore, because there’d be somebody there, just looking for the chance to do their bit, you know? Anyway, I screwed it all up. Took the help and made a mess. I was so ashamed I couldn’t even look this kid in the face.”

  “It was a kid?”

  “Yeah, how ’bout that? A twelve-year-old kid. Out of the mouths of babes, right? But then I thought, well, so I screwed it up. I mean, I’m a junkie, Charlotte. I’m always gonna be a junkie. I ain’t never gonna be no fine, upstanding citizen. But then I thought, hell. Just pay it forward anyway. Kid tried to help me. Okay, it didn’t work. Still, I’m trying to help you. Maybe you’ll jump. I don’t know. But I tried, right? But let me tell you one thing. I woke up one morning and somebody gave me a chance. Just outta nowhere. It was like a miracle. Now, how do you know that won’t happen to you tomorrow? How do you know? What if you jump into that icy cold water, and turns out this big miracle was coming your way tomorrow? You’d miss out. Wouldn’t you just kick yourself?”

  Charlotte wiped her nose on her sleeve inconspicuously. She sobbed one more time, then laughed out loud. “No, I guess I wouldn’t, Jerry. I’d be dead. I’d never have to kick myself again.”

  “Up to you.” He rose to leave.

  Charlotte looked up, wondering what she would do then. Could he really climb back up? Probably, but she knew she couldn’t. It involved pulling up your full body weight with your arms. But why was she even thinking of that? she wondered. Was she changing her mind?

  “Tell you what, Charlotte. Do this one thing, just for me. Flip a coin on it. Let chance tell you what to do. Heads, come get a cup of coffee with me. Tails, splat on the bay.”

  It may have been a release of tension, but it seemed like the funniest idea to her. She couldn’t stop laughing once she’d gotten started. It made her hiccup once.

  “You know, you’re pretty when you laugh.”

  That killed it. She glared at him defensively.

  “I didn’t mean nothing by it. I just said you’re pretty. You got a pretty face.”

  Charlotte snorted. That’s what they always say about a big, plump girl. She has a pretty face. “You want me to decide living or dying on a flip of a coin.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “That’s the stupidest idea I ever heard in my life.”

  “Why? Why is it stupid? At least my way you got a fifty-fifty chance.”

  He held a coin out to her in the dark. Placed it in her hand. She stared closely at it. A quarter, head side up. What if it didn’t come down that way? She’d really have to do it. Well, something had to break. One way or another. Something finally had to make up her mind.

  “Okay. Here goes.” Her heart pounded, blood roared in her ears. She levered her thumb under the quarter, flipped the coin up into the air. It arced too far out, and she missed it. They both leaned over the edge of the steel platform as far as they dared and watched the coin fall, turning end over end to the water below. But it disappeared, because the water was too dark, too far down. She didn’t hear the splash, because it was too far away. A shiver ran through her.

  “You’re right,” she said. “That’s a bad darkness.”

  “Shoot. My quarter.”

  “Christ, Jerry, it’s just a quarter. Here, here’s a dollar.” She pulled the bill out of her pocket and stuffed it in his hand, hoping that in the dark she hadn’t just given him a ten.

  “No, that was special. That was my two-headed quarter.”

  But she noticed he pocketed the bill just the same.

  “Two-headed quarter?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Where do you get a two-headed quarter?”

  “I don’t know. That’s the whole problem. That was unreplaceable.”

  “Well, where did you get that one?”

  “Stole it off a guy in a bar.”

  “Oh. Sorry.”

  “Shoot. Well, it’s okay, I guess. Only you better not jump now. If you do, and I lose you and my two-headed quarter, then I’d be pissed.”

  Charlotte rubbed her ankle and they sat for a few minutes, and she looked around again. At Marin, and the city side, and the lights, like somebody was alive out there. Thinking it looked more inviting than that cold, dark chasm that had eaten Jerry’s two-headed quarter.

  “So, you know someplace you can get coffee at this hour?”

  “Hell, yeah. This is the city.”

  “I don’t know if I can climb up from here.”

  “It ain’t so hard.”

  “I hurt my ankle, though.”

  “I’ll help you.”

  It took a while, but they ended up on the concrete walkway of the bridge again, though Charlotte never could have done it without him.

  Chapter Fourteen

  ARLENE

  She stood on his front porch with one hand poised to knock and her heart beating so hard she could hear it in her ears. She hadn’t done anything wrong, which was just exactly what she had stopped by to tell him, so why was she so afraid he’d tell her to go to hell? Exactly when had this thing taken a wrong turn again? Arlene decided she must have been in some other room when it all happened without her.

  She rapped hard on his front door and immediately wanted to run away. In fact, she’d taken two steps back when he opened the door. He was wearing dark blue sweatpants and a snug, plain white T-shirt.

  “Arlene.”

  “Reuben, do you think I’m easy?”

  “No. Actually I find you quite difficult.” Then he leaned back on the door frame and smiled. And she couldn’t take offense at what he’d said, because it was a nice smile, even though the left corner of his mouth didn’t go along, so he must have been teasing her in a nice way.

  “There goes the pot calling the kettle black. Can I come in for just a minute?”

  The smile dropped away. “Oh. Uh. It’s a mess.”

  “Your place? Get serious. You’re not the type to have a mess.”

  He opened the door just a little wider to show her the inside of his living room, all stacked with cardboard moving cartons. “I haven’t quite unpacked yet.”

  “Well, hell, Reuben. That ain’t a mess. It’s not your fault if all your stuff just got here, right?”

  “Right,” he said, still not sounding too sure of himself; but he stepped back from the doorway and let her in. “Why would I think you’re easy?”

  “Hell, I don’t know. I never know what you’re thinking anyway. Just wanted to make sure you didn’t.” She found herself a place on the couch.

  “Are you easy?”

  “Well, no. I don’t think so. Well, not by my standards. I mean, I get along fine with sex, it’s not that. But if I’m with one guy, then he’s the only guy. Ricky’s been gone over a year and I still haven’t been with anybody else. That doesn’t exactly make me promiscuous. What about you?”

  “No, I’m not exactly promiscuous, either. Can I get you something to drink? Would you like a beer?”

  “Hell, I’d love one to pieces, but no. I’m a recovering alcoholic.”

  “Oh, I’m sorry. That was stupid of me.”

&
nbsp; “You didn’t know.”

  “I noticed you never ordered drinks, but I didn’t think about it.”

  “We still don’t really know each other all that well.”

  That was the other part of what she’d come to tell him. That he kept himself so shuttered off from her that he felt like a stranger, which might have been why she’d ended up feeling cheap.

  “I’ve got orange juice and ginger ale.”

  “Ginger ale’d be fine.”

  He went off to get it and she sat chewing on the edge of her thumbnail, telling herself to stop it but not stopping. At least he hadn’t told her to go to hell.

  When he handed her the cold glass she said, “What did I do wrong, Reuben? I have no idea. What was wrong with kissing that side of your face, anyway? It’s all you. I was just sort of, you know, accepting it. As part of you.”

  He sat down beside her, perched on the edge of his seat the way he did whenever something made him uncomfortable. Well, see, he wasn’t a total stranger. She knew that much about him.

  “I’m not sure I can explain it.”

  “Know what Trevor told me? He said you told him that it’s better not to pretend like you didn’t notice, because that doesn’t fool you one bit anyway. And you know, when he said that, it made total sense. I thought, shoot, I been doing it wrong all these years, I’m sure not going to make that mistake again. So I didn’t treat that side of your face like it didn’t exist. So you left in a huff and I ain’t heard from you since.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “You are?” She hadn’t thought he would be, she’d thought somehow she’d come out sorry, the guilty one. That’s the way it usually went. “Oh. Well, that’s okay. Just kind of hurt my feelings some at the time.”

  He took a little slide over to her and gave her a hug. He’d never done that before. And she’d always wanted him to, and always noticed that missing, so why, now that it was here, did it seem to make her feel a little uneasy?