Ocean Of Words

• Parmis Amiri, Grade 8, Hornsby Girls High School -
• Short Story
• 2018

Excellence Award in the 'Horizon of Dreams 2018' competition

There are 5 elements that make up a human: oxygen, carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, calcium, and phosphorus. But there was something about Lucy that made me doubt that. There was a substance in her that made her different to any other person I’d ever met. The stardust that made the fibre of her being must have been charmed by the ancient deities she believed in. She was an ocean, endless, grand and vast beyond comprehension, made up of layers and layers, each darker and more mysterious than the other. I wanted to dive deeper, see the things hid, the ones the light didn’t reach.
The day I realised she found the same insightful beauty in me, I felt like the luckiest person alive. I thanked the deities she believed in for setting me upon her winding path. For not letting me take my life before I met her. Because that’s what she believed in. That life was pre-set for her by the wiser presences above and that we should sail through, not complaining, not wishing for more, not wanting, but merely enjoying.
And in the next three years, we did exactly that.
Lucy had called me earlier today, telling to meet her where we had first met: on the rooftop of her apartment. I’m heading there now, heart soaring high, mind buoyant soul drunk on the promise of her presence.
The lift door opened on the 13th floor. A flight of stairs, a door and the short distance of the rooftop separated us. Giddiness overcomes me. I smile at the thought of her like I always do.
When I finally see her, my heart stops. My smile falls away, giddiness forgotten. Fear shakes my core and for a moment I think I might collapse. There she stands, my beautiful angel, my lifeline, the only true friend I’ve had, standing on the edge of the roof.
I almost laugh. The irony is so great. This is exactly how we met, just the roles are reversed.
“Lucy…”
She turns around. I see an effortless smile on her lips. She says she always wanted to see how it feels to stand on edge of danger, look down at death. Then she tells me about the never-ending sadness that she seems to feel, how she finally gained power over it. She tells me that the deities above her haven’t given her any sign to make her stop. She screams to me, to the world, that they want her to take her life. She tells me they gave her no reason to stay.
And at that moment, I felt the true power of words. How they were useless to me when she jumped, how condescending they can be.
Because the people using them turned the exquisite euphoria of her being to only nine letters:
Suicidal.