“But... I mean… it’s just…why?” I ask.
A sigh. “Boredom.”
A pause. “…boredom? I don’t understand.”
“There’s nothing to understand. I’m bored with life. That’s all.”
“…you couldn’t take up a hobby like everyone else?” Levity. A gamble.
“Don’t be stupid.” I lose. “I’m serious here.”
Another pause, for tact’s sake. “Don’t we matter to you?”
“We, who? I have as many friends as I have noses, and you’re it. And don’t you dare say it…”
“Say what?” Innocence on the surface, a double entendre about blowing her nose popping into my teenage head. I keep it to myself, but not without snickering. Just a little. “Don’t I matter to you?”
“You do, it’s just…”
“Just what??” I press her for an answer. Another risk.
“…I… I don’t…” It pays off. She’s faltering. But it’s not the endgame just yet. “It’s not enough purpose for me.”
“You won’t miss me?” I pursue the pin.
“…no.” The sound of a swallowed tear. It’s hers; I haven’t cried in years. It’s an unwritten rule of hero work, death of a sidekick or mentor being the only excuse. “I… I have to go,” she says. Not a sentence I like the sound of.
“Okay… bye.” She hangs up. No farewell. I take the tissue paper off the receiver – makes my voice raspier – and take another coin from the pile of quarters at hand. Caller ID has necessitated the use of a pay phone as of late.
A few years ago, I began my subterfuge, my work. Any Internet user who searches for “suicide forums” will come up with any number of people and organizations who offer emotional life support. Good for them. Somewhat lower in profile are the places where suicide is discussed, aided, and in some cases, executed. I’m a member of several such places. I found Tara in one of them.
In virtually any forum with decent-sized membership, there are dozens of people who join but never post. No one ever notices one more. I encountered her about six months ago. “Umm… what does it feel like??” were her first words, (spelled correctly, anyway). For all the people there who were sure about themselves (or rather, the lack of themselves), she evidently wasn’t one. Her uncertainty prompted my response. My chosen username, “Vigilante,” probably didn’t register as anything more than a melodramatic heroic sentiment – more or less the case. When I took up this mantle, it was as much about glory as rescue. That changed as soon as I found Tara.
“What’s the matter?” was all I had to ask for her to perceive my trust. Sympathy is powerful. Thus far, all of the targets I’ve seen – so called to keep their sob stories from swaying me – have believed that no one cares about them. So I tell them I care. I do. Especially for Tara. More than she knows.
The ideal target is both unsure of their will to die and naïve in safe use of the Internet. Tara was ideal. Her name and her photograph were in her profile outright, as was her home city. She also had a weblog – she at least had the presence of mind not to mention it to me, but it wasn’t difficult to find. That gave me her school, her friends. Photographs of her house, inside and out, including her address. The pawns were behind me.
Girls are comforted by the sound of my voice, even over the phone. For guys, I skip over the phone step and go directly to the last resort. Hearing another guy’s voice, especially one unusually deep for its age, tends to make them defensive. They’re usually harder to reason with, besides, and by the time I get to them, many of them have already made up their minds. At any rate, Tara found it soothing, although for her, I’d had to alter it somewhat. I called her every day after I convinced her to offer her phone number, to keep a tab on her. Today was maybe halfway into the third month. I called her as usual.
“Hey, Tara, it’s Vig. Things any better?”
“No,” she says. She emits something that sounds like a cross between a scoff and a snort. Something derisive. She doesn’t mean it – derision is not in her blood. At least, it wasn’t before. “Gary’s still being a jerk.” Strange. I’d told her to dump him.
“We’ve been over this.”
“I know, but still…” The derision is gone. Just a façade. Good.
“...still what? You don’t have to date him.”
“But it’d be so much simpler if—“
“No. No, it wouldn’t. Suicide is not for fixable situations. Ask anyone on the Forums, they’ll tell you the same.” Not entirely true, but at this point, she trusts me a great deal more than she trusts them. A long, long silence. My eyelids fall as my shoulder leans against the side of the booth. I envision in my mind, over and over, the mantra I don’t dare whisper, lest she hear: “Don’t say goodbye…”
“I wanna say goodbye.” Sudden. Resolved.
“…what?”
“I’m going to do it.”
“But… I mean… it’s just… why?” I ask.
After Tara hung up on me, I turned to my last resort. The logical intermediary step (subtle hints to a third party) didn’t work, and I’d stopped using them a long time ago. I used to send postcards to the guardians (most targets had lost one or more parents by the time I found them) with “DON’T LET SO-AND-SO DO IT” scrawled in red marker across it. More often than not, they’d sit down with the target and deliver a lecture on abstinence and/or safe contraceptive use. Not the effect I was going for, and often made things worse. Nowadays, I called in the cavalry, instead.
“Hello… emergency?” Checkmate.
As I returned home on my bicycle, a convoy of flashing lights parked in my neighbor’s driveway assaulted my eyes. The paramedics were carrying a young woman on a stretcher out of the house, her arms strapped down tight. Getting closer, I could see her right index finger twitching, as if the revolver was still in her hand. That was unusual – the average girl opts for poison. She prefers the passivity, the lack of mess. Like the maid or relative who finds her is going to be happy they don’t have to wipe up anything. Then again, I’d known Tara for quite some time. Suffice it to say that having known her so many years, I could easily see her temperament telling her to perform a certain form of drastic brain surgery.
“Let me go!! Let me go!!” Her shrieking did for my ears what the ambulance lights had done for my eyes, although the intermittent sobs were sucking away her energy for screaming.
I dash up. “Tara!! What happened??” I ask her, no matter how obvious the answer.
“Suicide attempt,” interjects a nearby sergeant, a little curtly.
“I know!” I snap. A slip. I freeze as my skin starts pickling.
Tara’s gaze turns my way. Bewilderment and wonderment in the depths of her eyes. “It was you.” I nod, my eyes lowered. “How did you know?” she asks. I thought the answer would be obvious. Hadn’t she guessed? Maybe not… perhaps not… apparently not. The Vigilante lives another day.
“…I could tell,” I say.
“That obvious?”
“Well… it wasn’t easy, if it helps any.” My eyes are to the ground, but I hear her swallow another tear.
“I thought you were my friend.” It’s a lie – she hasn’t considered me a friend for years. She told Vigilante so. Trying to guilt me? Well, if it makes her feel better…
“I… I’m sorry.” She smirks in victory. That’s fine with me – she’s the one strapped to a gurney. They wheel her one way. I roll my bike the other. I watch my childhood friend, her secrets uncovered, depart the neighborhood. Better the neighborhood than the mortal coil, I suppose, but the thought doesn’t help much.
I used to have the luxury of not knowing my target. I assume seeing a familiar face on my monitor shocked me aloof. Lucky for Tara it did. Otherwise, I probably would have become one of those utterly unhelpful friends who treads too carefully, for too long. The unwritten-rule writers will pardon me this once. I need a good cry.
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Originally Posted by mtpspur
That story's got me hooked! 
I couldn't stop reading it.
! 
