End of the Line
an excerpt

The semester before Dylan died, I gave a report in sociology class. I told the class what I'd read, which was that people who are contemplating suicide usually mention it to someone. So if anyone talks about suicide, you should assume they might mean it and take it seriously. Even if it sounds like they're joking.

Two weeks before Dylan died, the day after prom, I asked him about his summer plans. "I guess I'm just going to kill myself," he said.

And I said, "Hey, that's no way to talk!" And punched him in the arm, jokingly, and didn't take him seriously at all.

And a few days after that, when I bombed my algebra test and got dissed by Ciara Dunbar in gym class, I sighed to him at lunch, when it was just the two of us left at the table, "Sometimes I think life just isn't worth the effort."

"Rarely," he said, and I nodded to agree.

The same day he died, after I said I didn't want to be his girlfriend, he looked me in the eyes and answered, "Jess, I don't think I can live without you."

I shrugged him away and said, "Give me a break, of course you can." But apparently he couldn't.

And then I said, "Besides, you don't have to." I meant, "You don't have to live without me because I'll still be here for you." But I guess he could have taken it to mean, "You don't have to live."

Regardless, he didn't.

And I've replayed those words in my head about a thousand times. Only, in my head I can rewind them so they never come out at all. In real life, I can't.