Path to Self Despair

Breathe in for four seconds. Hold for two. Breathe out for six. Repeat.

My therapist instructed me to do this technique when I was feeling overwhelmed, something that I had been feeling a lot of lately.

I peered over the bridge, onto the Delaware River, and imagined myself falling in, enveloped by darkness. I imagined myself struggling to breathe, sinking deeper into nothingness, until I hit the bottom and joined the rest of the forgotten knick-knacks hidden in the sandy floor.

But I didn’t have to imagine myself drowning because that’s how I felt every waking moment of the day. Two years, two months, and two days later, and I was still drowning. My pleas for help morphed into air bubbles that would never reach the surface.

I continued to stare out over the bridge as the band GRLwood screamed into my ears, a piercing scream that no one could hear but me.

It was a reflection of my own muted screams.

A couple walked past me, and all I saw was his face staring back at me, daring me to jump.

He was always taunting me. In school, at home, on the street.

Everywhere I went, he followed.

426. 426. 426. 426.

I went back to what I was doing, and I began to recount that night for the umpteenth time. A broken record on repeat.

It was ironic how my memory had deteriorated over the past two years, unable to recount most of my days

And yet I remembered that night like it had happened yesterday.

A sea of “what ifs” hit me, and I played out a million scenarios in my head.

I liked to imagine that night never happened and that we were still best friends to this day. That at any moment now he would FaceTime me and say some stupid shit about the way I looked at that moment.

If he were here now, he definitely would have mocked my tear-stained face before pulling me into an embrace that closed me off from the rest of the unforgiving world.

I shook the thought from my mind and continued walking down the never-ending path.

It couldn’t have been more than thirty minutes, but it felt like an eternity.

My lanyard brushed against my leg, and I felt his hand caressing my thigh.

He slowly moved higher up until I quickly stuffed my keys back into my pocket.

426. 426. 426. 426.

As I was walking, I saw a soccer team practicing below me, and I recalled my own athletic days. I loved soccer and everything about it. I loved maneuvering back and forth between opponents, defending my territory. My only focus was on transporting the leather sphere to safety.

It was one of the few times I truly felt alive.

I continued to watch them until I saw him again.

He was waving at me from the bleachers, but not in a welcoming way. It was more in the form of sarcasm, something I had once loved about him, as he was rarely serious about anything. Even about our friendship sometimes.

My eyesight was terrible, but I swore I could see him smirking at me.

As GRLwood continued to pierce my ringing ears, I decided to follow suit.

I screamed as loud as my lungs would allow, until I was gasping for air.

My screams were muted by the commotion of the busy highway, which still housed a myriad of cars despite it being ten o’clock at night on a Tuesday.

Satisfied, I continued on my never-ending path to salvation.

I peered over the bridge again and saw a Ferris wheel adorned with neon lights, flashing blue, purple, red, and green as it rotated endlessly. I studied the way the lights morphed into the different colors, providing a sense of comfort, like the way a rotating crib mobile would relax a baby in distress.

I moved on to the buildings around it and noticed a Wells Fargo straight ahead.

I instantly thought back to my sophomore year of high school when I confessed my feelings to him behind that bank I’d been a member of for three years. His blank stare pierced my gaze as I poured my heart out to him, only for him to crush it with his neatly trimmed fingernails.

I remember I cried on the nearby bus stop bench for hours until I defeatedly walked back home, just for him to reciprocate my words back to me through text.

And I ate it up.

I pictured him taunting me again, but this time on the Ferris wheel, reminding me of the never-ending cycle of our toxic relationship.

I studied his bony cheeks, high up on his face, and his chiseled jaw riddled with stubble. The way his glasses fell on the bridge of his nose, his chocolate brown eyes enlarged through them as he gave that same piercing gaze that always used to provide me with a sense of comfort.

But now all it did was cause me to shudder with uneasiness.

I shook the image from my pounding head and moved on.

As I reached the center of the bridge, I noticed that there was a stretch of darkness ahead, void of any light, even with the plethora of car headlights zooming by.

I was instantly back in Van Cortlandt Park, strolling closer to the abandoned bridge, my fingers intertwined with his.

The long deserted bridge was surrounded by trees and overgrown weeds, a plethora of shadows that provided a sort of separation from the rest of the park—it was nearly impossible to see anyone who may have been there.

We reached our destination, and he slowly turned to face me.

426. 426. 426. 426.

At this point, my strolling broke into a sprint, and I escaped the dark stretch before it could swallow me whole.

But I didn’t stop running.

I was determined to escape this makeshift hell I put myself in, and I picked up my pace until the city lights formed a blur around me.

I could hear laughing behind me, daring me to stop running and face the consequences of doing so.

I tried to breathe the way my therapist had told me to, but panic had formed in my chest, and I was unable to calm myself down enough.

My lungs began to ache, but I didn’t care. I welcomed the burning sensation as a sort of punishment for not running sooner.

But soon the pain was too great, and I had to stop and catch my breath.

Ironically enough, I was now in the second stretch of darkness, and I was transported back to the park.

This time, I was frozen, unable to move.

He began toward me, and I no longer felt that comforting feeling he had always provided me.

I was glued in place as fear began to take over, and my mind was imploded with a billion racing thoughts.

No matter what I told myself, however, I couldn’t shake that uneasy feeling that had morphed into fear.

The closer he got, the more I begged myself to move, but I couldn’t, and I began to panic.

426. 426. 426. 426.

This time, I ignored the pain, and I broke into a run again.

Thankfully, the end of the bridge began to appear within view, and I breathed a sigh of relief.

As I reached closer, I noticed a cop at the very end, gripping the gate to the entrance and pointing to the gate’s sign that read “open until 10 pm”, clearly annoyed that I had interrupted their schedule.

When I finally reached the end, the cop greeted me with a melancholy look, and as I got off the bridge, she began to shut the gate behind me.

I turned around, and there he was, unable to follow me; the only thing separating us was the iron gate.

He scowled and began to turn back towards the bridge.

Breathe in for four seconds. Hold for two. Breathe out for six. Repeat.

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