Edge of Never (The Edge Book 1)

by J.A. Redmerski

hate to say it, but shit really does happen. You just have to get over it. Beat the hell out of it by doing things that make you happy.”

What compels any of us to do the things we do when deep down a part of us just wants to break free from it all?

Depression is pain in its purest form and I would do anything to be able to feel an emotion again. Any emotion at all. Pain hurts, but pain that’s so powerful that you can’t feel anything anymore, that’s when you start to feel like you’re going crazy.

“You have to live in the now,” he says and I’m quietly stunned. “Don’t you think so?”

“You dwell on the past, you can’t move forward. Spend too much time planning for the future and you just push yourself backwards, or you stay stagnant in the same place all your life.” His eyes lock on mine. “Live in the moment,” he says as if making a serious point, “where everything is just right, take your time and limit your bad memories and you’ll get wherever it is you’re going a lot faster

and with less bumps in the road along the way.”

“Y’know, I’ve always hated that expression: Others have it worse than you do; I guess if you want to look at it in a competitive way, sure, give me welfare over blindness any day, but it’s not a fucking competition. Right?”

“Pain is pain, babe.” Every time he calls me ‘babe’ I notice it more than anything else he says. “Just because one person’s problem is less traumatic than another’s doesn’t mean they’re required to hurt less.”

“Well, guilt is a bitch, but don’t you think if you’re thinking it in the first place that it just might be true?”

She looks me in the eyes and says, “And for making me feel alive.” A smile warms my face and I glance away and say, “Well, everybody needs help feeling alive again every once in a while.” “No,” she says seriously, and my gaze falls back on hers, “I didn’t say again, Andrew; for making me feel alive for the first time.”

The heart always wins out over the mind. The heart, although reckless and suicidal and a masochist all on its own, always gets its way. The mind may be what’s best, but I don’t give a shit what my mind is telling me anymore. Right now, I just want to live in the moment.

Coincidence is just the conformist term for fate.

We look at each other and he quietly mouths: “One. Two. Three—” We sing together: “Ooooh… oooh… oooh… oooh!” A one-second pause. “Ooooh… oooh… oooh… oooh!” Guitar.

Dozens of heads turn all at the same time and the wave of conversations ceases like turning off a faucet. While Andrew plays the first riff and he’s gearing up to sing the first verse, I’m so terrified inside that I feel like I can’t move anything but my eyes. But the more he plays the more my body can’t help but move in time with the music. Just about everyone in the place are already swaying and bobbing their heads to the sound. Andrew starts to sing the first verse. And then briefly together again: “Ooooh…” Then comes the chorus and we both sing the words and I know I’m going to have to hit a high note in— I did it! Andrew smiles deeply at me as he merges right into the next verse, always strumming the guitar without missing a chord as if he’s known how to play this song forever. The audience is really getting into it. They’re nodding to one another, the kind of nod that says: They’re really good, and I feel my face just light up as I start to sing my part with Andrew again and with gradual confidence. I’m moving my body more naturally to the music now and I think I’ve almost completely shed the fear, but my solo… oh my God, my solo is next…

Andrew locks eyes with me as if to use his gaze as a means to concentrate and stay calm and he strums the guitar. He stops right in time with the music and taps the edge of the wood before my first line, strums the guitar and stops again, tapping the wood after my second and so on until I hit my last note and Andrew starts to play fully again while he says in a whisper to me: “Flawless,” and then he starts to sing again. He’s grinning so wide. So am I. We press our faces close as we sing our hearts out into the mic during the faster interlude. “Woooh… ooooh… ...

Dear Camryn, I never wanted it to be this way. I wanted to tell you these things myself, but I was afraid. I was afraid that if I told you out loud that I loved you, that what we had together would die with me. The truth is that I knew in Kansas that you were the one. I’ve loved you since that day when I first looked up into your eyes as you glared down at me from over the top of that bus seat. Maybe I didn’t know it then, but I knew something had happened to me in that moment and I could never let you go. I have never lived the way I lived during my short time with you. For the first time in my life, I’ve felt whole, alive, free. You were the missing piece of my soul, the breath in my lungs, the blood in my veins. I think that if past lives are real then we have been lovers in every single one of them. I’ve known you for a short time, but I feel like I’ve known you forever.

I want you to know that even in death I’ll always remember you. I’ll always love you. I wish that things could’ve turned out differently. I thought of you many nights on the road. I stared up at the ceiling in the motels and pictured what our life might be like together if I had lived. I even got all mushy and thought of you in a wedding dress and even with a mini me in your belly. You know, I always heard that sex is great when you’re pregnant. But I’m sorry that I had to leave you, Camryn. I’m so sorry… I wish the story of Orpheus and Eurydice was real because then you could come to the Underworld and sing me back into your life. I wouldn’t look back. I wouldn’t fuck it up like Orpheus did. I’m so sorry, baby… I want you to promise me that you’ll stay strong and beautiful and sweet and caring. I want you to be happy and find someone who will love you as much as I did. I want you to get married and have babies and live your life. Just remember to always be yourself and don’t be afraid to speak your mind or to dream out loud. I hope you’ll never forget me. One more thing: don’t feel bad for not telling me that

you loved me. You didn’t need to say it. I knew all along that you did. Love...