It's pointless. It's so pointless.
My eyes zoomed in on a middle-aged man offering two chocolate ice-cream cones to his kids. Funny, I thought, I'll never get to be in his place, and I'll never get to wear his smile. 
This love, it's so pointless.
All I'd ever fallen in love with was art, but maybe art hadn't fallen in love with me. It was kind of unsurprising and already expected, though. All the wishes I had whispered over fallen stars and stray eyelashes, and all the prayers I had murmured during sleepless nights weren't automatically supposed to come true. 
This work, this life, it's all so pointless. 
My legs dangled in empty air from the seventeenth landing of the apartment complex I resided in. The window...out of this window the world looked cold and crisp and judging. Out of this window people were happier, and more positive in their thoughts. Out of this window people didn't talk about suicide so frequently like those in my support group did. Out of this window people were busy enough to not think about the twenty-three-year-old man sitting on his windowsill and gathering up the courage to end it all. 
Outside this window, people were braver than me. 
These were all the observations I had made about the world outside this window during the twenty-seven evenings I had spent here, not being able to take the jump. 
Things will be so much simpler. 
I wouldn't have to come home from work everyday—exhausted and discouraged and check my old phone to see if anyone came around, looking at my still life paintings and posting a few words of encouragement to keep me going. I could just interact,  reply to their comments and feel like I'm not alone—and there are people out there I haven't met, places I haven't seen and there's a hell lot of life I haven't lived. 
But when that doesn't happen, I resort to aimless doodling—sitting on this exact windowsill—and discreetly wait for my phone to ping. Now I'm tired of the routine, the same, old, tiring routine, and I either want it all to change, or for me to do so. 
The sun was going down faster than I wanted it to, and I could now start to make out the outline of the moon hiding behind the clouds. Another day was ending, and halfway across the world a new one was starting. People were getting up, pulling open their curtains and inviting the sunshine in. They must all be smiling, welcoming a new chance. My family lived halfway across the world too, I wondered if they would've guessed, or maybe felt something wrong when the sun would've come up today. Would they have ever known that their son wouldn't live to see the end of the day? Probably not, and besides— 
You're doing it again. 
You're going to leave the world and you're overthinking everything. 
I sighed in frustration, then pushed my palm against the wood beside me. My legs dangled down below. One drop, and it'll be over. I edged forward, the coarse texture of my jeans making it difficult to slide. 
You're going to jump from the window. You're going to meet the outside world, and then leave it forever. 
I gripped the edge of the windowsill and shifted forward a little. 
Just the jump now. It's going to be okay. You're going to be okay. 
Yeah, I guess, it's going to be okay. Death may not be the happiest emotion among humans, but when you are stuck in a life like mine, death is okay. I guess it is, and besides, it's easier. 
I pushed forward in my seat, staring down at the busy street in determination. My breathing sped up irregularly, coming out in short spasms. 
Just a last deep breath now.
Tears welled up in my eyes unexpectedly. It was sad. This was sad. 
I sniffed, the water in my eyes blurring my vision and somewhere inside me a voice told me that I did not deserve this. I did not deserve all this agony, this helplessness, and I certainly didn't deserve this end. Yet I had to quieten that voice—not everyone got what they deserved, and not everyone deserved what they got. 
I just had to shush the crying baby within me—the one who complained and whined about not getting enough appreciation, the one who just wanted to bathe in the glow of someone knowing that he existed. 
I did not want to depend my life on the number of likes and views I got, but while chasing art as my field of salvation, I somehow did in the way, I somehow mistakenly let it take control over me. 
Art was the death of me and I took pride in the fact. 
I reached up with a hand, cautious not to fall down just yet, and then I rubbed at my eyes roughly. The world spinned for a moment, it spinned so hard that I had to reach out and grip the window glass to steady myself. Then suddenly the world looked just the same the next second. 
Goodbye World. Goodbye you and your dullness. 
It had been such a good day, though proving the saying wrong, 'All's well that ends well.' This wasn't going to end well. 
Jump now. 
My grip loosened on the walk, then left it completely, smiling bravely. I pushed myself up—
Ping. 
The small sound seemed to fill the silence of this apartment so far up, away from the clutter and noise of a daily subway. I decided to ignore the last message on my phone, but curiosity got the better hold of me. 
I sighed and reached into my pocket, pulling out the slim, old model which had been in trend some ten years ago. Sniffling through my cold-struck blocked nose, and squeezing my eyes to pour out the unshed tears, I unlocked the phone and looked at the notifications. 

HeyThereWorld 
'Good God, this is awesome. When are you doing your next post?'

Probably...never. 
Such an irony it was of life—for her to visit me on my deathbed, to give me what I was wishing for all this time, only when I had lost all hope. Such a cruel, teasing world this was. Such heartlessness. 
I swallowed the bile rising up in my throat, and my thumb stubbornly moved on its own. I clicked on the notification. My website page opened up. There, the photo of the still life painting I had done was posted, unviewed and unattended. Yet there was one number beside the viewed eyes. Just one  but it was. I glanced back into my dark house—at the smudge of colours on the canvas waiting to be furnished up. I had never intended to look at it again. It just seemed...pointless. 
My shoulders slumped as I realized this pattern: this same cycle since the past twenty-seven days. Only, this time I had come close, so close, I'd at last gathered up the courage and then someone just had to come and deflate me again. 
I looked at HeyThereWorld's bio. There was a middle-aged man with graying hair, wrinkles around his eyes and mouth which made it seem like he had seen many happinesses and smiled many times. Just a normal person with a life better than mine. It said he was a college professor, though he hated his job and just wanted to live on caffeine all day and admire museum galleries. 
He was still online, maybe waiting.  
Seconds later a new message popped up. 

'I wish I had talent like yours.'

I wondered if he realized what he had done by being the first one to comment anything—something positive—about my artwork. My shoulders slumped. He'll probably never know about this at all. 
With clumsy and cold fingers, red from this high up, I typed in a reply, something I had never thought I would. 

'Thanks. It'll prob be done by this Sunday.' 

If I had to get it done by Sunday, I had to get to work now. 
The phone pinged again. 

'👍I'm waiting.'

My feet and legs were heavy and numb when I stood up from the windowsill, and, to be honest, so was my soul. But I got myself to move nonetheless. I leaned out the window and looked down—into empty air I had been going to fill by jumping down. 
Then I closed the window, to block out the cold air and drew the curtains. 
Some other day with suicide. Right now, I have a college professor who's waiting for my next artwork. 

#suicide #sad #depressed #self-hate #art #artist #social-media

© Tanushka