If you love someone….

If you love someone you let them go. If you love someone you let them go. If you love someone you let them go. If you love someone you let them go. If you love someone. If you love someone. My hands gripped her pale arm even tighter. My head spun and my stomach lurched from looking down at her. I closed my eyes firmly on the scene and concentrated on my own strength, keeping her arm in a vice-like grip. I shivered. The wind was biting cold up here, on this lonesome tower block roof. She struggled violently to free her arm but I would not loosen my hold on it.

“Please” she screamed against the howling wind “Let me go! Let me fall!”

I shook my head resolutely, “No” I mouthed at her, the wind snatching away the word.

She tugged again, hard, in an attempt to wrench herself away from me. Away from safety. I squeezed her arm more tightly. She gazed up at me, tears of desperation in her eyes, “Let. Me. Die”, she managed to croak out, faintly.

I forced myself to stare down into her eyes, ignoring the ground that was sickeningly far below us. I tried to radiate all the love I felt for her into her body, to save her from herself.

At that moment, she stopped struggling, went heavy and limp. Limp and heavy. Dead. She was a dead weight. I held her arm in both of mine to make sure it did not slip.

She had given up. We were stuck like this. I realised abruptly, horrifically, that I did not have the energy to pull her up. We were locked in position. Her dangling off the edge of a twenty storey building; me balancing precariously on my stomach with my rough hands gripping her arm tightly.

I could not let her fall. I would not. If you love someone you let them go. No. Not like this. Not like this.

She was resigned to her fate. It is difficult to let someone you love die, even when they are begging you for death. It is particularly challenging when you yourself would rather live. But to live without her was unthinkable.

I had control now, very limited control. To live. To die. Either way we had to do it together. To live. To die. What a decision. She looked at me pleadingly. What should I do?

What should I do? I bit my lip thinking about my dilemma. It was the worst situation I could ever be in. The worst situation anyone could be in. I could not have foreseen this. Or maybe I had chosen not to foresee this. I had thought like a superman I could save her from her demons, her depression. But monsters crawl in the night from the dark recesses of her brain. How could I have thought I could protect her from something within her own being, something I could not see. Something that had gradually consumed her delicate mind.

I watched her fragile body hang over the rooftop edge. It was supported only by my arms. I felt helpless. I brought my mind back forcefully to the question in hand. To live without her, or to die with her. That was the dilemma, it had all come down to this. Horrifically. Definitely. Decision time loomed.

My brain hurt from contemplating my decision. What a huge dilemma to face.

What would you do?