Samaritan

There was quite a storm brewing the night the call came through. I was spending Friday night the way I'd become accustomed to spending it; delivered pizza on my pyjama-clad legs and a crappy action movie on the TV. When my house phone rang I knew the call wasn’t intentional. No one dialled that number on purpose. Even the telesales people had given up trying. The phone rang and rang and I just stared at it. I'd almost forgotten that it could even do that. I begrudgingly sat aside my pizza and crossed the room to the phone. Casting one look back at my dinner, rapidly cooling on the sofa, I answered the call.

I could tell something was wrong straight away. Over the sounds of the building storm, the distinctive and distressing sound of sobbing could be heard.

"Hello?" I asked it tentatively, the sound of tears rattled me momentarily.

"Is this the helpline?" She managed the words between sobs. I didn’t know what she was talking about and by the sounds of how upset she was, I was somehow ashamed of that fact.

"Um, no it's not..." Before I could go any further, her tears intensified.

"Oh... Okay." Her voice grew quieter, as if her head was moving away from the phone. Before I knew what I was doing, my voice piped up loudly.

"Wait. Wait!” Although she didn’t respond, she also hadn’t hung up. “My name is Terry. What’s your name?” There was a long pause, during which I realised that I was holding my breath.

“I’m Gina.” Her voice was still quiet, barely audible over the wind, but her crying had subsided ever so slightly.

“Hi Gina. Do you need someone to talk to?”

“I… I don’t know if I can. I came up here to jump.” My eyes went wide. I hadn’t realised the seriousness of the call until she said that.

“Gina, you don’t want to do that. Really.”

“You don’t know! You don’t know anything!” The anger in her voice pushed the sadness out of the way. I had said the wrong thing, clearly. I was woefully under-qualified to be taking this call but, now that it was happening, I really didn’t want to screw it up.

“I’m sorry, Gina. You’re right. I don’t know what’s gone on or why you are where you are.” I paused, desperately trying to find the correct words. “I’d like to know though, if you want to tell me.” The phone line was a poor one and the crackling audio made me nervous. “Where are you, Gina?”

“Why?” Her previous anger was now mingled with suspicion. She probably thought that I wanted to call the police or something and, to be honest, the thought had crossed my mind. I’d dismissed it though. Police would just make this worse, or so I judged with my complete lack of knowledge or experience.

“The phone line is breaking up and I don’t want you to be alone, thinking that I’ve hung up on you. Thought maybe instead we could talk face to face. Would that be all right?” I had no idea whether that was a sound plan or not, but I was going for it. After a few moments of silence from Gina, she answered.

“I’m at Thomasson Bridge. Don’t send the police, okay?”

“I won’t, Gina. Thomasson Bridge is about five minutes from where I am. You’ll still be there in five minutes, right?”

“I will. Hurry though, please.” There was a gentle pleading in her voice now and I could picture her saying those words on the brink, gazing into the chasm below.

“I’ll be there as soon as I can. I promise.”

She ended the call and I raced to my bedroom. After changing clothes faster than I ever had before, I grabbed my coat and headed to the front door. Pausing with my hand on the door handle, I looked back at my pizza. Didn’t make sense to waste any. Four minutes later, I hurried down the street with the pizza box under my arm, Thomasson Bridge directly ahead of me.

The bridge was deserted but for the young woman about halfway along. As I approached her, I started to think about what I was doing. She needed someone professional, surely. Someone qualified to deal with the complex emotions and issues that brought her to a bridge on the outskirts of the city. Instead she had a guy more accustomed to standing behind a cash register, holding a box of pizza.

As I got nearer, I slowed down to a snail's pace. The last thing I wanted to do was startle her that close to the edge. Luckily she noticed my approach and my words were not a surprise.

"Hey Gina." I tried to keep the fear and trepidation from my voice and I think I just about managed it.

"Hi Terry. Thank you for coming." She was on the wrong side of the steel railing. Just seeing the way that she casually held onto it with one hand was proof enough for me that she was serious tonight. Whatever else had been said or done, tonight she was ready to go through with what she’d planned.

"I brought some pizza. Might be cold now though. Are you hungry?"

"A little, yeah."

"Don't suppose you want to come back onto this side of the railing to eat it with me?" Gina responded with a look of stern sadness and shook her head. I held out a slice for her and she took it, smiling ever so slightly as she did so. I got a slice for myself too before putting the box down. It seemed like the right thing to do. Both of us quietly chewed for a minute before Gina spoke again.

"God, I'm going to miss pepperoni." She took another large bite, chewing slowly to savour it properly.

"You know, it isn't too late to change your mind. Plenty of time to get huge from far too much pizza. I can help." I patted my stomach as evidence of my pizza-eating credentials. Gina laughed lightly. She looked far less sad than when I'd arrived. More content. Although Gina had calmed, the night was still blustery and continuing to threaten rain. I decided to fire up the conversation again.

"Do you want to talk?" She took a long time to reply. I didn't rush to fill the silence like I usually would.

"I thought I did. But now that you're here, I don't know what I wanted to say. Really I just didn't want to be alone."

"Well you're not. Why don't you come for a walk with me? We can talk, or not, and get away from this bridge too." Again, Gina was quiet. She drew a small envelope from her coat pocket and clutched it tightly before she spoke once more.

"I didn't want to be alone, Terry. Thank you for answering your phone. Thank you for being here with me." She handed me the envelope. "And thank you for the pizza. That was nice." She smiled and so did I. I looked at the envelope in my hands.

"What is this?" The envelope had my name written on it.

"Goodbye Terry." She let go of the railing and fell out of sight.

I want to say that I cried out and grabbed her with extraordinary cat-like reflexes before she was gone, but that isn't what happened. Instead I froze on the spot, unable to comprehend the choice that she had just made. I moved slowly to the spot that Gina had occupied until a moment before and looked over. I don't know why I did it, but I immediately regretted it. I slumped down to the floor, cradling the envelope in both hands. I opened it slowly, carefully, and drew out the two sheets of paper from within.

The first was a letter. It didn't have my name on it, but I knew it was for me. In it she talked about her choice and why she was making it. She left out the majority of details but it was easy to understand that she'd been unhappy for sometime. She was sorry for bringing me here, but she hadn't wanted to be alone. She labelled herself selfish, but said that it had been necessary. I didn't think she was selfish. I understood. No matter what anyone said, she wouldn't have walked away from that bridge. She'd had a plan and I'd played my part.

The second piece of paper was a little more telling of her organisation and planning. It was a page from the phonebook with a few names circled and a couple crossed out. The chosen names had addresses close to mine. She'd chosen people that would have been able to get to this spot with the least time and effort. The names scored out must have not been available or had refused to come to the bridge. Two names were crossed out before mine. Two others were circled after it. I was a completely random stranger and that's exactly what Gina had wanted.

The storm that had been threatening to break all night finally did and I was pleased. I felt as if someone should be crying for the loss of Gina and if it wasn't going to be me then the sky would be a suitable alternative. I thought about getting mad about being lured out here deliberately to watch someone die, but I couldn't manage it. She hadn't wanted to be alone. She hadn't cared who it was that shared the moment with her so long as somebody did. I couldn't be mad about that. In fact, in a way I was kind of thankful that it got to be me. Otherwise I never would have met Gina. From the story she shared in her letter, it didn't sound as if there was anyone else around to miss her. I guess that became my job.

As I sat there on Thomasson Bridge and thought of Gina, of what she had been and what she could have become, I finally caught up with the sky and began to cry. There was no one else in the world who would share my sudden sadness. As I sat there, sobbing over the memory of the girl I hardly knew, I was grateful for the rain.