He flashes a small smile, and somehow, I just know he’s also remembering the other night as well. “Yeah. You just have to make it through the night.”

I nod, bracing myself for what I know is coming.

His expression sobers. “I wish I could tell you I never actually considered it, Will. I wish I could tell you that I...that I didn’t try to pull the trigger that night.”

I swear something in me dies a little bit. Right then and there, something just...winks out. Something I didn’t know I had to lose. Changing me...irrevocably.

He squeezes his knuckles with his other hand, hiding the tattoo. “Even before that day. I don’t remember a time where I didn’t understand that that was a choice I had, you know?”

Jesus fucking Christ.

His eyes seem to lose focus as he flickers his gaze over the front yard. “It helped, I think, to have a plan. A way out. Just holding the gun gave me more comfort than I’d felt in years.” He laughs humorlessly. “The safety was on. I didn’t know. I had no idea what the fuck I was doing. I pulled the trigger and nothing happened.”

I blink. I don’t know what else to do other than blink.

I’m going to be sick.

“I wish I could say it was enough. That I never touched another gun and wondered, What if? That I never again went back up on that bridge and contemplated how easy it’d be to just...let go. Jump. How it’d take hardly any effort at all.”

He crooks a wistful smile. “Sometimes, I’d imagine the wind made the choice for me. Back when I’d risk falling just a little too much, I could pretend then it was out of my hands. It probably helped that I was usually drunk or high or some combination of the two. Made it easier to ignore reason and blame it on Mother Nature or fate if something happened.”

Bile floods my throat. I clench my fists until my nails threaten to break skin, just so I don’t fucking reach for him and do something stupid, like throw him over my shoulder and take him as far away from that godforsaken bridge as we can get. Lock him in my room and never let him out of my sight again.

He taps his thumb over where the tattoo lays hidden and nods toward the tree line. There’s too much fog to determine whether it’s visible from here or not, but I imagine it normally is. “That night, though—the night I went up there with my dad’s gun...”

I squeeze my eyes shut.

“To this day, I don’t know why I thought about you.”

I swear my heart grinds to a halt. It just...stops. Everything just stops.