If I Jumped

On November 22, 2010, just a few minutes past 3 AM, Aiden found himself standing outside of Dr. DeWolfe’s house for the fifteenth time that month. He’d paid Dr. DeWolfe a silent visit every night since it had happened, hoping to see one of the lights on as a signal for Aiden to go inside. That’s what DeWolfe had told Aiden he would do, anyway. Every night, though, the lights were off, the door was locked, the windows were shut, and the air was silent, indicating DeWolfe was asleep. 

Maybe he died, too, Aiden wondered. But he knew the old man was wide awake up there. He would have been angry if he wasn’t, because that would mean he felt no remorse for Jordy’s death. It had been his fault, after all. His fault for giving Jordy the drug. His fault for not knowing, or possibly just ignoring, the consequences. And his fault for not doing anything to get Jordy back on his feet. 

At least, that’s what Aiden had been telling himself all this time. He knew the truth, of course -- his parents refused to let him forget it -- but he liked this version of the story better. He didn’t want to believe that Jordy was a criminal, and he definitely didn’t want to believe that Jordy deserved his death. 

No one deserves to die at nineteen, Aiden thought to himself. Not even a criminal.

But Jordy wasn’t a criminal. The evidence was all against him, sure, but Aiden had a feeling there was more to the story. There had to be, because Jordy wasn’t a criminal. 

Aiden glanced at his cell phone. 3:06 AM, now. He sighed and put his hands in the pocket of his hoodie, swiftly turning around and starting off down the empty street.

At the end of the block, he unconsciously turned left instead of right, bringing him towards the park he and Jordy used to play at as kids. For a second, he stared at the old play structure in confusion, but then -- not wanting to go home just yet -- he shrugged, pushed through the metal gate, and climbed up to the top of the slide. He sat with his legs dangling through the railing, and suddenly, he was eight years old again, sitting next to Jordy.

“Have you ever wondered what would happen if you jumped from this high?” Jordy had asked on the last night of summer before fourth grade.

Aiden had frowned. “What kinda question is that?”

He looked at his friend in confusion. Jordy was gazing out across the rows of cookie-cutter houses, fiddling with the zipper of his jacket. He was smiling, too, but Aiden noticed that the expression didn’t quite reach his eyes. 

Jordy shrugged. “I dunno. You never wondered?”

“Wondered what?”

“I already said. What would happen if you jump. You don’t think you’d die?”

Aiden was taken aback. “What?”

Jordy looked at him sharply, and Aiden was frightened to see that his friend’s eyes were different. They were swimming with a terrifying emotion -- one that Aiden was still too young to recognize. 

“You wouldn’t die,” Aiden said quickly. “You’d probably just break a leg. Or two.”

“Or three,” Jordy added with a chuckle, and suddenly his eyes were back to normal again. 

Relieved, Aiden had laughed along with him, and forgotten the conversation altogether. But now, just over ten years later, Aiden remembered it as vividly as if it had happened yesterday. 

He’d never known much about Jordy’s home life. He’d never thought to ask. But now, the question banged against the back of his head, searching through Aiden’s memory of the boy, itching to find its answer -- hoping that maybe it would help explain what became of the seemingly innocent Jordy. 

Across the street, a dark shadow caught Aiden’s eye, and so he pushed himself down the slide -- smiling a little as he did so -- and walked to the curb. There, just ten feet ahead of him, was the unmistakable silhouette of the very boy who’d been taking up so much space in Aiden’s head. The boy who was supposed to have died two weeks before.

“Jordy…?” Aiden whispered. It couldn’t have been him. He was dead. Aiden had watched them drag his body out of the burning wreck that was once Jordy’s rusty Volkswagen, and a week later had watched them lower his body into the ground. As much as Aiden wished otherwise, Jordy died. But it was him; Aiden would be able to recognize Jordy even if he was covered in black soot.

Aiden was frozen, caught between the biological instinct to back away from anything unnatural and the intense yearning to see Jordy alive and well once more. When the silhouette started moving towards him, though, Aiden felt his body backing away, despite both his mind and his heart telling him to go forward. 

But when Jordy stepped out of the shadows, Aiden’s heart stopped along with his feet. 

“Hey, Aiden,” he said, flashing the charming smile that Aiden knew so well. “It’s been a minute.”

“You aren’t real,” Aiden said firmly. “You’re dead. I saw.”

Jordy took another step forward and reached for Aiden’s hand, which Aiden yanked backwards.

“Don’t touch me,” said the latter. “You’re… You’re not Jordy.”

The dark-haired boy’s face fell, but he took Aiden’s other hand nonetheless. Aiden drew in a sharp breath at the feeling of Jordy’s warm fingers laced with his. He was real, alright -- and he most certainly wasn’t dead. 

“How the hell -- I saw your dead body, Jordy -- they asked me to identify you -- you fucking died.”

“I know you have questions,” said Jordy’s soft, kind voice. “But I can’t answer them.”

“You can’t answer them now? Or at all?”

Jordy only smiled, and once again Aiden was reminded of that summer night at the top of the slide. 

“If you aren’t dead, then -- why are you here?” he asked. 

“I wanted to see you before I go,” Jordy replied. “How long do you have?”

Aiden guessed he wouldn’t get an answer, so he didn’t bother asking where Jordy was going. “I should probably be home before my parents wake up. Let’s say until 7:15.”

Jordy beamed. “Perfect.”

---

Sitting at the top of the slide, the two boys looked out over the suburbs. The sun was just beginning to peek over the horizon.

They’d spent the past few hours talking as if November 7 hadn’t happened, as if Jordy had just been gone on one of his and his brother’s frequent cross-country road trips. The whole time, Aiden was holding Jordy’s hand with an iron grip, as if that alone would prevent their inevitable separation. 

I wanted to see you before I go…

But where was he going? What had happened? Why was Jordy here? Was he even really there? And if he was, whose body did they lower into the ground? 

Thousands of questions bombarded Aiden’s mind as he sat watching the sunrise, Jordy’s head resting gently on his shoulder. But for some reason, he decided to ask, “What did you mean, back then?”

“Hmm?” Jordy murmured.

“Ten years ago. When we sat here, and you asked what would happen if you jumped. Why’d you ask that?”

Jordy sat up and looked at Aiden in wonder. “I’m surprised you remember that far back.”

“You don’t?”

“No. I do. I’m just surprised you do, too.”

“What did you mean?”

“If I jumped…” said Jordy quietly to himself, looking up at the orange sky. “I think I wanted to kill myself.”

Aiden’s eyes widened. He’d seen this coming -- in fact he’d actually considered this possibility a number of times during their thirteen years of friendship -- but hearing Jordy say it out loud was chilling. Knowing that Jordy was in enough despair to want to end his own life broke Aiden’s heart, and conjured a feeling of helplessness that he’d been trying so hard to avoid. 

Noticing the terror on Aiden’s face, Jordy chuckled. “I don’t anymore. But I used to. For a long time, I thought it was the only solution.”

Aiden didn’t say anything for some time. He was too busy imagining what things would have been like for him if he didn’t have Jordy throughout middle and high school.

“Obviously I realized that a jump from this low wouldn’t kill me,” said Jordy. “And eventually, I realized how miserable you would be without me… and how miserable I would be without you.”

All of the emotions Aiden previously felt were suddenly replaced by boiling rage. He looked sharply at Jordy only to see that the boy was smiling in amusement, heightening Aiden’s anger tenfold. 

“If you knew that,” Aiden exclaimed, “then why’d you leave? Why are you still trying to leave?”

“Don’t be like that, Aiden. I’m not doing this to hurt you.”

“Then why the hell are you doing it?”

Jordy glanced at him, and for the final time that night, Aiden saw the same sadness in his eyes as he had ten years before. 

“I wish I could tell you. But I have to leave now.”

“You can’t,” said Aiden.

“I have to.”

“Then why did you even come back?” he exclaimed, letting go of Jordy’s hand and pushing him away in anger. “Why couldn’t you just keep pretending to be dead?”

“Because I wanted you to know that I’m not,” said Jordy, and he stood up.

“Don’t go,” Aiden said through newly-emerging tears. 

Jordy looked away. “I’ll see you later, Aiden.”

---

Aiden awoke to the all too familiar sound of his phone ringing on his bedside table. He reached for it groggily but, seeing that it was a call from his mother, he only watched it ring before setting it back down on the table.

It had been five years since Jordy’s supposed death; five years since Aiden’s strange encounter with Jordy two weeks after. Aiden was smart enough not to tell anyone about his discovery, but after about a year of replaying it in his head he started to wonder if it had even really happened. None of it made sense to him, and Aiden wasn’t the type to dwell on things that didn’t make sense. But as the years dragged by, as Aiden met new people and tried new things and moved on with his life, he still couldn’t manage to get his encounter with Jordy out of his head. The feeling of Jordy taking his hand lingered on his fingertips, the gentle pressure of Jordy’s head on his shoulder never seemed to dissipate. 

I’ll see you later, Jordy had said. But how much later? How long would Aiden have to wait before Jordy finally tried to reach out?

After five years, Aiden was beginning to lose hope that Jordy ever would. 

He laid on his side, staring at his phone as it picked up its ringing again. His mother had called him every day since he left home, but Aiden had answered only half of her calls. He found it strange that she even wanted to speak to him; after he and Jordy started going out, things had gotten more than a little tense between him and his mother, and after Jordy’s death, she took every chance she got to remind Aiden that Jordy was a “worthless good-for-nothing who turned out just like his father”.

Yes, it was strange that she wished to speak to Aiden, but it was even stranger that she thought Aiden would want to speak to her. 

He watched his phone ring two more times before abandoning it to get a cup of coffee. Out of habit, he glanced down at the floor beneath his door, expecting to see nothing but junk mail -- but a dark green envelope caught his eye, and he immediately thought of Jordy.

Aiden stared at the envelope in shock for several minutes before finally managing to walk over and open it. He regarded the beautiful mess that was Jordy’s handwriting with a smirk, remembering the countless times Mrs. Baxter berated him for its illegibility. Aiden, on the other hand, had always admired the carefree loops (and, he had to admit, he prided himself for being the only one who could read it).

For the next fifteen minutes, Aiden stared at the still-folded letter. He had been waiting for any sign of Jordy since that November night five years before, and now that it was finally here in his hands, he wasn’t quite sure what to do with it. Eventually, though, sheer curiosity compelled him to unfold it and begin reading. As he absorbed himself in Jordy’s message, bits and pieces of their conversation flooded back to him. 

“I never liked the suburbs,” Jordy had said, plopping down next to Aiden and taking his hand.

“Yeah,” said Aiden. “They’re nice at night, though.”

They’d sat in silence for a bit before Jordy sighed and rested his head on Aiden’s shoulder.

“Do they miss me?” he asked softly. It sounded almost as if he didn’t want to hear the answer.

Aiden wasn’t sure whether to tell the truth or not. He assumed “they” meant Jordy’s mother and younger brother -- neither of which had shown any emotions at the news of Jordy’s death -- and Aiden figured Jordy already knew that, but he couldn’t bring himself to say it. 

“I think so,” Aiden had said finally, squeezing Jordy’s hand as though the gesture alone would be enough to convince him.

Aiden looked up from the letter sharply. All this time, he’d worried that Jordy needed to escape from anything, and everyone, that was a reminder of his life in the suburbs. And despite everything, Aiden had been inextricably tied up in it all. He couldn’t bear another goodbye from Jordy. He knew it would be easier not to read it to the end -- and certainly much simpler -- but he had to know. His heart caught in his throat as he read the final two sentences --

I promise I’ll tell you everything in person -- if you’re willing to see me again, that is. Anywhere and any time works for me. Just let me know, and I’ll be there.

Jordy