Between the Lives - By Jessica Shirvington Page 0,74
I’d given it a lot of thought since seeing her and decided I didn’t want her to be exposed to things she shouldn’t be; didn’t want her to think I’d condone something that in other circumstances would be terrible.
The ironic thing was – I really didn’t condone it.
I still had trouble admitting to myself that what I was considering, what I was now planning, was technically … suicide.
But how could I go on this way?
I honestly didn’t believe I could survive if I had to go on living two lives. They may have me in a mental clinic for the wrong reasons, but if I didn’t make this change – give myself the chance to live a normal life – I might end up in a place like this in both of my lives. I couldn’t risk that.
I’d written one letter to be given to Maddie straight after I was gone, and others that I wanted to have set aside for her birthdays until she was eighteen. It was the best I could do to try to help her understand that I was okay, how much I loved her and how much I valued life. I hoped they’d get to her.
‘Hi,’ Ethan said, his voice raspy. He looked exhausted.
‘Hey.’ I glanced at him briefly.
‘I’m sorry I wasn’t in the last couple of days.’
I shrugged, trying to hide how much his absence had affected me. ‘Everyone deserves a day off now and then.’
He bit his lip, but didn’t say anything else. Instead, since I was sitting in the chair, he perched on the edge of the bed.
I stared at my cast. The bouncing bunnies were starting to fade.
Finally, since it was clear I wasn’t going to, he spoke. ‘Levi is talking about putting you on some meds.’
I grimaced. He’d said as much, but I’d hoped that all my talking in our last session might have changed his mind. I guess I hadn’t been that convincing.
‘I don’t care what he does.’
Ethan shook his head at me. ‘You think you have it so bad. Did you ever stop to think that maybe you’re lucky? Maybe you have a chance to do something amazing with your lives? You could … I don’t know, you could change the world, maybe more than just this one. You could make a difference. Do you know how incredible that is? Have you ever considered that you could use your knowledge in one world to benefit the other? Have you ever even investigated?’
‘You want me to make a difference? Be important?’
‘Yes!’
I looked up at him. ‘Do you know what I want, Ethan?’
He spoke quietly. ‘What, Sabine? What do you want?’
His eyes bored into me and my heart clenched. I hated the involuntary reaction I had to him. Especially now – knowing I meant nothing to him. I ignored the feelings welling up inside and held his gaze.
‘I want to be able to breathe. I want to know I’m with people who care about me – about all of me. And I want to be free to care about them too. To be able to tell them everything about me, not lie and pretend all the time. I want to know that if I drift off to sleep by accident one day, I’ll wake up in the same place. I want to live each day once, the best that I can live it. Who are you to deny me that? I told you I don’t want to die, Ethan, I want to live. Is that so wrong?’
‘But how do you know you’re choosing the right life?’ he pleaded. ‘What if you’re giving up something you don’t even have yet, a future in this world that would give you more happiness than you could have ever imagined?’
‘It’s a risk I have to be willing to take. There are a lot of “what ifs” in life. I can’t live my lives hedging my bets. Trust me, that’s no life.’
‘But that’s exactly my point, Sabine. It’s like that saying: life is what happens when you’re busy making other plans. You keep thinking one life will be better, but how can you give up half of who you are and think it will make you happier? And while we’re on the subject of “what ifs” – what if you’re wrong? You can’t be sure that if you die in one world, you’ll go on living in the other. What if you lose both worlds? What if you die?’