Splat
by Zachary Robert Long (3192 words, estimated reading time: 16 minutes)

32.

During certain moments in life, the human brain changes our perception of time. One common example is the feeling that the work day is dragging on, you keep glancing at the clock but that last hour just doesn’t end. Time dilation is often referenced in trip reports on LSD and other psychedelic drugs.

It is also common when the brain knows it is going to die.

As was the case for Phil.

While the ground is rushing towards Phil – or, rather, Phil is rushing towards the ground at an accelerating rate – to the people walking below it is only a matter of seconds between that last fateful step and the splat that is doomed to follow. For Phil it is quite a bit longer, time being a fickle beast.

While standing on the roof of the office complex, one foot hanging off the edge, Phil feels neither happiness, nor sadness. Truthfully, Phil feels nothing at all, as is the case with many depressed people. It is a misconception that depression correlates with sadness, depression just as often correlates with emptiness.

Phil has felt nothing at all for some time now. Perhaps it’s been years, or maybe just months, for time is meaningless when you have nothing to care about. The wedding ring on his finger should give him a sense of belonging, his wife and two sons should bring joy to his life as he has to theirs.

But they bring nothing.

31.

In thirty-three minutes they will be receiving a phone call that brings their world crumbling to its knees. In forty-five minutes they will be telling police officers how they never noticed the signs of Phil’s depression. It’s a story familiar to too many people. Right now, however, they are sitting down to an early lunch of grapefruit, toast, and Captain Crunch cereal.

Marie, Phil’s wife, will tell the officers’ how he had kissed her goodbye before leaving for work, how he had roughhoused with the boys before taking his morning shower. She will break down crying and blame herself for his death. The blame does not belong on her shoulders, she was a good wife, a loving wife, and if Phil had left a note, it would surely speak of her devotion.

As Phil is racing toward the cement sidewalk, his body will start to pump adrenaline, his brain meaninglessly triggering the fight or flight response. When Phil connects with the pavement below, landing face first as he has positioned himself to ensure death, his skull will shatter and compress like a melon hit by a sledgehammer. Bits of skull will spray out, the furthest chuck landing seventeen-and-a-half feet away, and he will paint the sidewalk a chunky red. His neck will snap with a thunderous crack and bits will splinter through his shoulders and out his back.

It won’t be a pretty image, and at least nine of the pedestrians on the ground below will be wiping remains of a man they never knew off themselves. Sixteen of them will seek professional help to deal with the image. One lady, who has the misfortune of being two feet from the impact zone, will later commit suicide herself because the image refuses to leave. Nineteen people will vomit. Eleven will dry heave. Perhaps most surprising, or not depending on how you view the human animal, the majority of people who witness the event will continue on their day.

Only a couple will decide to forfeit lunch.

30.

If Phil knew the damage he was going to cause, not to himself but to the people below and to his family, he would feel nothing at all. For his was a true depression, he told himself, and he rationalized that if he was to not feel again then why should he continue living? Continue to fake it?

The reasons Marie, his loving wife, whom he was married to for the last twelve years, never noticed the signs of Phil’s depression is entirely due to how well Phil could mask his emptiness. Like an actor playing a role, Phil has played the role of the happy husband and the loving father – perhaps for years or perhaps only for months. Kissing his wife before work, laughing and playing with the kids, smiling when he sat down for supper, no one could see through the facade he had erected. If his life was a Hollywood film, he would win awards; albeit postmortem.

Right about now Phil’s life is passing before his eyes. In the space between floors he will see his wedding day, the church smelling of lilies and daisies; his wife’s favorite flowers. He is seeing his gorgeous wife, only twenty-three years at the time, smiling wide as she strode down between the pews of the church; the same church both his sons were baptized in. He sees his honeymoon, spent in the tropical warmth of Hawaii, drinking colorful mixed drinks and fucking on the sand; the same sand their first son would be conceived on.

Phil doesn’t smile, or feel the warmth of love one feels, when reflecting on such times. Phil still feels nothing at all, much the same way he won’t feel the concrete as it turns his brain into abstract art. There was a bittersweet irony in all of this, and if he could feel, that fact would have brought a smile to his lips, but then again, if he could feel he wouldn’t have thrown himself off the high-rise’s roof.

29.

His mind changed tunes, sudden and swift, and he was at his mother’s funeral. He was trying not to sob, trying to hold onto the dignity that he believed befit a grown man. His father was crying and screaming at the open casket, trying to wake the silent sleeper inside. It was a disturbing moment and he watched his niece’s and nephews’ scared faces; faces unaccustomed to death. His sister was glaring at him but he couldn’t fathom why.

It never even occurred to him to try to console the evil grieving man.

The image of his father screaming into the casket brought another picture to him. He was thirteen again and his father was screaming in his face, screaming and bringing rough knuckle after rough knuckle down on him. He was thirteen and he had found a baby kitten alone, abandoned behind the family shed. He brought it inside for milk and his father found him. Drunk again, his father beat him until his knuckles bled, until his mother came into the kitchen and began to scream.

He beat him until he started to beat her.

Flash forward and Phil is attending another funeral, this time for the man who had left him broken and scarred in his youth, trembling through the hours of the night, scared whenever he smelled whiskey still.

His sister didn’t fly out for the event and only Phil sits in attendance. Smiling, knowing he has won.

For some reason Phil wonders if he left the windows in his bedroom open. It seemed an odd thought, present situation considered. Yet he contemplates it for what feels like minutes before finally remembering that Marie is at home and she would surely have closed the windows herself. He wonders if he should have removed his glasses, it seems a shame to break such an expensive pair. Wonders how much replacements will cost him.

If he could he would’ve laughed.

28.

Phil still has two hundred and eighty ft. to the ground, and can’t quite make out the people below. He can see the cars, many yellow he knows to be taxis, but can’t tell the make of any of them. It often doesn’t occur to jumpers that people litter the ground, walking on sidewalks, crossing the road, stopping to check the time, their phones, their reflections. It often doesn’t occur to them that they could land on one of these bipedal creatures, committing manslaughter and suicide at the same time It doesn’t occur that they could land on one of these bipedal creatures whose soft flesh and troublesome internal organs could cushion the inevitable landing.

If Phil had spent time thinking about what he was going to do that morning, instead of just deciding today was the day he would put an end to his emptiness, he might of been surprised to know that jumping was only the seventh most successful method of suicide. He would be pleased to know it worked ninety-three percent of the time, though.

He might even be surprised to know that putting a handgun to his head would’ve only been third place, tried with cyanide, at ninety-seven percent. He didn’t own a handgun, or know where to procure cyanide, perhaps if he did his tale would be entirely different. Perhaps if he had sat in his study, put a dirty pistol into his mouth and painted the wall with his brains, there would be sixteen less people seeking professional help. Perhaps the only person laying down on a leather couch would be his wife, dealing with the trauma of scrapping him off the plaster.

If he owned a shotgun, put it in his mouth and let that ninety-nine percent success rate do him away, she would be scrapping him off the ceiling as well.

27.

At this point Phil is passing by, both quickly and taking forever, the floor he spent the last three years working on. As an architect it was Phil’s job to design buildings, much like the one he was falling off of at this time. He had always been interested in architecture and landed a great job, starting off at seventy-five thousand a year with impressive medical and dental benefits, that would cover his whole family.

It crossed his mind that he did not have life insurance; and, if he could feel, he would surely be worried about his wife and kids. As a stay at home mother, Marie didn’t bring home any money. The cost of a funeral would surely be great. Yes indeed, if he could feel, he would feel quite terrible. But if he could feel, I wouldn’t be telling you this tale.

But you already knew that.

26.

According to the statistics, more men commit suicide than women, while women attempt it three times as often. The gap between these numbers is called the gender paradox of suicidal behavior. Phil, having chosen to fall from a building, is joining five hundred and thirty five other American men, and one hundred and ninety American women, that year, in experiencing the rush. If Phil knew these numbers he may have decided against this method.

But only one thing can be known for certain, he wouldn’t feel anything about them.

Phil’s mind has decided to settle on his first experience watching Star Wars with his best friend Alec, who was the best man at his wedding. His mouth is hanging open in childhood awe at the alien creatures on the screen, and when it’s over they go outside and play light-sabers with sticks. It was a simple time and he can remember what it’s like to feel that joy, even if can’t feel it himself anymore.

25.

His mind jumps between films he saw as a kid, going from Star Wars with Alec to Robocop with his sister, Total Recall, The Fox And The Hound, Back To The Future, E.T, Raiders Of The Lost Ark. In seconds, seconds that stretch forever, he watches each of these movies, at the same time, yet all separately, start to finish. It’s a very weird thing the mind does when your life flashes before your eyes, like stepping outside of time and looking in all at once.

It’s an even weirder thing the mind does when it smashes against the ground from three hundred and twenty ft.

24.

Looking into the plate glass windows of the office building parallel to him, he can’t help but wonder if anyone has noticed his fall. His descent from grace, like the angel Lucifer cast from the heavens. Wondered if they recognized him as he zipped past.

Looking into the plate glass windows of the office building parallel to him, Phil saw a man he didn’t know. Balding, his body barely contained in his white dress shirt, the man was sitting at his computer in his tiny three by three cubicle staring into the light of his computer screen.

He was playing solitaire.

23.

Most of us bipedal creatures fear our own deaths. We do not willingly go throwing ourselves off of buildings or in front of trains, the thought rarely crossing our minds and often scaring or disturbing us when it does. Some of us act like we want it, slitting wrists and taking pills, thinking we’re ready to die. Mostly we’re just looking for attention, lost, or crying out for help. If we’re lucky, we will receive it.

What makes someone take the willing step as Phil has?

What brings a million people a year to take out their shotguns, step in front of trains, or jump off buildings? To set up nooses and leave themselves dangling a few feet from safety. The question is a hard one to answer. Stress and depression, anger and sadness, feelings of being unfulfilled in work, and love, feelings of worthlessness, struggles with body image, the rigors of capitalism, or the planet’s dying can all be found as causes.

Suicide is rarely as beautiful as Romeo And Juliet, though always as tragic.

22.

But why take the final step when life can so easily be changed with willpower and motivation? The mind works in interesting ways. Sometimes the idea crosses your mind, ‘Why don’t I just end it all?’ Most times it leaves. But for more than a million people a year, that thought stays. Buried deep inside in the subconscious, breathing despair into the brain. Breathes the air of certainty, solves all the problems of pain and suffering us bipedal creatures suffer.

Phil, who hasn’t felt anything at all, for years or maybe just months, knows that when he is gone he will be the same as in life.

Unfeeling.

No longer the actor forced into the role of life.

He will be what he feels.

21.

Thinking about solitaire, Phil once again is reliving his past. This time he has just fallen off his bike, a brand new ten-speed he got for Christmas, and he is crying. His nose is broken and pouring crimson water onto the pavement, the same crimson substance which nine people will soon be wiping off of themselves. He is crying and bleeding when he enters his home hoping to find his mother.

It’s not his mother he finds.

Dripping blood onto the hardwood floor, his father discovers him in a sad state of panic. His father finds him but he’s already started drinking, just past noon, and the whiskey is burning hatred inside of him. The stench of his breath would terrify Phil if he wasn’t preoccupied by his fear of bleeding to death.

He doesn’t see the fist coming.

19.

Phil has only been falling for two seconds. The wind hitting his eyes has begun to hurt, so he closes them. The thought of buying a new pair of glasses crosses his mind again. He begins to take off the pair he is wearing. He won’t finish the movement before he hits the ground but, between now and then, there is still a lot his brain must show him.

18.

The reflection of Phil on the plate glass window shows a fit middle aged man, one who would be hard pressed to have body image issues in the general or “traditional” sense. It’s the body of man who has been kept busy from years of playing with young boys. The body of a man who hasn’t turned to the bottle.

The body of a man who is about to explode all over the concrete.

17.

It’s the body of man who has lived with a loving woman who has fed him well. A loving woman who in thirty-three minutes is going to be weeping uncontrollably.

A woman who won’t be cooking supper tonight.

16.

It’s the body of a man who should be smiling. The body of a man who has succeeded in the American dream. He has a small house, sure; his boys have to share a room, sure; but there’s plenty of yard space.

It’s a shame Marie won’t be able to afford the mortgage on her own.

15.

It’s the body of a man who should be in his corner office working away at designs for the job he always dreamt about.

The man who made friends with his boss, and enjoyed steak rare every Tuesday.

14.

Sometimes depression doesn’t make sense. Sometimes it takes the best of us. Some of us can beat it, but we’re not all strong enough.

Sometimes depression makes you feel, feel anger and sadness and rage. Sometimes it can seem like a never-ending repetition of the same impulses and mental tics.

Sometimes, like in the case of Phil, it takes away that feeling and leaves you empty.

Not soulless. Just empty.

13.

Phil wondered if he would be going to hell.

Raised Catholic, he knew what happened to a person who takes the step off a building or a stool.

He couldn’t say if he still believed in God, Heaven, or Hell, but he knew he would find out soon.

12.

His mind filled with images of Sunday school, filling out crosswords with answers like Jesus and Angels. Dressed in his Sunday best and trying to figure out thirteen across. Happy to not have to stay sitting and listening to the priest drone on about things he didn’t yet understand.

11.

At this point Phil has about a second left to live.

His hands are only just now touching his glasses.

10.

His pineal gland is flooding his brain with endogenous DMT, a psychedelic chemical which triggers during traumatic events such as life and death.

9.

Phil is looking down a long tunnel filled with a beautiful white light.

At the end stands waiting a being of Technicolor brilliance, hands out beckoning him forwards.

8.

Phil rests his hand in this alien creature’s and they begin to float above the clouds.

7.

Phil’s body is still falling, less than a second from making nineteen people vomit, thirty-three minutes from the phone call that will bring Marie to her knees.

His body is still falling but his mind is not.

6.

He flies above the clouds, hand in hand with the Technicolor being whose lanky limbs and hands with only three fingers separate it from our own primitive race.

The clouds break away and Phil is staring at a city of impossible geometry.

5.

The city is a pale blue, made up of mind-breaking angles; building stacked upon building, rising from the ground, and falling from the air.

4.

Phil tries to ask where he is but all that comes out when he opens his mouth is the sound of rushing air.

3.

The being looks in his eyes and he understands everything.

Even those things Phil does not.

2.

For the first time in months, maybe in years, Phil feels.

A single tear comes to his eye.

1.

Splat.