Andre-1

I knew it was a bad idea once I started up the stairs. Of all places I decided a theater was
a good spot. I could see the headline: 22 YEAR OLD JUMPS OFF OF WINDY CITY
PLAYHOUSE CHICAGO ILLINOIS. Or maybe I would get no press at all. I don’t know
which I would prefer. I had dreams of performing here someday, I guess that dream was pretty
much over. This morning was one of the most peaceful mornings I’ve had in a while. I started
with sitting on the roof and drinking my coffee, which I always wanted to do but I knew my
father, Cristian Fuentes, wouldn’t approve. Maybe he wouldn't approve of me cutting my own
life short, either. He probably also wouldn’t approve of me smoking one of his cigarettes this
morning. I only did it to see what the hype was about. Turns out, it wasn’t much but the flavor
of burnt coals in your mouth and a rim of residue on your gums.
Soon enough I made it to the top of the building and sucked in a breath as I pushed
open the door. I was content with my decision. I wasn’t necessarily sad about my death. I had
reflected and grieved my passing long ago. I paused in the doorway when I noticed a woman
sitting on the side of the railing. She had long black hair which clung to the tears on her face.
She made no effort to pull the strands away. The heavy door slammed shut behind me, startling
her. From the way she jumped I almost thought she’d fallen off the barrier. The moment she
planted her eyes on me the flush on her face faded into green. She threw her legs back over the
railing and lowered herself onto the cold concrete of the roof. Without saying a word I
crouched next to her and held her in my arms. She wailed into my gray hoodie and pushed
away locks of hair that blew into her mouth. She shook like a small dog in my arms.
“I’m so sorry,” she screamed over and over. I didn’t exactly know how to comfort her
except for sitting with her and making sure she was safe. After a while a few of my own tears
escaped my eyes. She pressed her hands to her chest and tried her best to regulate her breathing.
“Everything is so much,” the woman told me, “no matter what I do there is always this
voice telling me that life only gets harder.” I never knew I could understand someone to the
level I understood this woman that I had just met. Every word she said felt like the only truth in
a world full of lies.
“What about you? What are you doing out here?” She choked on the last part. I had to
think for a moment. What am I doing out here? There are a lot of things I could say. I could
even lie.

1
 “I guess my life is just…over. There isn’t anything left for me to live for.” She pushed out
a shaky breath, leaning her head against my shoulder.
”Do you think it gets better?” the woman says through sobs. I don’t answer the
question. She noticed the note that started to come out of the pocket of my hoodie.
“May I?” She asks. I nod.
“It’s not like its a secret. I wrote it for people to read.” For a few moments, she skims the
words along the page. When she finishes, she folds the note and holds it to her chest.
“List people who care about you.” It wasn’t a question, she was telling me to. I didn’t
really know how to answer. Of course I had my dad. He was always working, though, so he
wasn’t there for me in that way. And I guess I have my mom back in El Salvador. We don’t talk
much.
“No one.” I feel a part of me break inside. Even in a moment where it’s okay to be
vulnerable, I try to blink away the tears clouding my vision.
“Wrong.” She says
“How would you know?”
“I care about you.” I pull her closer to me and move her tangled hair out of her face. I
notice her eyes are green, she either slept in makeup or cried it all off, and the whites of her eyes
were bloodshot and tired.
“What’s your name?” I ask.
“Charlotte.” Her voice is barely a whisper.
“I’m Andre.”
“Will you try it again?” She sucked in a breath and exhaled shakily.
“What do you mean?”
“Next time, will you try to kill yourself again?” I shook my head, although it wasn't an
answer, more that I was thinking.
“I don’t know. Will you?” She doesn’t answer.
“Should we get off the roof?” I forgot we were up here in the first place. I turn to gaze
down at the moving cars and buzzing city beneath us. None of them know what is going on
here. None of them know that if things went a little bit differently, one or both of us could
have been dead right now.
“Do you eat Charlotte?”
“Not usually.”
“Do you want to?”

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 Charlotte-2
Andre took me to a diner I had never been to before, Dragonfly. I was never going to go,
either, because I was going to die today. He acts like he owns the place. He waves at a few
waiters and takes a seat in the corner. I don’t know why I didn’t just jump when I heard the
door close on the roof. I could have, then maybe I wouldn’t be distracted by this guy in a diner.
“You should try the pancakes here. They are the best you’ll ever have.” He tells me. I
only nod and b=play with my hands under the table. I don’t want him to think that he “saved
me” back there. I am just as sad and hopeless as I was when I stepped over that railing. A
waitress comes over and greets him by name. Damn, he really does come here a lot. I don’t ask
for anything.
“Be that way, then.” He laughs, handing our menus over to the waitress.
“How come you seem so happy, now?” I ask, “You were up there for the same reasons I
was, yet now you’re smiling and ordering pancakes. Andre shrugs and reaches for the silverware
wrapped in a napkinI knew that he didn’t want to talk about it but there was no way I could
just let it go. I was the most vulnerable I could have possibly been with him and he wouldn’t
answer the simple question of why he was up there in the first place. We sat in silence with the
hope that he would come up with some sort of answer, it never came. The waitress returns
with a coffee for Andre and water for me. I swirled the straw in my water a few times without
actually drinking any of it. A different waitress brings us plates of pancakes and hashbrowns
and sausage and bacon and biscuits. How the hell could Andre eat so much for himself?
“You should get in on some of this.” He said through mouthfuls. I glanced out the
window, desperate to change the subject.
“I think we should go to the park after this.” I suggest. Andre cuts through more of his
pancakes.
“Oh so there’s going to be an after this?” He jokes. I watched as he stuffed his face like it
was his last meal. Maybe it was. I still knew nothing about this guy. It’s kind of disgusting, kind
of endearing. I shaked my head and smiled.
“Oh so you smile, too?” Before I let that comment make me smile even more, I asked,
“Hey can I get some of that hashbrown?” Andre pushed the plate closer to me and shoveled
what was left of the food into his mouth. I broke the hashbrown into a smaller piece and ate it,
trying not to think too much about it.

3
 “Let’s go to that park.” Andre wiped his face with a napkin and threw two twenty
dollar bills on the table. Then, he grabbed my wrist gently and guided me out of the diner.
Once we got outside, the sun felt blinding in contrast to the dim lighting of Dragonfly.
“You never answered my question.” I tried not to give him the impression that I was
angry or upset that he didn’t answer, I just wanted him to tell me.
“Which one?” He asked, looking straight ahead. Maybe he didn’t even hear me when I
said it the first time.
“How are you so happy when you were just on the roof of a building?” I repeat.
“I don’t know. I decided last night during a breakdown that in the morning, I would
disappear. That episode seems to be fading away now. One of the harder parts of borderline.
You almost do something crazy and then you realize that it was never even that serious.” I
didn’t know he had BPD. I didn’t really know him at all. At this point, I want to know
everything about him.
“When were you diagnosed? Sorry if that's too personal.”
“Nah it’s okay, I was nineteen. I saved up, like, a thousand dollars to get it, though. Just
for a piece of paper telling the world that I’m messed up in the head.”
“I’m glad you were able to find out what it was.” He nodded. I could tell he didn’t want
to stay on the topic for very long. We got close to a lightpost, where Andre had to run and spin
around it, of course. The park wasn’t too far at this point. A million words swirled in through
my mind like a whirlpool but none created a coherent sentence. I couldn’t tell whether to ask
another question, or if he would think I’m poking around in his personal life, which he was
not at all obligated to tell me. So instead of doing something that could be the wrong move, I
decided to just keep my mouth shut until we arrived at the park.
A few children ran around the playground and swung themselves across the monkey
bars. I followed Andre to the only vacant bench. For a while, we just watched the kids run wild,
and observed an airplane as it flew by.
“Do you want kids?” Andre asked. The question caught me off guard at first. My
question about his mental health history probably caught him off guard as well, though.
“I never thought I would live long enough for it to be an option.” I couldn’t believe
that I was telling some of my deepest thoughts to a man I just met an hour and a half ago.
“What about you? Do you want kids?” As selfish as that feels, I wanted to shift the
focus back to Andre. I want to know every detail of him, though I don’t want to have to share
the same kind of information about myself.

4
 “I would love to have a few mini-me’s,” his face fell, “I just wouldn’t be able to afford
them. Plus I’m still living with my dad.” He looks down and then back to the kids screaming
and chasing each other to the slide.

5
 Andre-3
She never talks about herself. I would love to know any random fact about her, but she
always turns it around on me. It doesn’t bother me; at least I don’t think it does. If it’s helping
her cope then I think it’s fine.
“Let’s cloud watch.” I suggest. She didn’t really have the option to say no, I was already
sliding down to the dry grass and looking at the sky. Hesitantly, Charlotte joins me.
“That one looks like a crab.” I squinted and pointed to it.
“Nice.” she replied. I don’t really think she saw it from how blinded she was from the
bright sun, but I guess that’s fine. The sky was pretty much clear. That didn't stop us from
finding shapes in it.
“That one looks like a baby.” Charlotte pointed to a blob in the sky that resembled
nothing of a baby. I nodded anyway, if I looked like a baby to her, then it looked like a baby to
me. I looked over to her and for the first time her face was bright with life. She turned to meet
my gaze, the sun glistening in her deep green eyes. Her hair was tangled, as if she hadn’t
brushed it in a few days. We couldn’t watch each other for too long. She had to squint the sun
away in order to see me.
“What?” She asked, a small smile started to spread across her face.
“Can we be honest for a sec?” We both adjusted ourselves to rest on our elbows, facing each
other.
“Do you feel safe around me?” She took a moment to think about it.
“Yeah, it kinda feels like I’ve known you so much longer than just a couple of hours.” I
nod. I don't know why I asked that.
“Have you noticed that most of our conversations are just questions?” Charlotte asks,
shutting one eye to block the sun from her heated face.
“Yeah.” I pulled my arm out from under myself and went back to looking at the sky.
“I’ve always wanted to go to Hawaii. I feel like the sky would be so clear.” Charlotte
said, taking a hand to cover her scrunched face.
“I’ve always wanted to travel to Europe.” I said.
“Let’s go together.” I almost forgot that only a couple hours ago she was going to die. I
was going to die.

6
 “I’d like that.” I try to keep my voice neutral. “Maybe we can go canoeing or
snorkeling.”
“When I was like, 8, my family and I went canoeing together. My brother pushed me
off the side into the water.” I tried to hold in a laugh. It didn’t work. Charlotte laughed along
with me.
“I didn’t know you had a brother.” I felt dumb as soon as I said it. Of course I didn’t
know that. I just met her.
“I live with him. His name is Ryland. He’s a pain in my ass but I love him.” The ends of
her mouth twitch up.
“That’s nice. It’s just me and my dad at home.” The kids from earlier are gone and there
isn’t a cloud in the sky. Our eyes are locked in the blue abyss anyway.
“What happened to your mom? If you don’t mind.” She didn’t put too much weight
into her words. I could tell she didn’t want to ruin the light mood.
“She still lives in El Salvador. Luckily, Pa and I were able to move here, but she
decided to stay with Abuela and Abuelo.” I leep trying to focus on learning more about her, so
I ask, “How about your parents?” She closed her eyes and sighed. I’m not sure if that was the
right thing to ask. Did I just ruin everything?
“Ryland and I gre up in foster care. Because sometimes mommies and daddies don’t
love their kids. So what do they do? They give them to someone else.” She took a shaky breath,
eyes concentrated on the atmosphere. “And these other people didn’t love Ry and I, either. The
end.”
“How did you get out of there?” I was glad she finally decided to open up to me.
“No. No. I don’t want to talk about this right now.” Charlotte shot up from the
ground and caught a tear with the heel of her hand before it got the chance to fall over the edge.
She stood up before me and turned around without making sure I was following; I was.
“I need a goddamn cigarette.” Charlotte sped away, I followed close after her.

7
 Charlotte-4

I don’t know why I was walking away. One second the walls come down and I’m
opening up to this random guy, and the next thing I know I’m putting up walls and shutting
him out of a room I built for the two of us. I stop after a block and pull a spare cigarette
floating in my pocket.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know that would upset you.” I light it and hold it in my mouth for a
few seconds, mostly to stall speaking.
“Whatever, it’s fine. I don’t know what’s wrong with me.” I spoke more aggressively
than I really felt. The freaking cancer stick in my hand was helping a little.
“There’s nothing wrong with you.” Andre began to reach for my hand, then pulled
away. After a few seconds of silence, I offered the cig to him.
“Nah those are nasty.” He declined. I shrugged, took a final pull and stomped it under
my shoe.
“Let’s go to a bar. I can’t deal with today anymore.” My emotions build in my chest and
throat. I try my best to hold them down.
“With what money?” I pull a wad of cash out of my pocket. “I was gonna leave it with
Ryland but, oh well.” I take Andre’s hand and we make our way to a bar a couple streets down.
I stayed careful not to say much on the way because I could tell he was still worried about my
outburst earlier. Once we are just a store away from the bar I stop dead in my tracks. Andre
stops with me.
“I’m sorry for my emotional outburst earlier. Mental illness is a bitch.” I laugh a little to
let him know everything is okay now.
“It’s okay, I would never hold that kind of thing against you.” He smiles at me and this
is the first time I notice how big his smile is. He doesn’t care about whether or not his teeth are
white or if he might have a snaggle tooth. He’s so unapologetic.
Inside the bar was pretty much empty aside from a few middle aged men sipping beer..
We take a seat at the end of the counter and order shots. It was shot after shot and drink after
drink and soon enough we were talking and drinking and slurring and now it was dark outside.
“Crap. It’s almost 8:00,” Andre points out. “We should get you home.”
“No, please stay here. We haven’t even danced yet” I whined.

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 Andre-5

Charlotte dragged me to the dance floor now full of people. She's trashed and can
barely stand yet she locked her arms around my neck and moved her hips to the loud music.
Although she was running on manufactured happiness, she whooped and sang along and I
danced with her. Charlotte twirled and moved and climbed me like a jungle gym. I smiled at
how care-free she is. She screams over the music, “Can I kiss you?” I didn’t know what to say.
She wasn’t in the headspace to consent to that right now. I didn’t answer right away.
“Please.” She pleaded, still grabbing onto me and wobbling around.
“Okay.” Charlotte cupped my face with her hands and planted her lips onto mine. She
reeked of alcohol and sweat but so did everyone else here. I reached one arm around her waist
and pulled her closer to me. I pulled away first. She had this huge grin on her face and went
straight back to dancing.
“Andre,” She hung on the ‘e’ for way too long.
“What’s up?”
“When you decide to leave me. Like, when you don’t want to be here anymore I might
attempt again.” She shouted over the blaring sound of buzzing people and music. Again, she
went right back to dancing as if nothing happened. I guided her outside and sat her down on
the sidewalk bench.
“Charlotte I know that you won’t be able to absorb this right now, but I care about
you, okay? You’re my friend now, even if we just met this morning. I will do anything in my
power to help you and I pray you’d do the same.” Although I was more sober than she was, it
was still hard to keep a train of thought and come up with the right things to say.
“Who knows, I might even love you already.” I said. I didn’t even think about it. I just
told this girl I met today that I love her. Charlotte looked at me with a mixture of terror and
confusion before vomiting at my feet. I scooped up her thick hair while she got the rest of it
out, then called us a cab.
We settled on going to Charlotte’s house since Ryland wouldn’t be home tonight. I
stared out of the window and watched the dark shadows pass by with Charlotte’s head resting
on my shoulder.

9
 As soon as we walked in the door to Charlotte’s apartment, she headed straight for her
room. I followed. She looked like she was being weighed down by a bag full of bricks when she
flopped into her bed, shoes still on. I turned to the living room and behind me Charlotte
whispered, “Please don’t leave.” I gave in and crawled into bed next to her. The two of us were
asleep in seconds.

10
 Charlotte-6

I woke up with a huge headache. I sat up and looked around to find myself in my own
bed. I had no idea how I got there. The last thing I remembered was being angry and taking
Andre to a bar. Andre. Where the hell did he go? I ripped back the covers and stood up way too
quick, sending a shock of pain through my head. I ended up finding Andre in the kitchen,
pouring two glasses of water and sliding one down the table to me.
“Good morning sleepyhead.” He laughs.
“Morning. What time is it?”
“Almost 11:00. How’d you sleep?” He took a gulp of his water.
“Like crap, my head is killing me. I don’t remember any of last night.” Andre laughed
and shook his head.
“Oh my god, I kissed you didn’t I? I’m so sorry. I get that way when I’m drunk I
honestly should not be trusted around alcohol-”
“It’s fine, Char. Not as bad as me telling you I loved you.”

11
 Andre-7

A shiver of embarrassment rolls through my spine. Charlotte takes a sip of her water, as
if to think of what to say.
“As a friend, of course.” I clarified. A smile grew on her face. Saved it.
“Well then I love you, too. As a friend, of course.” A wink. She winked at me. Some part
of me wanted to pry. What was that about? Who are you, really?
“Want to get coffee?” She asks.
“Of course.” I replied. Suddenly I remembered. Dad. I didn’t tell him where I was last
night. As Charlotte gets her things together I shoot him a text: Hey. Sorry I didn’t come
home last night. Stayed at a friend’s.
“You ready?” Charlotte asked.

I vaguely remember the layout of her apartment complex. Creamy walls and
brown carpet made the floor, it looked almost like hotel flooring. Now I noticed that almost
every handle to each door appeared loose from usage. Even at this hour, you could hear faint
sounds of married couples arguing and married couples having the time of their lives. The
elevator smelled like sweat masked with air freshener. When we finally made it outside, the air
was cold, the kind that burns the back of your throat. A coffee shop was just a few blocks away,
one that I had been to before. Love’s coffee.

The shop was buzzing with wannabe writers sipping their latte’s and pretending to
write on a mostly empty google doc, usuals coming in to make small talk with tired employees,
and a few readers sitting alone.

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