Untitled -Ryden-

Standing alone drenched by the rain, sitting on the curb outside my house. I take a look around and do the one thing I always do when I am in a spot of trouble - I dig my phone out of my pocket and call my best friend Spencer, praying to anyone that can hear me that he answers his own phone. As the monotonous ringing continues to pour from the device, I start to worry even more and my eyes start to sting as tears threaten to fall and dance their way down my cheeks along with the unsympathetic rain.

“Hello?” As I hear my friend’s groggy voice through the phone, I let out a gush of breath that I was not aware I had been holding and temporarily forgot how to speak. I let out a sob and I can tell that he immediately knows something is wrong.

“Ryan is that you, what’s wrong?”

I attempt to clear my throat and reply, “Yeah Spence, it’s me. Th-They kicked me out.” I pointlessly dry my eyes as I hear Spencer swear faintly through the phone and here something rustling around in the background. “Stay outside your house and I will be there to get you in ten minutes, okay?” He says almost breathlessly, I can tell he is moving quite fast and whisper out a forced “O-Okay, Spence” as he hangs up the phone and I am left alone in silence that is only broken by the harsh sound of the disengaged phone, which if I focus hard enough on, I can almost forget all my troubles.


                                                           * * *


My name is Ryan Ross, I am now twenty-one and that gloomy night has been haunting me ever since it happened five years ago, today. I was kicked out of my home and beaten by my parents after I told them something I had been hiding ever since my first day of high school. I guess I can’t blame them. When I first figured it out, I thought I was a disgrace too, but I have learnt that I’m just like everyone else.

Luckily my best friend, Spencer Smith, had accepted me for who I was for as long as he had known, which was pretty much just as long as I had known because it is impossible to hide anything from him. He knows me so well that he can just figure it out without me even saying anything about it. His parents let me stay at his house and I took up a job at a breakfast joint which served horrible coffee to try and pay my share. The hours were long and the pay was little but since it wasn’t very busy I could spend most of my days just dwelling in my own thoughts and dreams.

I hoped to one day be in a famous band so that I could spread my message to others and hopefully help some people too. That is what I had told my parents the day they kicked me out. Mum and Dad had always wanted me to follow in their footsteps, become a lawyer and make good money. I could have done it, I was getting good grades in school and even if I wasn’t, my father would have known how much money to “donate” to get me into whichever college was best.

But Law just wasn’t something that held my interest. I personally thought that most lawyers were just like hawks, searching for the weakest prey with the most money and most tragic story. It's one of the most horrible things in the world. They would do whatever they could just so they could feel more accomplished. Of course, that is just my opinion. It's based off my father I guess. He was a greedy man and always shoved his money in everyone else’s face. He would always tell everyone about the clients he got. It was almost like he thought that helping a man who burned down every single possession owned by another man get off without a single charge was something to brag about. Nope. I wanted to be a musician and even if it killed me, I would be in a famous band, just so I can shove it in my parents' faces and anyone else’s who thought that someone like me couldn’t do it. I could do it. Just because I’m different doesn’t mean I’m not their equal.

As the years went by, I had matured and grown wiser but was still withdrawn from the people around me. I had the occasional nightmare because of what happened when I was sixteen. I convinced myself that I was never going to be happy in life because of what my parents did. I found it hard to get close to people and the only person I ever showed my real self to was still Spencer. He still stuck by my side every day and we had started that band I've always dreamed of. We weren’t popular or famous or anything like that, but we made a living by performing in stingy bars to small crowds. It wasn’t so bad because we were doing something we loved.

We were still looking for the right people to join the band, and a few people had come and gone, but no one had been right so we kept some temporarily until we found someone with both the right skills and attitudes.

It was a particularly cold night, some time in the middle of winter, I think. I didn’t pay much attention to the date these days. I had given up on most things and just thought it was pointless counting down the time that we got older.

We had performed at a dirty and overpriced bar earlier that night and we had been surprised to find that the owner of a famous record label had been there to watch the bands performing to find new talent to add to his label.

After performing, he came to us and asked if we would like to audition tomorrow as a possibility to get a sponsor for our band. Needless to say, we were all excited and I was in my happiest than I have been in a long time. I looked over to Spencer and our newest band member, only to be met by beaming smiles and eyes that looked like they might just sparkle, almost like a child’s on Christmas when he finds that Santa has left him that bright red fire engine that he begged for and rewrote over and over again in his letter to the North Pole. But as I turned to face the fourth and final member of the band, I was met with not a look of joy, but with a face that only expressed sadness.

It was at that moment that I knew that something terrible was going to happen. In fear of what was going to happen, I left. I walked out of the bar and as far as away as I could without making it impossible to get back to the band's van.

It was later when I had reached a bridge which hung high above an icy stream, that I received a text from Spencer. As I read through the message, I experienced more emotions than I thought a small electronic device could trigger. The text said that our vocalist had quit the band because his wife was due to give birth during the next few days and he wanted to stay with her and find a job that could support his family better. It was a smart choice, and if I had a child on the way I would have done the same thing. But I still couldn’t help but feel like my dreams have been shattered, the one chance we had to make it big, ruined.

As I stumbled across the bridge, I made my way over to the railings to support myself. I looked over the side of the bridge and watched the water below, swishing around, looking like a dark abyss. As I watched the icy flow, almost hypnotized, I swung one leg over the rail and as I stared down into the water crashing into the rocks I thought that life is like a river. Just like the gushing water, we start out as a small flow and as our life has more substance added to it, we get bigger, faster and stronger, and as we travel down the path, we crash into things, and even collide with ourselves and this happens all our life until finally we move along and start to slow down and there are less things to disrupt us from reaching our final destination were we become tranquil and calm.

I swung my other leg over and shuffled closer to the edge. I felt the cool breeze hitting my entire body and I knew that this was it, my chance to be just another unnoticed part of the flow of life, and finally I will reach my own calmness. I concentrated on the water below and distantly registered a car screeching to a halt on the bridge. Dismissing the yells of the car's driver, I took the final step across the small expanse of hard and unforgiving concrete.

I shut my eyes and let my body fall, glad to say goodbye to the world that has been so harsh to me and as I felt myself tip over, I remembered the last thing my father ever said to me, “You aren’t my son anymore. I can’t have a homosexual living in this house. I hope you die.”

Surrounded by silence, my body is numb. Sharp pain is thrumming through my skull and it hurts to try and open my eyes, but I don’t care. I stay completely still and give into the silence, knowing that I can forget about everything. I can forget about how I was mistreated by my own parents because I was gay. I can forget about my crushed dreams. I can even forget about myself. I finally feel like I am truly calm...

...until I hear a quiet sound.

I can't identify what the noise is and I slowly crack open my eyes and look towards the source of the noise only to see my best friend sitting next to me, wet tracks stain his pale cheeks and his eyes are red and puffy. It is a heartbreaking sight and I can't help but reach out and touch his cheek. Spencer jumps at the touch and makes a weird squeaking noise as he envelops me in a bone crushing hug, leaving me gasping for breath.

“W-What happened?” My own voice sounds almost foreign to my ears, it is rough and sounds forced.

“You were going to jump-“ his voice cracked but he continued, “off a bridge. You were going to leave me, everything. This guy was driving past and saw you, he saved you, Ryan.”

I looked up to see that Spencer and I were in fact not alone in the stuffy little van that the band owned. Sitting on my other side was Jon, our guitarist, and kneeling at my feet was another man, his face flashed before my eyes and I remembered him from the bridge. His arms encircling my waist and being dragged back onto the road, hitting my head in the process.

Seeing the hurt that my friends were in made me feel so guilty. How could I ever leave them?

“Thanks… for saving me and everything.” I said turning to my savior.

“It’s okay. All in a days work for super Brendon… Oh, and sorry about your head,” he said as he smiled. “Is there anything else I can do to help?”

“No, the only thing that could possibly help us now is if you could sing.” As I said this Brendon just gave me a heartwarming smile, brightening up the atmosphere immediately.


                                                        * * *


My name is Ryan Ross, I am in a famous band that performs for hundreds of people around the world each night.

One year ago I was saved from my watery death by a handsome boy, and as he wraps his arms around my waist and kisses my cheek, it makes me think. Life is like a river, there are people throughout it that we crash into, and forces us to take a bad turn. But the right people can help your life become calm like the ocean at the end of that river, and eventually when everything around you is calm like the ocean, you might even fall in love.