Garett, his name had been. 

I kick the tied-up garbage bag to the drop of the jagged cliff, peering down gently. Foam splashes and blooms up the corners of each rock, bubbling before fizzing away. If someone fell down, that’d be it for them. I sit down. 

The sky is overcast with salt-filled clouds. Condensation sticks to my arms, a cold sweat trickling down my back from the sheer excitement of it all. I pet Garner through the poorly tied-up bag, black plastic wrinkling beneath me. I honestly can’t tell which way up he is and if it’s his head or his feet.

“You should see the view from here… bet you would like it.” With a smile, I nudge the heavy bag up in an upright position, slanting it against my side for support. The fleshy stench breaches my lungs and I scrunch my nose.

“You should wear more deodorant, honestly. Eugh.” I turn my head to the side. The grass below is a bluish-green, reflecting the atmosphere. Behind me is a graceful garden abloom with the purples and pinks and yellows and oranges of fresh florets. It’d be covered with tourists usually, but travel restrictions have emptied the place out. Either way, even if there was a person here they’d probably end up uprooted and flung over the edge.

Gareth thumps down next to me as I lean back into the green, arms propped behind my head and eyes tilted towards the sky. You’d tell me today’s pretty lousy, but the cornflower sun flashing down covers the grass in a comfortable cerulean that says that it’s gonna be alright. The breeze smells like fog and rain, even though it’s been a week since the last storm. 

Epinephrine is still coursing through my blood-- I’m jittery and can’t shake the overwhelming elation blossoming in my heart. Part of me is hoping for someone to sneak up on me, to start a fight they definitely can’t win. A puff of air escapes my lungs.

It’s a peaceful kind of quiet, and I can only hear the sound of blood and waves crashing against my ears and the jagged stones below. With a sharp laugh, I grip onto the grass and sputter out chuckles until my sides hurt and the corners of my mouth are sore. Back in grade school, I’d collect ribbons of flowers from here to bring to you. You’d laugh and throw them over the cliff. Reaching to my side, I pluck out a bright yellow dandelion. I peel off the sepals and twirl the stem between my fingers before tossing it off the edge. 

A car is backing up on the cliff to the left of me, about a hundred yards away. I jerk my head upwards, scrambling to pull a gun from my pocket and point it towards the car. My heart pounds and a feral instinct buds in my mind, telling me to protect myself, to protect Garth, to get rid of the threat. The person shouts loudly and I can hardly hear the drag of a heavy object thumping over the grass.

A blur of a suit and black hair rises from behind the car's hood. He’s dragging a beige farming bag behind him, pulling it up and heaving it over the cliff before plopping back into a bed of flowers.

I turn the gun up to the sun and shoot. He jumps, scrambling to look at me.

“Anderson! What’s up?” I shout, waving frantically and dropping the handgun. With a sigh, he runs a hand through his hair and waves back.

“Hey, John!” 

“Are we still on for Wednesday night?”

“Yeah!” The rest is indecipherable.

“What?”

“Casey says he’ll come, too!” He repeats.

“Oh, awesome!”

“Who you got over there?” Anderson nods to the body bag.

“I don’t know, think his name is Garron? Definitely a nice one, I’d show you but his face got a little messed up in it all.”

“Have any fun?”

“Yeah! One sec, let me come over there.” I glance up. He walks over and leans against the hood of his silver car. I pull my mask down and lean over to press a chaste kiss onto Gary’s forehead (or toes… still can’t tell). The bag slides wetly under my lips, squelching against something that feels awfully rubbery. My lips curl up against the plastic.

“You were such a nice one. Have a good swim down there, don’t forget to tell me what kinds of sea monsters you see!” I whisper gently into his maybe-ear maybe-foot. With another smile, I hug the body bag and heave it over the ledge. For a scrawny guy, he’s pretty heavy. 

“Hurry up, what are you doing?” Anderson yells. 

The fog’s a bit concealing, but I can still see him relatively well. I push myself up to my feet and grab my bookbag, jogging up the ledge and to his car. There are two cliffs, both facing the same way with a little indent separating them. Probably because of a landslide or something of that sort, there’s a messy pile of rocks crumbled right under. If I were a bird, I could jump off and fly right over. A seagull, you’d tell me. That’s your favorite bird.

A smear of blood is crusted into my thumbprint, and I slide it under my mask to suck it away. Anderson is holding his phone with one hand, swiping with the other. Bending down, I gather up a few flowers. A pink, red, purple, orange, and yellow. They’re slick with runny fog-water and dew, petals a sticky mess of pollen. Reaching into my bag, I pull out a roll of twine and sloppily tie the blossoms together. My palms are sweaty and stick to each other when I clutch the bundle between them.

Heart racing and fingers quivering, I almost tumble into Anderson in my rush to get over.

“Here,” I offer, placing the flowers into Anderson’s hands. He takes the bouquet and pushes it back into my hands. 

“I don’t want this.”

“Come on!” I grin. He groans and takes it, tossing it haphazardly into the back of the car.

“One day, I’ll be shoving you off that ledge.”

“Counting on it.” With a wink, I slide into his passenger seat. Loose bits of broken off corollas stick to my pants like a crime scene. The car is stuffy and smells like metal and blood. When he sits down, I force myself to only fiddle with my gun shoved into my pocket, relishing in the smooth, frozen metal against my soft denim pants. You wouldn’t even wait. You’d jump the gun and shoot.