It was two weeks before college graduation when the first outward signs of use started to creep over Chase's body. One after another, he was collecting commentary about how tired he looked, had he been hitting the drugs too hard, the booze, people wondering what secret parties he'd been to because he'd always seemed like a sensible guy. Not that they knew where he wandered off to the few weeks he skipped school and just disappeared for a few days. He could be wholesome and sensible only most of the time.

He was over the edge. Teetered on it for years, had finally fallen off. He could barely move his hands without pain. His knees didn't work. He'd made it to college on money alone, no swim scholarship for him. Hadn't been near the pool in three years.

His mind burned with hate and revenge and senility that was turning his thoughts into sponge. Age-related dementia in a twenty two year old was ridiculous, they diagnosed him with late-onset ADD and pumped him full of drugs that didn't work. He took them anyway, desperate for some sort of relief and they did change his condition, a lateral slide from bad to bad. He was throwing up from some kind of stomach ailment he didn't want to look up on WebMD and if he heard "you're too young for this" from another doctor he was going to scream.

Caleb was no help. Ever since the spring he'd refused to talk to Chase, attacking him on sight, and while his mind was clear on why that might be the rest of him couldn't understand why Caleb hated him so damn much. They were just the same. They were the same. And he was in trouble, and shouldn't Caleb at least feel some kind of sympathy for the devil? It never worked. The second time Caleb and Pogue had broken three of his ribs and left him spitting up blood in the woods. There hadn't been a third time.

Chase went back to the Marblehead cliffs and stared down. Serve them right to find him here, he thought with a brain too tired to be vicious about it. It would serve them right to see him broken even if he didn't think they'd know what it was like, or be able to understand what he wanted to throttle them into understanding.

He spread his arms open wide and called wind just to feel it against his back. He'd pulled his shirt off a few minutes earlier and it blew off the cliff in a dead flutter. The wind was cold. The air was wet, droplets sliding down his skin behind his waistband. It felt good. Like tears. Like mourning. They were hot down his cheeks as he ignored them and took a step forward. Another.

Chase toppled into the wind and felt the power singing through his brittle veins. He soared all the way down. Cried with relief. He just wanted to go home.

Go to the top! For you have reached the bottom.