Saving lives

I took a deep breath as I watched the train approach. My mind had been made up, but that didn't mean that this would be easy. In about twenty seconds it would arrive where I was. It wouldn't have enough time to stop. That's what I was counting on. My legs moved almost automatically, taking me towards the edge of the platform as the horn of the train blared loudly.

Just as I reached the edge, with about ten seconds before the train's arrival, and my foot left the solidity of ground, a hand wrapped roughly around my arm, and I felt myself fall back and hit the ground hard. The air rushed from my lungs, and I saw the train rush by in front of me. I had missed my chance.

My vision of the train was blocked as the man who had pulled me away from the edge dropped on my chest, knocking the little air I had gotten back into my lungs back out of my chest. His eyes burned with anger, and he had one hand raised in a fist behind his head. "The hell's wrong with you, you stupid fuck?" he called out to me. I blinked, confused. "Did you really think you were gonna just step out there in front of the train? Let it run you over? Were you gonna just throw your life away like that idiot?"

I tried to push myself away from the man, but he used his other hand to push me down against the pavement. "What's it to you?" I asked him in return. "Why the hell should you care? It's not like anyone else does."

I felt his fist make contact with my face. It stung, and and combined impact of his fist and the ground beneath my head made me dizzy. "Don't you give me that shit, fucker," he spit bitterly at me. "Just because no one says it to your face doesn't mean people don't care. When you die, people will cry. People will be pained. They may even follow in your footsteps. Do you really want to be responsible for that?"

I tried to push him off, but he pinned my arm to the ground. "No one will cry for me. No one ever even talks to me! How can someone cry over someone they've never known?"

"Because they will never have the chance to get to know that person!"

For some reason, those words hit me. From somewhere deep in the back of my mind, I remembered when my mother died when I was a child. I had hardly ever seen her, because she had been in the hospital so much, and yet I cried at her funeral. I hadn't thought about her in a long time.

Almost immediately, the man stood up off of my chest and held a hand out to me. Hesitantly I took it, and he lifted me back up to my feet. "Promise me you aren't going to attempt some stupid shit like that again." I nodded silently at him. "Good boy. Don't ever let me catch you even thinking about something like that. I'll get back on you and beat the ever loving shit out of you."

With that, the man simply walked away. I watched him, unsure of what had happened, but was distracted when I heard the train's horn blow again as it pulled away from the station. When I looked back, the man was gone.