Please note I"m only leaving 2 chapters of this story on FP. I'm editing it and self-publishing as "Like a Rolling Stone" by Rachel DeLuca on Amazon later this month. Stay tuned to my profile for the link!

Prologue

It was at least 100 feet to the water. The man glanced up into the night sky as if to assure himself that there was no moon, no stars under the swath of clouds, no ambient light from the city to cast down on him as he stepped gingerly out of the car's open door and onto the patchy grass. The water in the reservoir reflected nothing, a flat black darkness that, for a moment, he wished he could slip into along with the car and its grisly contents. The thought was fleeting; his life would never be the same – a half a life if anything – but it was still living and he wasn't quite ready to extinguish his last tiny glimmer of hope.

Despite the chill hanging in the dank air, he was sweating. A trembling hand swiped across his forehead but it did little good, his eyes stung with the sweat. The forty minute drive had done little to quell his anxiety, each passing minute ramping up his heartbeat more than any drug ever had. Pushing through the discomfort, the man turned toward the rear seat of his car, nose recoiling in disgust as he stared at the dark lump covered by a coarse blanket. Whether the disgust was at himself or what the blanket covered he wasn't sure – but he suspected it was a mixture of both and that it was a feeling he should get used to.

Taking a deep breath and holding it, the man pulled his cargo off the floor of the backseat. His stomach, already queasy from what he presumed was detox, roiled again and he stopped for a moment to get a hold of himself. With a final shove and an exhaled groan as he maneuvered the unwieldy thing into the front seat, the man stepped back, allowing the contents of his stomach to finally come up. There wasn't much as he had not been able to eat for days, and he dry heaved onto the parched ground. When finished, he kicked some gravel and dirt over the small patch of moisture.

The man then reached inside and turned the car's ignition back on, cringing as the sound cut through the eerie silence. A glance behind assured him that he was still alone and without pondering it further – because he had been thinking about this moment for days – he used a long, gnarled stick to punch the accelerator through the open window and leapt backward as the car hurdled uncontrollably toward the edge of the ravine. His heart beat so loudly in his ears that he could barely hear the explosion of sound as the car hit the water 100 feet below. He made it to the edge in time to watch the bumper disappear. He lay perched on the edge, motionless until the water slowly began to glass over again as though nothing had happened. A few large bubbles rose to the surface and popped.

He did not linger. Pushing himself up, he jogged toward the back road that led to the reservoir and headed into the bordering woods to disappear. It was darker than dark; not only in the air but down to his soul in that finite moment when he ended his life yet lived on.

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AN: Please move on to chapter 1. :)