To save a life?

I was a peaceful soul walking by the lonely shores. The sound of the wind and the music of the waves gave me the serenity my soul sought. The past years, I was struggling, chasing life. Now I thought I found my calm.

I walked through the soft sand and viewed the beautiful, red horizon. At my back was a cliff, standing like a giant guarding its calmness.

For a moment, I felt someone was watching. When I looked up I saw a soul not a giant. I watched him there, his feet were at the very edge of a rock, some twenty meters or more above. He was staring at the red horizon.

I was thinking of what to say or do. Should I call him up? If I did catch his attention, he might be caught off balance and plunged to the pointed rocks beside me. I could feel the wind up there, for his hair was blown by it.

"My name's Ed," finally I shouted. He only stared down blankly.

"I have no one to talk to, I'm all alone," I caught his eyes when I said alone. Loneliness may bring anyone to such despair.

"If you want, I'll climb up there," I was still shouting and thinking of a way to reach him and beat time before death would claim this man's destiny. If I was going to pass by the right side, or go to the back of the cliff where a road would lead me to him, there may be no more time.  This man was not himself. I knew it. I was there once.

I decided that there was no other way but to climb the cliff in front of me, a vertical ascent. The rocks and the eroding soil could lead me back down, and I may face death ahead of him. Or, we maybe together down.  Two were there to claim, the sand or the hungry rocks.

A force was driving me to get to him - save him. In that twenty meters above, his face was clear to my vision - a very lonely and frustrated face so full of the negative forces of hell or what.

I made my first step up. Stones and earth kept falling down. I was focused at him, the man was still in his former position - his feet glued at the very edge of the rock, never uttering a word.

Now, while I was ascending, various thoughts were in my mind. What right words should I utter to get his attention? At about half of my way, I thought of something to ask of him.

"Do you know the story of Jesus and Mary?" A point-blank question. Couldn't think of anything except those two words; so many bright ideas about life you wanted to relay but they just slipped from your mind in an emergency. I didn't bother looking up at the guy anymore. I was concentrated on my climb... and my story to tell.

"He was killed ... killed in front of her," I shouted. "He was a good man who had a loving mother. In his death, her heart was like pierced by a sword."

Careful of my feet and hands not to make a false move, I realized I was also telling a passionate story, this as tears were streaming from my eyes. Was I in a situation that I had to choose which life to save, mine or this stranger's?  But I never thought there was any other one.  Maybe, just maybe, there were angels guiding my fingers to scratch the surface of the stones or dig the earth to make me stick to the side of the world.  Just hold on, just hold on so I can reach you, I whispered.  Whispers that were full of wind and pleading, not words of pleading.

Nonetheless, I was in a happy moment of my life, finally I was doing something worthwhile - saving a life so precious, and I didn't care who this stranger was.

I reached the top, and he reached for my hand - gladly I should think.  We just sat there at the top of the rock and witnessed the red wharf becoming still. We watched it and found the answer why God made life so tough.