On The Ledge

On The Ledge
Chapter 1 - Emotions aside
I was a brisk night Daniel,and as he has been many times before, was sat on the ledge outside his window above the back door of his house. For some reason he doesn't question how he found himself there, after a long hard day out here he is looking at the moon and stars. He found comfort in knowing that if nobody was around to judge him or to question him then he was safe and he didn't have to deal with the world for just a moment. Ever since that day he has often found him self climbing out this window time and time again, every time he needs a break or has no where to turn he stops everything and goes here. Now this may seem quite so sad and it make seem he has it hard but he doesn't look at it that way. All he sees it that he constantly has things put on him that he can't handle and doesn't know who he could go to for help, and even though he ends up on this ledge time and time again , not once has he considered the idea of jumping, taking too many pills or anything of the kind.

So you see this is a story of a guy who can't handle himself but doesn't need to because he has his place, his place that makes it all go away and lets him know he doesn't have to give up yet. One thing that you are probably wondering is why Daniel needs a special place, what is it that pushes him away from wanting to be a part of him day to day life?
Well lets go back to the days that things when down for Daniel. Now he never had an amazing life but a few years ago he was fine with what he had and never complained. At the age of 23 he has finished university and was working at a local restaurant called Little Blue Maiden as a manager. He was living in a house that suited his needs pretty well and he was living with a good friend that he met at university because it was easier to pay for the house with two people rather than one. One thing that made his house-mate feel sorry for him though was the fact that he never seemed to ever be dating anybody and was always alone. Now his house-mate Jason had been seeing the same girl for two years and things were going great for them so you would expect them to notice the difference in each others love lives. One thing that Daniel didn't expect though was that Jason was soon going to move out leaving Daniel on his own.

Daniel didn't have many friends , because although he wasn't a bad person in any sense of the word he didn't really know how to make friends with people and what to say in most situations. So, because of this Daniel considered himself lucky to have a friend like Jason. Sadly on September the 9th Jason had to tell Daniel that he would be moving out in 3 weeks to get a place with he girlfriend ( Soon to be fiancé if things went to Jason's plan ). Daniel didn't know how to respond.

“How am I suppose to pay for this house on my own “ Daniel said in a shocked and worried tone. Jason could only think to say “ I guess you'll have to get more hours at the restaurant or something, look man I want you to understand that this is something I have to do, I love Jodie and me and her have to take the next step in our relationship.”
A tear came to his eye as Daniel said “ But what about me? I don't have anyone are you just going to leave me alone.”
looking down at his feet” I'm sorry Daniel you have to understand that I have to do this for me I can't stay here when I need to be with the girl I love” Replied Jason.
Daniel picks up an ash tray from the side and throws it so it nearly his Jason and screams “ Get out , if you don't want to be here any more then I don't need you .”
Jason starts to leave and just before he steps out the door he drops a note on the floor and says “ sorry “ in a sad tone. This immediately makes Daniel realise how he is acting, how unfair he is being to his friend. He runs to the door and tries to get to door and apologise to Jason before he has gone. As he opens it he notices that Jason is already in his car and he tried to shout “sorry “ , but Jason has his music on and can't hear a thing. Jason drives off leaving Daniel on in out.
As he steps back indoors he feels a cold breeze before he shuts the door. He decides to pick up to note and read it sat at the bottom of the stairs. The note reads “I am sorry that I have to leave and I wish you the best in your life , please take care of yourself” with Jason's signature at the bottom. Daniel just cries to himself for the next 20 minutes.

Now two years later Daniel has been working 12 hours a day 5 days a week since he got the owner to give him the hours so he can pay for the house and since that day things just seem to have gotten worse. Before he managed to get the extra hours he ended up selling his television , Xbox , Guitar and even his desktop , having to downgrade to a netbook. But things got better after he got his hours at first. He managed to pay off bills he was behind on and could carry on without having to worry about his finances. Just as things were looking up though he got a call off his Father telling him that his Mother had died 3 days before and that he would have to attend the funeral in 3 weeks. After receiving this phone call Daniel just wanted to throw himself off a bridge as he sat in his living room in tears. It took him 5 days before he managed to call his Father back to say that he would be there.

Daniel never really spoke to his parents or anyone else in his family for a matter of fact. He pretty much stopped talking to them when he went to university and now that his mother had died he was realising how horrible he was for doing that. even after realising this ,after the funeral he still didn't put any effort in to keeping up with any family members. I guess he had gotten too used to just not speaking to people no-a-days.

One day at work the was a customer that was being rude to a waiter and he had been asked to sort it out , and when he tried to kick the customer out of the restaurant the woman sprayed pepper spray in his eyes. Leaving him on the floor in horrible pay holding his hands over his eyes as the woman left with her date. After recovering from this he decided that he was going home and would not be at work the next day for personal reasons.

Once he had gotten home after a 20 minute drive he went to his bathroom and looked into his mirror and looked at himself “ How useless are you ? Why can't you just have one good day ? How had is it to handle a freaking customer ? Why can't you do something right? “ He shouts at himself in frustration. He was about to go outside and just take a drive somewhere in the hopes that he could just get lost and use it as an excuse to not have to go to work the next day if his boss tried to complain over the phone. But as he stepped out his front door he looked up and say the first star of the night. Apon seeing this star he thought to himself “ I have never seen the stars appear before I just know there are not they at some point and then are after.” Soon he got to wondering how long it would take for the next star to appear and almost two minutes later of him checking out as much of the sky as he could see he noticed another star and for some reason he smiles. For some reason he had completely forgot about his current problems and his plans to get lost with his car and was wondering what would be a better spot to view the starts from. After looking around he realised that outside of his bedroom window there was a ledge and that seemed flat enough for a person to sit on. So went back indoor and changed into some more comfortable clothes that the current work clothes he still had on . Soon enough he was on the ledge looking at the sky and just thinking about what was going on in front of him instead of what was happening with his life. From this day on this was his spot and was the perfect place to not have to worry about anything any more just for a small amount of time.

After this his life didn’t get particularly better in any sense but he didn't get broken down so easily and was able to take the crap as he looked forward to his special spot the next time he needed to escape life.

Months later he was on his way home from work when he felt like getting a coffee so he went to a local coffee café and as he went to leave he noticed the most beautiful woman sitting at a table , and for some reason instead of just walking on by as he normally would he turn to this woman and without thinking asked her if she was alone.. she turned to him and ….

This is just the first chapter more to come in the next few days. Please give me some feedback so I can improve and do a much better job on the next chapter of on the ledge.
Thanks for reading :)