July 1st



How could anybody understand? It wasn’t me being crazy. It was him being crazy. I didn’t do anything, but of course he’s dead so nobody can ask him.


July 3rd


Maybe I am going crazy. I have nothing to live for. I am alone. Despondent.

Only words keep me company now. Nothing else. Nobody wants to come near me. They say I’ll get better. They say I was depressed. I was neither. He was.

But I do not talk. They will not get me to. Only nod my head. Shake my head. I put my thoughts down on this paper and pray that someday it will be read.


July 7th


“Now, Hannah,” my counselor says. “This must stop.”

I shake my head. No.

They have given up trying to get me to talk. They have given up trying to give me medication. Now I simply sit while they talk. The words flow in one ear and out the other.

Today it’s the If you talk you can tell us you’re innocent and we can stop investigating you lecture.

I stay in my seat until it’s time to go. Then I walk calmly out the door.


July 9th


It was dark and we were on the balcony I just wanted to get down but he wanted to kiss me so I said okay and then I found a blade against my neck and he was pushing me pushing me over to the edge I could see the city below and

Stop. That part is too painful.


July 12th


“This is your new counselor, Hannah.” The lady says. I nod. Okay.

She tries to get me to talk. I remain silent. Finally she gives up and give me the who do you think you’re fooling, everyone’s worried, stop acting like an idiot and talk lecture. I ignore her.


July 13th


Then I grabbed the knife and looked at him and I knew he was crazy knew I couldn’t kill him like he was about to do to me and then

No. No, no, no, no, no!


July 15th


He looked at me and I knew he was about to do something and I started running and there was blood and I thought I had cut him and then I realized it was my own and it was mixed with tears and he jumped jumped jumped over the railing and he didn’t scream and he was gone.


July 16th


There. I said it. He jumped. I didn’t push him. See? He tried to kill me. I don’t care. I did then. I was at the top of the building with a knife when the police came and of course they thought that I has pushed him. So they put me in a mental hospital. I don’t care. Can’t care. Won’t care. Oh, I don’t know! My thoughts are tangled inside my head and I can’t get then to unravel.


July 17th



I stand in front of my mirror. “It wasn’t me.” My voice is cracked from lack of use. I swallow and keep talking.

Just talk. I don’t car what I say. Talk and don’t try to stem the flow of words. Talk. Keep talking. If you stop you lose the ability to speak. Keep talking.


July 20th


“Hannah, we just want to know what happened.”
“You want to know?”

It feels good. Good to talk.

“Yes.” She is tentative, afraid that if she says anything I’ll go back inside my shell.

“He… he…” I can’t. I can’t tell her. All that practice was wasted. A sob catches in the back of my throat.
I close my eyes and talk. It comes so easy I can’t believe it. “He jumped. I didn’t push him.” I can imagine his sandy hair in his eyes as he fell. “We were at the hotel for dinner with my parents. We went up the elevator to the top floor.” I almost stop but I can’t. “He had a knife. He tried to kill me.” His look of terror at what he had done, but also so calm. My eyes fill with teardrops. “Then I got the knife, I don’t know how.” They spill over. “And he jumped.” There I was, crouched at the top of the tower, holding a bloody knife.

“You didn’t do it?” My counselor asks. I shake my head.

“Do you have proof?” I shake my head.

“Hannah… the police won’t take the word of a girl who is possibly…ah… mentally unstable.”

“They have to!”

“Have you written anything…since then?”



July 22nd


He reads the last page in my book. “Can you tell me how this happened?”

I don’t want to. But the police officer is waiting.

So I talk.


15 YEARS LATER

September 3rd


Do I know you?

I think I do.

But I will watch you

As you grow

And then

Maybe I will know you better.

But do you know me?

I think not.

I could tell you

About that night

On the balcony.

I could tell you

About the weeks that followed.

I didn’t speak.

Didn’t care.

But you still would not know me.

I could tell you everything about me.

My whole life.

Every moment.

But you still would not know me.

So you can watch me,

As I watch you.

See me.

Follow me.

I can teach you.

Everything,

Or,

Simply as much as I can.

I can show you

What this world is like.

Full of pain and sorrow.

But also joy,

And love

And truth.

And words.

I will teach you,

My dear child,

The beauty of

Words