• I stared over the cliff. It was my time. The emptiness wasn't worth it anymore. Life wasn't worth it. I closed my eyes and jumped. To my greatest surprise, I awoke in, what seemed to me, seconds. The pain was filling. I felt stronger. I had survived death. Sitting up, I saw him. He was in the chair beside my hospital bed. He had black hair and the palest of skin that I had ever seen. This boy was my savior? I grinned slightly. He had no clue what he had just gotten himself into.

    My name is Anion Serano. Yeah, I was named after a type of ion. My parents were science nerds or something. They died when I was very young, in a fire. Since then, I lived with my grandma. She hated my father and saw my mother as a fool for marrying him. So, naturally the treated me like a dog. I went to school and got made fun of for the weirdness of my name. No one cared. I hated being empty all the time.

    One day, I lost it. I couldn't see any reason to live. My light was lost, my parents were gone, I had no friends, my family saw me as a freak. From then on, I started jumping from high places, putting myself through unimaginable pain, and purposely getting into dangerous situations. I ended up in the hospital about fifty times in one year. By the New Year I had had seven broken ribs, a broken femur, been in a body cast, and had been put into at least two rehabilitation facilities. I was barely at school, so I had to repeat the eighth grade.

    When I returned the next school year, one of the girls had found out about my thirst for death. She made fun of me for it. I had had enough of the teasing, so I got into a fight with her. I won, but the teachers and her friends were trying to restrain me. I broke free and ran toward the river where I had jumped many times. When I stopped, I was on a cliff above it, a place where I had been wanting to jump for many months. This was it.

    I jumped. I fell. I should have died.

    When I awoke in that hospital bed and saw my savior, I was filled with hope. Maybe he could help me. He was pretty good-looking, which was a plus, but I owed him. I would always be there for him.

    "Miss, you should lay back down," said a passing nurse who had noticed that I had awoken. "I'll go get the doctor."

    I tried to speak, but I couldn't. My throat hurt as well as everything else. I wanted to ask what his name was so I could thank him properly when he woke up as well. Most of all, when he awoke, I wanted to hear his voice. What would it sound like? The nurse was long gone, however, and minutes later only the doctor returned.

    "Miss Serano," he said calmly. "I'm glad to see that you've decided to join us finally. That was quite a fall you took there. You should be glad that my son was skipping out that day, or you would have never made it. Still, I haven't quite forgiven him for playing hookie." The doctor looked at his son in disgust. "Your vitals seem good. I'm guessing you're still in immense amounts of pain, though. You should just lay down and take it easy for a while."

    I hadn't noticed that he had been checking my blood pressure or anything like that. I couldn't feel it anyway. I tried to speak again.

    "Doctor," I croaked. He turned around. "What's his name?"

    "Kaden Luka," the doctor said clearly. "I'm Dr. Kiiro Luka. It's nice to meet you, finally, Anion Serano."

    When he left, something stirred to my left.