This has been edited. I mainly used Icaruss's critique, and I ended up taking out the girl's death scene. So, two questions for all of you:

1) I want the reason for the girl to leave to be vague, but do you get that she leaves/dies?

2) A lot of people have been telling me that I ramble in perfectly good sentences, and I'm seeing that. The only thing is, I'm bad at spotting it. While I'm learning to spot my own rambles, can you guys point them out to me? Just so I can see more of what you mean.

This is for ambercoultis's A Picture's Worth A Thousand Words contest.

The picture I chose to work with is at the end. Please don't look 'til the end - I want you to picture what I describe, not the picture. I just was required to add it for the rules.

Out of Focus

I picked a great day to end it. Dark and dreadful, the clouds hang low in the sky. The sun can't break through, and fog hides the dock, hugs the water.

My polished black shoes are speckled with gritty sand. It's nearly solid from the rain – it feels like clay. Like the clay I dragged her onto.

No. I won't think of her. Not now.

Behind me lie the sole blemishes on the beach – a straight line of my shoe prints. They draw attention to themselves, but there's no one around to pay any attention to them.

The beach is empty today.

-----

"What are you doing?" I asked.

She just smiled, throwing her arms above her head and spinning. Her yellow curls – golden beneath the afternoon sun – lifted off her shoulders, twirling along with her, beckoning me to come too.

"Dancing!" she said, her voice a music of its own.

"But there's no music," I argued. She laughed.

"You don't need music to dance, Mike!"

-----

This is a good place to do it. I'm so sick of the silence, but the ocean isn't quiet. It's an endless recording of noise: waves splashing against rocks, the dock, creating a foam cover; gulls crying out to each other, looking for food, killing, scavenging; the echo of my shoes as I walk down this endless dock.

-----

"You're crazy!" I told her as she swirled around, but I was laughing.

"It's fun; I promise!" She reached out to grab my wrist, pull me closer. Her hand is small, but her grip is tight on my wrist, and I come closer, breath in her scent.

"Fine. But if someone laughs at me…"

"Who's going to laugh? The trees?"

"You."

She came up right next to me, lifting her mouth to my ear. I drew in a sharp breath as her breath tickled my ear, bringing the smell of the trees and her hair in with the air. "I wouldn't laugh at you."

She drew back and pulled a little harder, her soft hand now clasped in mine, and I relented. I couldn't stand to be the one causing her to stand still when she was made to be in motion, even if there was no one but me around to see.

"So what am I supposed to do?" I asked her, a grin on my face. "Twirl?"

-----

I shove my hands deep into my pockets and walk onto the dock. I hadn't bothered stripping out of my Ralph Lauren suit earlier – it'll help weigh me down. But even with my shoes, I don't think I'm heavy enough. And I don't want to come back up.

Maybe I should have put rocks in my pockets. I heard of some author who did that once – it sent her straight to the bottom. That's what I need.

I look back over my shoulder, but I can't tell if the end of the dock's three or thirty or three hundred feet away through this fog. I try to tell myself that they wouldn't make a dock that long – that it's probably only a few steps – that if I turned around to get rocks, it wouldn't even take that long.

But I walk forward, convincing myself that my jacket is thick, made for autumn, and that my shoes are big and heavy.

If I had turned around, gone to get rocks, I don't think I would be able to make myself come back. And I want to do this. I have to do this.

-----

"You're supposed to dance!" She pulled me closer, grasped both of my hands in hers. Leaned back, pulled against me, left me to do the same. We twirled around, faster and faster, both of us relying on the other to defy the gravity that was crashing down on us.

"This isn't exactly dancing!" I yelled over the tornado we had created.

"Is it fun?"

She spun faster and faster, pulling me along with her. I gripped her hands tightly, using her weight to balance myself while she used mine. "I guess."

"Then it's dancing!" Her smile was huge, lighting up her pale face. She was all I could see. The rest of the world – the bridge, the trees, the slowly setting sun – they all flashed by too quickly. But she was the constant. She was right there, right in front of me.

-----

It's easier this way. I know it's not right, but it is easier.

I doubt this will feel good. Actually, it will probably feel like shit, having my lungs fill up with water, my clothes weigh me down, darkness everywhere.

But it can't be worse than not doing it.

-----

My hands became coated in sweat as we danced, and they started to slip through her grip. She smiled slyly at me and loosened her grip. Her fingers let go and left me to fly through the air alone. I landed on the ground with a thud, and when I looked up, I couldn't get my head to stop swimming long enough to focus on her.

But I heard her laughter – the music to her dance.

"I thought you said you wouldn't laugh at me," I accused.

"I'm not laughing at you," she replied, spinning and spinning, closer and closer to the water. She paused for a minute, leaned over, her hands on her knees, a big smile on her mouth. "I'm laughing with you!"

The way she said it, the way she looked, it made me laugh too. She was acting just like a little child, innocent and carefree and happy. The way I used to be. The way she made me again.

But my head was still spinning from our dance, and though I tried to focus on her smile, I couldn't. She became part of the background, just another tree that flashed by every once in a while.

-----

I'm standing here staring out at the ocean, big and menacing, just waiting to eat me up, and all I can think is how much bigger it is than me. I mean, it's bigger than everyone, but it just feels like I'm even smaller than everyone else in the world. Like nothing will happen when I jump in – that no water will even have to move to compensate for my body. Like there's not enough of my body to matter.

The ocean's hungry. The waves claw at me, splashing my legs, my arms, my face, desperately clinging to anything it can reach. Come, it's saying. Come with me – I'll keep you safe. I'll make you feel better. I'll take away all the pain.

And I believe it, because it's easier.

-----

"Are you going to get up?" she asked as she looked down at me. I shook my head, not wanting to be dragged into twirling around again, not after how dizzy the last dance made me.

"Fine. I'll dance by myself!" She swung her arms out again, her laughter flying up into the air, her body seeming to follow.

And I just sat there, watching her spin further and further away from me.

-----

The last thing I think of is her face with her beautiful smile flashing by, just like on the day it happened when my head was so dizzy I couldn't see anything; just another tree that flashed by every once in a while. There, but out of reach. Visible, but out of focus.

My chest squeezes as I look into the water. It's finally real. I'm not just thinking about it anymore – I'm going to jump. My eyes squeeze shut, and I count to myself. Just like jumping into a cold pool, only this time, I won't come back up.

One.

Two.

Three.

__________

Link to picture here.