text: Alone, she watches the water flow over her cave dwelling. This cave has been her home her entire life and the small forests and cliff that surround her are the only world she’s ever known. She gets up and begins to walk alongside the flowing river as she has done 1000 times before. She’s lined the river with different edible plants that she was able to find foraging. Outside of the occasional bird or fish this has been her main sustenance. As she walks she picks a few different fruits for breakfast. She follows the river all the way down the 2 mile path she knows by heart and arrives at the falls. She looks over and sees no bottom, nothin but mist and fog. She looks around, the landscape etched in her memory. Cliffs surround her, and for all but the falls it is a harrowing and impossible fall, no where to climb and no way to jump. She thinks to herself that she could be happy with life above the falls. That she has everything she needs and lives a life of peace, she doesn’t need more. For the first time in a long time a stabbing thought, a jaded memory comes to the front of her mind, her as a young child laughing with her parents sitting on a soft bed. She can’t remember her parents or anyone else well. She can’t remember a time where she was not by herself and not responsible for herself. She still questions how reliable this thought is, it’s the only memory that ever comes to mind, how does she know these people are her parents? How does she know they were with her here? There was no trace of them, has she always been alone on this island? Do other people exist? She has nothing more than a feeling, a yearning, to go on, but lately the fire inside her seems to be growing and pushing her to find out if there is more out there. She takes another look out on the horizon and turns around to walk back towards her cave. With each step she begins to feel more sick and upset. By the time she is back she breaks down crying. She looks at the cave wall by where she sleeps and sees the picture she has drawn using berries, a crude drawing but none the less effective, her present day sitting with the two people from her memory. In that moment she realizes that she needs that as much as food or water. She can’t live another day without anyone to share it with. At this moment she decides she’s going over the falls. She spends the entire night foraging for anything she can find that may be useful -food, sticks leaves, anything. She builds what she can of a bucket and raft over the next few days testing it in her small, calm part of the river. Once one was able to hold her afloat she loaded it up with everything she had and walked with it alongside the river holding it upright with a long stick. When she made it to the falls she looked once more out and looked for resolve within herself. A reason to not do what she was about to, a doubt, but any semblance of one was gone. She jumped into her make-shift raft and floated toward the falls. The river rages and almost immediately flips her over, but she holds on and gains a balance squating on the raft. She tied everything down best she could with leaves and branches and she held them as secure as she could. She used a large trunk to steer her way away from rocks and towards the center of the falls, she figured this would be the place with potentially the deepest and most clear bottom when, if, she lands in water below. She moves closer to the edge, her heart now racing. She closes her eyes and dreams one more time about a life with people she loves. She opens her eyes, she is inches away from the falls. She looks out to the horizon and sees what looks to be artificial lights in the distance.