Only a finger's grip kept me from the abyss. I could smell the stink of abandoned hope below me, like infections and decay. And a defeated voice within encouraged surrender to the fall, for even if I escaped this hell, other dark fates would inevitably find me.

They still may, but the stench of self-sacrificial death no longer saturates my nights. Even a fifth of myself, my being, is too high a cost for 80% contentment. Perhaps the torment I'll ultimately face will be featureless oblivion, the endless ache of unbroken, unwanted solitude. Yet even this future, especially in its uncertainty, is preferable to the one so narrowly escaped.

Our dreams make us who we are. To kill them, to neglect them, is to fall into a state of living suicide. Unlike those walking dead, I will still worship at the altar of possibility. Homeless and battered, I nonetheless sleep soundly on even the steps of that sanctuary, knowing I am stronger than I ever dared imagine.

A journey awaits: my own.