Across a Gap

24^th September 2007

I turned around and zipped myself up at the same time.

Walking towards the sinks I caught a glimpse of movement outside the men’s room large windows. These windows were of those that were tinted brown; you could look outside and from a far enough distance no one could see into the latrine.

The bathroom windows of my building faced the other tower. What caught my eye as I rinsed my hands was a guy climbing out of one of the opposite tower’s windows. He wore coveralls that indicated that he’s one of the maintenance crews for the complex.

Built underneath all of these windows were small ledges that would not fit a normal size fridge and this dude was climbing out and looking shaky as he did it. I saw him stretch out and set a leg on the ledge a few feet from the open window he’s climbing out of. I knew he had to do that as the glass pane closer to the ledge could not be opened; it was the same on our tower.

I was alarmed and a morbid part of me said, this guy might fall and I’d be the first person to witness it. The building I was standing in had no shortage of jumpers. While most had been suicides and (alleged) murders, this guy I was looking at was just a maintenance worker. If he fell, it would have been the mother of all bad days at work.

Now, the guy was grabbing his stuff from the first window and making his way to the other side of the ledge towards the ladies room. Same thing again, only in reverse. He put his pouch on an open part of the ladies room window and slowly climbed up again. Same as before, most of his body was hanging precariously from the ledge before he managed to clamber into the building.

God, I’d never have bothered to look at that if not for my glasses.