Suicide Buddies

Tragedy & Then Some (A Cumulative List)

(hi thanks for readin :) vote if you do so please)

I made an entire list of reasons why dying would be beneficial when I was thirteen years old.

Thirteen was a dramatic age for all of us, let's be honest.

It managed to go all the way up to 10 reasons before I realized how sad I sounded and hurriedly abandoned it into the jungle of files on my overworked computer, where it resided in its comfortably gloomy state from then on. But generously, I'll unearth it for you.

One: Don't have to worry about math midterms.

(That one was especially charged with seventh-grade-algebra hatred, if you ask me.)

Two: You get to haunt people.

(That one could be taken in a cute way and a foreboding way, depending on the genre you take it under.)

Three: You don't have to disappoint people and see it sink in.

All right, a darker take there. Moving on.

Four: It's quieter.

Now that one is just depressing.

Maybe because five years later, it's still true.





___________________

"Where the hell were you?"

I looked over from my stance at the threshold of my apartment. My uncle stood a few yards from me, arms over his chest, grey dawn at his back. He blended into its murkiness.

"Somewhere," I said, kicking off my sneakers. "I gotta go."

I shoved my way past him and he snagged my sleeve. Stale breath hit my face. "Where the fuck is somewhere?"

"Somewhere that's not here," I snapped. "I gotta go to school."

"Am I an idiot?"

Yes. "What?"

He shoved me back and shook his head. "Walk," he hissed. His work clothes, wrinkled and barely an excuse for employee-worthy attire, strained against him as he bent over to grasp a bag of files from the ground. "You wanna be out all the time then you can manage."

In sixty degree weather, two miles and a half from my school with less than thirty minutes before the bell would ring, I sure as shit didn't want to manage.

"That's not fair—"

"Neither is you skippin' work to go play on the goddamn playground." He pointed a bulky, accusatory finger at me. "You owe me a pack of Camels. I'm not stupid."

"Says who?"

He took a step at me and I stepped back, face still but body unwilling to remain in its place. My uncle turned on his heel with a bitter scoff.

"Don't tell me you were trying to die again," he hissed, and I winced. "Chicken out, then? Yeah, that tracks."

I spun towards my room. "Bye."

"No good comeback?"

"Bye."

I slammed my door shut and heard the front door follow suit. My skin burned with phantom red acid. I closed my eyes.

My uncle was from my father's side, thirteen years younger than him and the only relative in the States I had left, or who at least knew I was alive. The age managed to close the gap between us with less distance than what was considered normal. He therefore treated me more like a cousin he hated rather than a nephew he couldn't stand.