Tw: Death, suicide, self harm
He never wanted much. He never asked for anything.
He just wanted love.
He never received it. No matter how badly he needed it.
He was 6 when his mother passed. He heard the heart monitor flat line. He barely knew what it meant but he saw the tears.
He was 10 when his father admitted he a shit father. He openly admitted that he could have done better. His father promised to do better but there was no change.
He was 12 when he first tried to kill himself, his brother finding him with pill bottles. His brother made him throw up and called 911, it was almost too late.
He was 13 when he spent time going in and out of mental hospitals. He never opened up so they couldn't fix him, but he was right back there again when he was found with slit wrists.
He was 14 when his brother tried to talk to him about what it meant. He ignored his brother and wouldn't meet his eye, if he wanted to die that was his problem.
He was 15 when he ran away from home. He felt ignored by his father and brothers. They all stopped looking him in the eye so they surely didn't care.
He returned back home when he was 18. His family hadn't seen him in years and assumed he was dead. He didn't know what to say so he didn't say anything.
He is still 18, living back at home, trying to find himself somewhere in the mess of the world.
He thought coming back home, looking at the photos on the walls, seeing his brothers and his father would maybe help him understand something. But it didn't help anything, if anything it helped nail in the fact that he didn't belong.
The photos around the house were his brothers and father, almost none of him. The only one that did contain him was the family picture they got done was he was young, his mother was still there too. She was beautiful and she made the picture light up with her smile.
He noticed that the photo was tucked away in his father's office, like his existence was nothing but a secret for the family to know.
His father didn't know what to say when he was caught staring at the photo, didn't know how to explain it. So there was no explanation.
His father just gave him a look that made him feel like a burden.
He didn't want to feel like a burden, he just wanted love.
His brother never spoke to him. What were you supposed to say to your brother who everyone thought was dead for years, no one knew. So his brother said nothing.
He only gave the same look as his father did, making the deep feeling of being a burden feel worse.
He didn't want his brother to stare at him like that, he just wanted love.
His other brother didn't even acknowledge him. There was no words, no glances or side eyes. There was nothing. It was like he wasn't there, just an invisible being.
He didn't want to seem invisible.
He wanted his brother to look at him at least once, he just wanted love.
And suddenly it felt like he was 12 years old again. Like it was the first time he tried to kill himself. He felt himself feel sick at the thought of being stuck like that again.
His father was shitty, his brother was busy, and his other brother didn't even want to see him. He felt like a burden and just wanted to see his mom again. She loved him, and he just wanted love.
That's why he had done it the first time, just wanting to see her again to feel some sort of comfort and feel like he belonged somewhere. He certainly didn't belong where he was then. He didn't belong then and he knew he didn't belong now.
But he couldn't leave like he did before. That brought nothing but hardship and too many cold sleepless nights, thinking he wouldn't make it to morning. He found comfort in those thoughts but felt upset when he woke up the next day.
He wanted to make sure he wouldn't wake up next morning.
He did what he thought he had to do.
He gathered what he would need, pills, a razor and his note.
The note he had been perfecting since he was young. Since the age of 12 he had been writing this note over and over again. Spending the days in the hospital writing it over and over again in his head. He could leave no room for error, it was being left for a family that did nothing but judge him his whole life.
So when it came to the day he knew that he would not see the end of he smiled, he could finally do it.
He walked around the house like he did when he first got back. He stared at the pictures on the walls, at the family photo in the office, at the things he missed in his brother's lives.
He looked into his brothers room, sitting next to his guitar was his own old stuffed animal. He didn't realize his brother kept it.
He looked into his other brothers room, seeing tapped to the bookshelves full of books his drawings from when he was child. He didn't know that his brother kept them all.
He looked into his own father's room, seeing so much more. He saw photos of himself, he saw happy memories and smiles. His father didn't just have the photo in the office but all of this.
Despite the happy picture that was being painted, he couldn't ignore the years of suffering.
So he went to his room, making sure the note was on the desk and he took all of the pills in the bottles.
"Tommy!"
