A new life

Prologue

March 17th, 2023
The Japanese suicide forest.

Also known as Aokigahara, it's a forest located inside the Yamanashi Prefecture near Japan's famous Mt. Fuji.

It has a historical reputation with ghosts and starting in the 1960s, it became associated with suicide, hence its infamous name.

Why do I know this you ask?

I'm killing myself of course.

It all started when I was 8, my da- no nevermind I'm not going to bore you with the backstory.

It was 2:13 in the morning, all I've had on my mind since I got here was trying to find the spot.

I've been walking since 12:26 trying to find the place, unfortunately, I underestimated how big the forest is and how hard it is to travel through such a dense forest during the night. It's a new moon too. The stuff on my backpack, a flashlight, rope, and a map with a layout of the forest, were starting to feel heavy.

After another 30 minutes of walking in circles, surrounding trees finally started to look familiar.

Finally going somewhere.

Turning right and walking a little bit further, I found it.

It was the spot where my mom and brother hung themselves.

I know I said I wasn't gonna go into detail about my life, but I'll give you a rundown on what you need to know.

My name is Haru Romero, strange name right? Well that's because my mom, who is Japanese, chose my name, Haru means spring in Japan (ironic right?), meanwhile I got my last name from my dad, who is from Venezuela.

My dad met my mom during the 90s, he was in Japan to sign a contract for a team in the recently formed J-league (the Japanese soccer league). He was at a cafe waiting for his agent to come in and tell him the terms on his contract.

That's when he saw my mom entering the cafe, Aki Sato, a woman with light brown hair, a radiant smile, and brown eyes that he couldn't look away from.

It was love at first sight for him.

She worked as a supervisor in the infamous suicide forest, where I am now, she always told my dad how much she wanted people to, you know, stop killing themselves in the forest. She always said to him that they should enjoy the nature in the forest instead of hanging from it.

They were together since 1994, they had my brother in 1998 and then me in 2001.

A year after my mom had me, she fell into a deep depression, not long after she hung herself against the same spot I am, seems like years of seeing suicide finally took a toll on her.

My father had soccer to distract him from his wife's death.

That was until he didn't.

During 2008, his 12th season on the J-league and on the brink of turning 34, he got into a accident that made him lose his left leg, leaving him with nothing from the knee down.

The following 2 years he was a mess, I wasn't old enough to remember my mom's panic attacks, but I can remember my dad beating me and my brother whenever he was in a drunken state. He blew his brains out in 2011 when I was 10.

Me and my brother moved in with my uncle from my mom's side since my dad's side of my family still lived in Venezuela. Living with him was fine, we were happy. Or at least, as happy as 2 kids who's parents died by suicide could be.

That was until 2019, Natsu, my brother, was undeniably hit harder with the death of my parents, he had a better memory of my family when we were happy than I did.

He was mostly able to get through it, I was actually supposed to become an uncle, but it ended up as a miscarriage. Seeing his wife grief stricken with the pain of losing her baby, he tried consoling her, but she was never the same.

With everything that happened to him throughout his life he gave up in 2019. He called me before ending his life at the spot I'm at, he asked me to tell his wife that he loves her.

I can still remember arriving 2 hours later and seeing his lifeless body moving with the wind. I was barely old enough to walk when my mom died, my dad was either emotionally unavailable or a dead beat so I really wasn't all that sad after he died.

But seeing my brother hanging in front of me, his body purple, his eyes lifeless, his mouth dripping saliva.

That, that did something to me.

The 4 years after I was a mess, it finally hit me how alone I was with how boring my life was and the fact that the only family I did have, my uncle, was too busy taking care of his own family to be able to talk to me.

So here we are, the tree in front of me was visibly  very old, the wood was loosing its color and some twigs were on the verge of falling off.

Aside from that, it has very strong and thick branches, perfect to hold my neck.

On the trunk there were 2 names carved on it.

My brother and my mom's.

Using my flashlight, which has a knife since it's a multitool. I carve the Kanji letters for my name on the trunk of it.

I climbed the tree and hopped on a branch I thought would be able to hold my weight. Tying my rope on it and putting a simple yet effective knot on it I learned from boys scouts.

I climbed down and started gathering any random item I could find in the forest. After gathering enough I used as a sort of step so I can comfortably put the noose around my neck.

While making sure it's tightened I start thinking about my family, and how happy I am, I knew that after I die we'd be reunited, well I don't know about my dad that motherfucker left one to many bruises on my body for him to see the pearly gates.

Back on track, I look down from the mountain of miscellaneous shit I made and prepared myself to jump.

3.....

2......

I miss you guys.

1......

I quickly felt the air leave my body. However I didn't struggle against it. I just accepted how that this is how it would end. My neck felt tighter and tighter, my vision became blurry. Did I just see someone walking in the background?

My immanent death felt ever so closer and I embraced it, I let her come with my arms wide open, I felt her take over my body as I started to loose feeling all over it.

I wasn't scared nor sad.

I was happy.

I wave of euphoria took over my body and the last thing I felt was the smile that plastered on my face.

I may have not had the best life, nor the best time, but I'm glad I'm able to die happy.

I fell unconscious when enough oxygen left my brain.

However, for some reason, I never truly felt dead that night.

I would soon find out the reason why.