The Big Little World Of Us

I Need To Be Okay

Chapter Twelve

My parents used to tell me, I was lucky for everything I've gotten in life, from being born, to going to school, to growing up in a nice neighborhood, and even getting married and having a kid. That my life wasn't important enough to be consider, valuable to them, to be cared about by them, that i was just lucky, and that made me guilty for existing, for being me, and i still feel that way, especially now, that in a way I felt it was my fault he died, he committed suicide.  I know it wasn't and that you can't always save those whose ready to die.

I rember those 15 minutes of waiting for the police officers to arrive and make his death official. Clear as day, as if they happened yesterday, Jace sitting at the last step of the stairs hands in his hair as he cries quietlyand painfully, I sat in the kitchen, holding his empty bottle of medicine in my hand.

The wait for the police was a painful 15 minutes and exactly 45 seconds long wait, they had arrived with medical aid in their pursuit, told Jace to head into his room away from this whole ordeal but he stay put, wiping his tears on his pants and holding my hand tightly as I explained  from morning to the moment I had checked on him learning he was dead, and how it was normal for him to sleep in, since he work late shifts and only wakes up in the afternoon. How we thought nothing of it until it was and hour pass when he normally would be up for the day.

I had to watch as they stated and signed his death certificate,  as the paramedics came down the stairs with a body bag, as Jace body shook with emotions he refused to release. He was like his father in that aspect hell bent and stubborn on being strong and confident about everything all the time.

So when his funeral rolled around we were his only family, his parents having died when he was a teen, but alot more people from town then I thought would have, showed up to pay their respect, pitying us treating us like we were fragil animals, especially Jace, who hadn't cried, hadn't said anything.

A part me is glad he hasn't said nothing.

I decided that we needed a change of scenery, I couldn't bare laying bed, the same bed that was cold to the touch but brought a thousand memories, all being of him and that night. Nothing good came from sorrow feeding hurt, so I  moved us to my childhood home my parents had left me when they passed a couple years ago, while it brought back shitty memories it beat living in a home my husband, and first love died in, and a town who pitied my family or judged us for something we didn't have a choice in either, it's not like we chose for him to die.

So by the time we moved and settled in to our new forever home, our old one still in Alaska abandoned awaiting one our returned filled with memories of laughter, anger, warm-hearted love. He had left it in my name until Jace is 18, when he'll have legal rights over it, and can do whatever he chooses to with it.

Then I was all alone it was time for school to start up again or was already started here, so Jace went to school while I worked from home as an interior designer, or sleep in my own darkness I had created for myself.

So when Jace had asked me why did he kill himself, I was shocked to say the least, but conflicted whether I be honest with him or treat him like a kid, because he was to me and always will be in my eyes.

So breaking down in front of your child who had also lost their dad wasn't parent like thing to do so I tried pushing my emotions away for him to be strong for him because I have to, but then he'd look at me and talk they exact way he did and would scoff the same way, even wrinkle his nose, he was both of us in one but mostly his father, and that broke my heart even more.

Because he spoke as if he had already lived his life as if he's not still a kid, and having to figure out who they are, like he was becoming the parent of the house.

I saw it in the way he would do the dishes after dinner, fold laundry and put them away, remind to shower text to eat lunch, or get of bed. Check the mail and sort out the important ones and the junk mail, wrote good morning note and make breakfast if I slept in late or make dinner when I would work late and he'd go to hang out with a new friend he'd made Waylen something.

He thinks I don't notice all things he does for me, but he does so much its hard not to notice, and I feel so guilty and angry proving my parents right whose always said I won't ever be a good mother.

So if forcing myself to wake up drink like four cups of coffee and more just get through the day to take care of him, to be the parent he deserves even if it isn't what we wanted.

I can't be weak for him. Never for him.