in memory of

xxi. sara [mum]

in memory of susanna

s̶u̶s̶i̶e̶,̶ ̶i̶.̶.̶.̶

h̶o̶w̶ ̶c̶a̶n̶ ̶i̶ ̶m̶a̶k̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶i̶n̶g̶s̶ ̶b̶e̶t̶t̶e̶r̶?̶

i̶ ̶k̶n̶o̶w̶ ̶i̶t̶'̶s̶ ̶t̶o̶o̶ ̶l̶a̶t̶e̶,̶ ̶b̶u̶t̶.̶.̶.̶

i̶ ̶m̶i̶s̶s̶ ̶y̶o̶u̶.̶

y̶o̶u̶ ̶w̶r̶o̶t̶e̶ ̶m̶e̶ ̶a̶ ̶s̶u̶i̶c̶i̶d̶e̶ ̶n̶o̶t̶e̶,̶ ̶j̶u̶s̶t̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶ ̶m̶e̶,̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶i̶.̶.̶.̶

i love you too, susie. i thought i should burn your suicide note and start my life again. 

and i'm sorry more.

"i'm sorry, mum.

i'm sorry that you're reading this after a long day at work when the memory of dad probably still haunts you. i'm sorry that you have to think that it was 'your fault', even though it never was. [it will always be my fault.] i'm sorry that i've left you with two grieving children. i'm sorry that i could never be the daughter you wanted. 

i'm just sorry i'm a failure. 

i will only leave one note, and that is to you. and i hope you'll keep it a secret and never tell anyone, not even toby or millie. i want to tell you my story, and the things i never told you, and the things you might not have known, and the things you probably knew, and the things you probably guessed. 

i was a mistake, wasn't i? i was born a mistake. i wasn't meant to be. you fell in love with dad for one night and got married within two months. because of me. i was the mistake. that's why you fell out with your sister, and why i never got to meet my cousins. because you slept together before marriage. and so, i, the mistake, was created. 

if i never existed, you wouldn't have got beaten up every night for eleven years, and neither would i, or millie, or toby. because you would have realised who dad was before you properly married him. and there would be no mistake. and i wouldn't have existed. and neither would the depressed you. or the dad rotting in hell. or anyone. and there would be no letter, and there would be no suicide, and there would just be happiness. 

i won't go back to young childhood. we both know what happened there, and we both remember going to the hospital with me crying frantically in the backseat, holding my bloody head desperately in my hands and you driving faster and faster and the memory of dad slamming me to the dining room table in anger. and when we lied and said i fell over. and when we got home and dad beat you up for taking me to the hospital. 

but you remember middle school, right? i managed to have a few friends. even a best friend, before she moved away and forgot my existence. i...i was better in middle school. slightly happy. even though i dreaded coming home to dad. i knew what he was doing to you. i knew that he'd cheated on you and i probably had a half brother or sister in this very town who shared my blood. yet millie was still born. and then toby. 

and i loved them. apparently you and dad did not. 

you started to go on anti-depressants and dad still beat you up and still hit me sometimes, even when you tried to stop him, but he didn't touch millie or toby much, probably because they were not the mistake. and they were clever at school, and didn't get into trouble. although i didn't anymore, and in middle school i got quieter and quieter. 

until i became invisible, only seen by my close friends. if you can call them that, really, because they didn't have any idea. i never took them home, and we never really went to their houses. only to the town centre every few weeks to "hang out" and feel cool and to just feel living.

it didn't work. 

and then in sixth grade, dad died. a car crash, they said. on the twenty seventh of december, coming back from his parents after christmas. it was a snowy night, and ice was everywhere, the police said. it was a quick death, the hospital said. he's at peace now, the vicar said. 

i didn't cry. you did. i never understood why. toby did too, but that was because he was young. millie said she didn't, but i heard her the same night we found out. the truth is, i didn't want it to be a car crash or stupid ice. or a quick death. or for him to be a peace. i wanted it to be me that took his life, and for it to be slow, and for him to feel pain for what he did. 

he ruined my life. and yours too. 

you got worse after he died, although you know that.  at least, i think you do. you just sat there, staring at the fire and not caring about anything. i took toby and millie to school. i helped them with their homework. i made their costumes for the nativity plays in years to come. not you. 

were you even a mother, really? 

i still felt unconditional love for you, of course. as did toby and millie. but...you weren't there. not like the other mums who picked their sons and daughters up from pre-school. 

and then high school came, along with the bullying. 

"nerd," "geek," "freak," "ugly," "die," "fucker," "bitch," "swot," "i hate her." [i'm crying because i agree with them.]

i won't give you names, because you'd just march into school and demand that they pay the price for my death. but it wasn't them. they were just another reason to not get back up after falling. to be honest, i'd fallen from the moment i was born. 

but you didn't know about the bullying, and i thought you should. or maybe you did know, but just didn't care. i don't really know anymore. 

i didn't even last one semester in high school, and i'm sorry for that. high school is supposed to be the best time of your life...but not for me. nothing was "the best time of my life". i think dying will be though. 

so, that's my life. kind of depressing, really. because all i've done is grow up and do school. i didn't really live. although, who has lived? the famous people? i don't think they live either. i don't think anyone does.

mum, please look after toby and millie. i know you'll be worse after i've gone, but look after them. or they'll end up like me. 

and i know i never said it, but i love you. 

and i'm very, very sorry.

but this is goodbye."