I realized something one night as I laid in bed, watching my ceiling. I am a time bomb. I am ticking away to my own death and the days and hours and minutes are counting down. When I explode, when I die, shrapnel is going to go flying in every direction. If there is anyone who is close to me, they are going to get hurt. It is entirely possible that they will get a fatal wound from it. I don't want to be the cause of more suffering. I am already causing enough as it is.
Thus, I figured out my game plan. It is going to be a lot easier to accept my death if the people who are closest to me don't like me anymore. So I need to do them a favor and make them hate me with every fiber of their being. This is one thing that I am good at, as I have already started my task. I no longer have any friends, I mean, not that I had any to begin with, but I pushed them all away over the last few months, sick of their glib joking, or worse, their sympathy.
Mom and Dad need to come to grips with the fact that they will more likely than not outlive their daughter. I can't totally push them away. That will hurt them worse than if they are with me when I die. I can't do that to them, not when they are trying so hard to stay strong for me. So I will spend some time with them, but slowly taper them off, just like one would do to a drug addict. Slowly stop the supply until it stops completely.
Nikki's another problem. She knows how I think. She's my best friend in so many ways. She already knows what I am going to do and has taken steps to prevent me from completing my plan. When she moved into my apartment with me, she said it was to make sure that I was ok and so that Mom and Dad wouldn't worry so much about me being alone. But now I see she was just setting herself up to be there for me when I stopped letting anyone in. Damn her. But there is nothing I can do about it. I have tried to distance myself from her, but there is something about her that draws her closer to me the harder I push her away. I give up.
Addie and Nova are the same as Nikki. When I tried to push them away, they just kept coming back stronger and harder to do it again. They knew me too. So, once again, I gave up.
Uncle Terr and Aunt Steph weren't much of a problem. I was ok with spending the limited time I already was spending with them. That is the thing with family. They are going to get hurt regardless, so why not spend a little time with them. It wouldn't hurt matters much worse.
Come to think of it, the only relationship I really changed with this new realization was with my parents.
Everything goes off without a hitch in regard to my them. I spend a varying amount of time with Mom and Dad but slowly over the weeks I stop visiting so frequently. They don't know what I am doing. Nikki does though. But she understands and actually agrees with me. Mom and Dad need to let go and it is easier if I help them do that before I die.
I didn't know that I wasn't actually doing what I intended to do, or even the opposite. Mom and Dad had their own issues that they didn't let Nikki or I see. I was right about them needing to come to grips with the reality that they will outlive me. But they dealt with it in a way that I will never understand.
They killed themselves.
