My End and Our Beginning

My End and Our Beginning Chapter 1

This is a true story containing an attempted suicide; if you are uncomfortable reading such material, or are not permitted to do so legally, please go no further. The author of this story does not in any way condone or support the act of taking one's life.

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MY END & OUR BEGINNING

The following story is a true account of what I went through almost a year ago.

I had struggled with depression, undiagnosed, since I left school. As anyone with depression will tell you, there wasn't a single cause, but one of the main reasons, and probably the biggest, was the fact that I just couldn't let go of one thing in particular.

I am not telling this story to keep you entertained, and for those who are looking to "get your rocks off", you may want to look elsewhere; there are no sex-scenes to be found here. I am telling my story purely because I feel the need to; it is a personal thing, and it has as much to do with my recovery from depression as it does for the need to rekindle my passion writing.

For those of you who are lucky enough not to know what it is like to have depression, I hope that by reading this, you gain some insight into what it. Please keep an open mind while reading my story; it is mine and mine alone, however I am sure there are many who will be able to relate to it.

This is my story.

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"Adam, I love you. I've always loved you. I'll never stop loving you," I finally revealed.

A day earlier, I finally came to the conclusion that I would never be with Adam, the only guy that I have ever truly loved.

I don't really know what drew me to Adam. He was everything to me. He was my reason for waking up every morning and my reason for living through each day in this hell-hole called life. He was three years younger than me, which meant that he was still at school, but in his second-last year because he had been held back.

I knew from the moment that I first laid eyes on him that there was something special about him. I never really understood what it was though. I started to get closer to him and then one day I finally realised what it was... and it scared me.

I'd had other crushes and other relationships before, but I'd never felt this way about any of them. I didn't know what to do. From then on it seemed like all we did was drift apart, but all that did was fuel the flame. We were still friends, although barely; we were never close.

I didn't want to get too close because I knew that I could never tell him how I felt. He was too precious to me. There was no way that I could be sure that he would understand and no way that I could be sure he wouldn't be freaked out and never to speak to me again. I couldn't live with myself if that happened; I couldn't even live with myself as it was.

So yesterday, over a year after I realised what it was I felt for him, I finally came to realise that even if we were the last two people left on this god-forsaken planet, Adam would surely choose death over me. Nothing I could do, nothing I could say, would ever change it, and knowing that hurt... a lot.

So I'd given up; on him, on love and on life. The world wasn't a place for a person like me and I wanted nothing to do with it. I could never be with Adam; the one person who made me smile, the one person who gave me a reason to live each day. Now, I felt like that reason was gone.

I give up; I was going to end it all that night. That night, all of my pain and suffering was finally going to stop.

That day, I sorted all of my belongings; I don't think my place had ever been so organised. I even decided to write letters to my family, even though we hadn't spoken since they disowned me years ago. There was nothing special in them and they were easy to write, just filled with sorrys and goodbyes; to be honest, I didn't even care if they read them.

It was my letter to Adam that was the most difficult to write. In fact, I could never bring myself to do it; I just couldn't find the words. I'd started so many messages to him in the past, from phone messages to emails, hand-written notes to Facebook "inboxes"; I think that every one of them started with `I know this is going to sound crazy but...'.

I've heard people say that it is easier to write your feelings down, to send your loved ones a letter, but I just couldn't do it. So I decided to do what I always thought was the hardest thing -- tell him face-to-face. It was something that I hadn't been able to do since I first realised how I felt about him. Now, at the end, it felt like the only think that I could do.

Whenever I tell this story, I am always asked the same question -- "Why was that night any different; why could you tell him then and not before?"

Most people will never understand the feelings that overcome you when you finally decide to take your own life. For some, it's extreme sadness; knowing that after everything you have done, the only solution to your problems is to give it all up. For others, like me, it was a total sense of calm and peacefulness; I knew that the finality that death brought was what I wanted. I knew that by taking my own life, I wouldn't have to be without him any longer.

The difference between that night and any time previous was that I knew the next day I wouldn't have to wake up and feel ashamed of what I had done. It was different because the next day I wouldn't have to live knowing that he thought I was a freak. It was different because the next day, for me, would never come; and in that, I found comfort and peace.

So I made my way over to his house. I walked, taking in one last look at the city that I used to call "home". In one pocket was a bottle, full of my poison, in the other was my phone. To this day, I have no idea why I brought my phone with me; I have never believed in fate, so it must have just been by habit; a habit that I later came to regret and even later, came to thank.

By the time I had arrived at his place it was dark; I could see the lights on in the room at the front of his house, and I could just make out his figure through the window. It was his room, it had to be.

I couldn't just knock on the window and say "Can I speak to you"; I knew it would freak him out and I didn't want the attention from his family. So I sat, waiting, on the edge of the dry creek that ran through the park across the road. I sat, watched and waited, for what felt like hours, until all of the other lights had finally turned off; his room was the last. I waited a few minutes and then reached for my phone and started typing a message.

It read: `Adam, I need to talk to you, its urgent'. I was never one to use poor grammar, even when typing an SMS.

I sent it, half hoping that he wouldn't receive it. Then I saw a fait blue glow in his window; he had. My heart raced as I waited for his reply.

Back it came: `Now? Wat is it? r u ok?'

I remember how my hands shook as I read his message and then typed my reply: `Meet me out front of your house alone; I really need to talk. It's important'.

Again I saw the faint blue glow through his window. I saw the light move as he picked it up. I knew he had seen the message, but I had no idea if would he come. Why would he? To him, I was nothing.

I waited, again it seemed like hours went by, but in truth it was only a few minutes. Then, down the side of the house I saw a dark silhouette heading for the road. It was him; he was coming to see me. I think my heart nearly exploded out of my chest. I flashed my phone so that he could see where I was; the glow of the screen caught his eye and he walked towards where I was sitting.

"Are you okay?" he asked, once he was within earshot, still standing.

"N...not really," I replied, softly. I sucked in a deep breath; I knew that it was now or never.

"Th..." I breathed out, "there's something I need you to know."

I heard my own voice, it sounded croaky; what would you expect, it was the first time that I had actually said anything out loud in almost two days.

I could tell he was uncertain about what was about to happen because he sat down a bit of a distance from me.

"I know this is going to sound crazy..."

I cut myself off; there was that line again. I could never start anything to him without it popping into my head. I paused for a bit, questioning if I should say what I came here for or not; and then, the words just came out of me. So did the tears.

"Adam, I love you. I've always loved you."

I couldn't bring myself to look at him, but as the tears kept flowing, so did my words. It took me almost an hour but eventually I told him everything.

He just sat there, silent, taking it all in. To me, it felt good; it felt like a giant weight had been taken off of my chest. I have no idea how he felt about it.

I paused again, took a deep breath, and told him about what happened the day before.

"When I woke up yesterday, something was different; I knew I could never be with you. I realised that I was holding onto some stupid bit of hope that that there was some tiny chance that I could be with you, even though I knew there wasn't and there never had been."

I paused and took another deep breath.

"I've never been able to tell you because I couldn't live knowing that you'd never want to be with me or knowing you thought I was a freak."

Freak; I hated that word; just saying that made me start crying again.

"So yesterday I... I gave up. I realised that I had no reason left to be here."

I struggled to get the last few words out, but in the end I did.

He sat there for a bit, looking at the ground and taking it all in. Then he stared straight at me.

"Wait! What are you saying?"

I knew by the tone of his voice that he knew what I was meant. For the first time in ages, our eyes met; he looked... scared.

"You're not going to... you know... are you?"

I reached down into my pocket and clutched the bottle. I watched as his eyes left mine and followed it as it left my pocket. He knew what was inside.

"I... is that... it?"

"Yeah."

"Y... you're serious about this?"

"Yeah."

I saw a look of fear spread through his entire face. He knew that I wasn't joking around, that what was in that bottle would kill me; it scared him.

I watched him cringe as I told him how the stuff makes your toes go numb first, then your legs and eventually, once your whole body is numb, you go to sleep and, a little while later, your body just shuts down. Slow, yes, but painless.

"D... don't do it," he said, I could hear a shudder in his voice.

"I have to." I paused for another breath. "There's no other way out for me. I can't do it anymore."

"But," he said, "it can't be that bad, can it?"

I could feel the tears start to fill my eyes; I wiped them away and started again.

"You don't understand what it's like. My life is meaningless; I have nothing left to live for," I sobbed.

"What do you mean you have nothing left to live for?"

He sounded slightly angry; I could tell he was confused about how to feel, and what to say.

"The hope of being with you was the only thing that kept me alive and now that it's gone; I have nothing. For so long I've felt so numb and empty, like everything inside me was just scooped out and all that I felt was pain. Doing this is the only thing that takes the pain away."

I wiped more tears away from my eyes and continued.

"I've had enough. I don't want to be here anymore; it hurts too much."

And with that I opened the bottle and swallowed the lot.

I heard him yell as I did it, but it was too late; I swallowed the last gulp as he snatched the bottle from my hands.

He saw the empty bottle and just sat there, with the same scared look on his face.

We just sat there, for ages, too scared to look at each other. Then, I saw his hand move towards me. He was reaching for my phone.

"No!" I said, knowing that he was trying to call for help. "Please. This is what I want."

He was scared; I could see the tears start to fill his eyes. At the same time I could feel my toes starting to go numb. It was happening, in a few minutes time I knew that I would be asleep, never to wake up again.

"Can I ask one favour, before it happens?" I asked, as I finally tried to make eye contact with him again.

"Anything," he replied, wiping a few tears from his eyes, trying to hide them from me, but I could still see them; he really was scared.

I started to ask for a hug, but before I had finished the question, he had jumped to his feet and thrown his arms around me. It was like nothing I had ever felt before. It was... perfect. The first and last time I would ever hug him. I grabbed hold of him, and buried my head into his shoulder.

"I'm sorry," I cried. "I just... I just can't do it anymore."

My legs started to give way. I felt my knees buckle and waited to hit the ground. But I didn't, we both knew what had happened and we just held each other tighter. I could feel my fingers start to go numb, then my elbows and then my shoulders. I knew he was struggling to support my weight.

"Put me down," I said.

"No"

I could tell he was crying too; he wasn't trying to hide it now.

"Adam... please."

I was starting to feel tired; I knew that it wouldn't be far off, the part that I had been looking forward to for two days. He gave in and laid me down on the edge of the bank.

I felt my eyelids getting heavier; the end was coming. With every bit if strength I had left, I kept them open, looked him in the eyes so I could say one final thing.

"I love you. Goodbye."

The last thing I remember seeing was tears rolling down his face and his lips moving, saying something that I could no longer hear.

And that was it. It was over; I was asleep, forever.

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Thanks for reading my story; I hope it is keeping you interested so far.

I'm keen for your thoughts and feedback, so if you feel the need, please feel free to send me an email -- andy.smith3011@gmail.com -- and I'll do my best to respond.