Chapter 17: The Second Christmas

Fewer cards have dropped on to the mat this year, perhaps because I’ve not been able to send any myself, who knows? I don’t really care, but the question lingers. I guess people don’t know what to say that they haven’t said already, heartfelt words that fall on a wounded soul, words that are unable to comfort or bring peace and that’s what Christmas is all about, peace and harmony I’ve none of those things any more.

Steely is due home on 22nd December and we are so looking forward to him being back, even though it’s only for a few days. He will breathe fresh air into our lives again, be able to share his adventures, and tell us about his life in LA. I can’t wait.

I’ve not been into Reading to shop. I can’t face it - too many people smiling, laughing and jostling each other with their bags and tubes of wrapping paper. I’m not brave enough yet, so the boys will have to have things bought via the internet or the supermarket.

It’s snowing, cold and icy and travel is getting harder. I have that underlying feeling of dread. I daren’t say it out loud in case it comes true, but I have a terrible feeling that flights are going to start being cancelled. Stay positive, don’t worry - it will be fine.

Seven o’clock on the morning of 21st December and the internet is screaming at me the words I had so dreaded. Flight VS008 from Los Angeles cancelled. This simply can’t be true. Surely we are due some luck this time. No.

I’d not realised how vulnerable we all still are. ‘Gutted’ is the only way I can describe it. The worst news we’d heard for over a year. How can this possibly be happening to us? He still doesn’t know - they are eight hours behind us. All day we have to live with the knowledge that we have to ring him and tell him he can’t come home. It’s been a black day, my eyes are red from crying and I feel sick all the time. Ridiculous - I know he is well, he is safe, he is alive - but not going to be here with us. All the feelings of panic and the inability to function properly return with a vengeance. It’s hard to breathe, my chest tightens and nothing is in focus. How can I be feeling this all over again? The news is almost as devastating as if we’d been told he too had been killed. So much hope had been pinned on him coming home. We’ve soured over the months and he would have been there to sweeten us all again.

Rob rings him. There is a silence and all I hear is Rob asking, ‘Are you still there, mate?’ Oh God, why this pain all the time? Why do we have to be breaking bad news to our children again? ‘I’m here Dad, it’s ok, I just needed to take it all in really.’ He’s so brave and adult about it. He’s comforting us - surely that’s all back-to-front? He the parent and we the devastated and disappointed children, how odd.

He’s ok. We’re not. Now Christmas without two of my boys. We Skyped him and he sat on the end of the table, framed by a computer screen while we opened our presents. It was lovely to see him - Skype... what a magic invention. Seeing his face made it all seem less dark. He reminds me of Cyrus in so many ways, all three of them had/have something in common - a bravery that runs through their very beings. I wish I had some of it. I’m not brave, I just feel old and terribly, terribly sad.

We made it through, but it wasn’t the same. It will never be the same again and I knew that last year. I guess I hoped it would be easier this year - but how stupid am I?

Once again I find myself teetering on the edge of insanity, feeling the need to metaphorically slit my wrists, peel back the flesh and rid myself of the pain that lives under my skin. The inky blackness of night consumes me during the day - that ‘full moon’ feeling that never strays far from my conscious thoughts. I’ve tried to rationalise it, put myself into a ‘category’ to reason my way out, but those are tools used by counsellors who think that we are all basically the same creature, who can be reached and healed with words that are hollow and meaningless. I’ve lost my future and my past, my meaning and my children. My children disappeared on 2nd June 2009. They became adults out of necessity - the need to survive, the need to cope - and the innocence of childhood became a distant memory. We all lost our past that day. The memories are still there but the ability to see them clearly has gone; they are defused with pain and sorrow, they are opaque, rather than crystal clear. That is why we have lost our past.

My life is not a corridor whose path has been blocked. There is no ‘other’ way around that blockage. I had a life - we all did - and now that life has gone. It’s not hidden or been moved - it has simply gone. Snuffed out, stolen. There are no soothing words, no book, no recipe for ‘better’; there is a new life needing to be learned, new paths to be woven into the fabric of our souls. Different, and at times hateful - a life I don’t want but have to take. There is no choice that isn’t a completely selfish one and I still have no desire to take that option.

2011. I wonder what this year will bring. Last year was a blur, and looking back I can’t really remember anything in great detail. Strange, as I thought that I was less blank than I had been the previous year. Odd, how we move through our spaces in life, not really taking it all in, and yet living as though we are; going through the motions of living, but not living. Surely to have a life you have to appreciate it - or at least take part in it. I don’t feel as though I’ve been able to do that these past months. I wonder if this will change with time, and whether or not I will continue to merely exist rather than live.

13th January: Cyrus would have been twenty-one today. There is a balloon announcing it on his grave - a gesture made full of good intentions and love but excruciatingly painful to see, bobbing almost joyfully in the wind. How dare it? Rob untied it, releasing it to the wind and we watched as it disappeared into the distance. It seemed symbolic somehow. I miss him so very much every second, minute, hour, day, month, year - every birthday and forever more.

The past is hard to conjure up sometimes, but it is my past, shared with Rob, Zac, Cyrus and Steely. It is who I am, why I am the person I am, what makes me strive, even through this awfulness, to continue to be who I am. Cyrus was a huge part of everything we are, and without him I wonder, would we have had the great times we did. He, as part of my family, has given me some of the best years of my life - times of laughter, peace, love, joy and pride. The pride of seeing him join the Army, taking that vow, Passing Off after a long physically and mentally hard period of basic training, and becoming a man. Without him in my life I wonder if I would be able to say that I have truly experienced everything that this life can throw at me. He has left a huge hole in our lives, but we will continue to love and support each other, move forward - knowing that it is exactly what he would have expected of us. It would be so disrespectful of me to just give up - he would never have given up on anything in his life, and I intend to honour his memory by being the best person I can, despite this massive mountain I have to climb.

When Cyrus was in Year 8 he wrote a poem, and I came across it again recently as I was looking through some paperwork. It was part of some things that the staff at his school had found and put to one side for us. The words are those of a young boy not knowing what he wanted to do with his life or what road it would take. It is completely ironic.

I’m on a Kamikaze mission, so follow no laws,

I can be big and dangerous but have no jaws.

I’m sometimes bright colours, pink purple and red

But if you touch me, I will steal your leg.

I can be hidden in fields, jungles and such

There are thousands of me, I don’t cost much.

My life is dedicated to terror and fear,

I rip through the flesh of those who come near.

It’s not only people, animals as well.

My purpose in life is to make your life hell.

To rid this world of me and my friends,

Would take years and months, days upon end.

The life I live has a very long line,

In case you’ve not guessed, I am a landmine.

Cyrus Thatcher 8LC

Oh Cyrus, I love you my darling. I wish I could tell you. I wish I could hold you. I wish you were here. Mum x