Six Months Ago
The door to the bedroom is halfway open. Our bed is unmade and empty, and boxes that were on the top shelf of my closet since I moved in are thrown across the room—pictures and papers and cards spread along the floor.
What the …
I call Christopher’s name for what seems like the hundredth time.
I take a step forward and nudge the door open.
Something is different.
Something isn’t right.
The room is void of anyone and all the furniture is in place.
There’s a thump as I open the door wider, and I move around it to see what’s on the other side.
I scream when I see Christopher hanging, a belt noosed around his neck with the other end knotted around his over-the-door pull-up bar.
Tears fall down my cheeks, and my hand shakes so hard that I feel like I have no control over it. His hand is cold—lifeless—as I take it and check his pulse.
Nothing.
Christopher no longer has a beating heart.
I scream his name, as if my voice has the power to bring him back to life.
Could give me back the man that I love.
“Please,” I cry out, my knees wanting to buckle but I do everything in my power to stay standing. “Christopher, please wake up!”
I jump up, trying to reach him, to pull him down, but I’m too short.
It’s as if someone were choking me, as if I can’t breathe myself, and I scramble across the room when I see Christopher’s phone on his nightstand. I call 911 while dashing into the kitchen for a stool and scissors. The operator tells me someone is on their way, and I call my mom with my phone.
How I’m moving, how I’m speaking, I have no idea.
My body is on autopilot.
All I do is scream Christopher’s name over and over while my mom begs me to tell her what happened. She says she’s on her way, and I cry out that it’s too late. We’re all too late.
My sobs hit my body, assaulting it, as I return to my bedroom. I stand on the stool, struggling to balance myself, to keep hold of the scissors. I drop the scissors and curse myself, hating myself, as I bend down to grab them.
Then, I drop them again on my second try.
“Please,” I cry out, heartbreak aching through me so heavy that I’m barely able to produce words. I feel like I’m dipping in and out of consciousness, and the only thing my body knows how to do is save the man I love.
All I want to do is cut him down and save him.
To have him in my arms, so I can tell him everything is okay.
It’ll haunt me for the rest of my life—to see him like this. I want to run out of the room and hide, but I can’t leave him.
I clutch the scissors in my hand and attempt to cut through the leather belt, being as careful as I can not to hurt him in the process.
It’s hard, so hard.
My hands are shaking.
My arm muscles ache.
And I want to collapse on the floor and die every time his body bumps into me.
“Come back to me!” I wail, my tears blocking my view of him, and my shoulders shake so hard, making it even more difficult for me to cut him down.
I’m pushed away by paramedics, one of them grabbing my waist and hauling me back as I try to fight against them. As I kick and scream and beg them to save him.
I’ll never forget watching them cut him down. The way my mother holds me back, how I collapse into my father’s arms.
Even though I know it’ll kill me more, I ask to sit with him for a moment. The paramedics stare at me as if I’m a crazy person, and maybe I am, but I don’t care. I trace his jawline, tell him that I love him and that everything will be okay. Then, I apologize for not being enough for him.
I gulp in heavy tears as I say good-bye.
My mother is sobbing. My father is holding back fresh tears—no doubt an attempt to stay strong for me. My father drags me out of my townhome and places me in the backseat of his car.
I’ve lost Chris.
He’s gone.
The burden of his death sits at my feet.
I see it in people’s faces and overhear it in their whispers.
They believe Christopher killed himself because of me.
Why else would a young man with such a bright future want to end his life?
Because of the woman, is the immediate response.
For a while, everything seems to happen in a blur.
I stay at my parents’ for three months. My father cleaned my bedroom, and my mother packed my bags, so I wouldn’t have to return to my townhome. My parents are overbearing, needing to check on me as if I might do the same, as if Christopher’s suicidal thoughts rubbed off on me like a stain and they don’t want me to be the next loved one they’ll have to say good-bye to.
I go home even though they told me it was too early.
I go home, step into my bedroom, and fall apart.
I suffer in silence, kind of like Christopher did, and ask myself what I did wrong.
What did I miss?
What made him want to end his life instead of coming to me for help?