Читать книгу Our Collective Life - JD Kennedy - Страница 23

Nobody can understand what life is like for me. Nobody can understand how I live, what I have to endure.

There is a pain, a deep pain that cannot be described. It’s like the very soul is being torn in two over and over again. Sometimes there is crying, coming from deep within me. I can hear it echoing throughout my mind within and there is no relief from it.

I find my life is so disjointed, and I seem simply unable to do anything meaningful or productive. I act like everything is ok, and most people would have no idea that anything was wrong. But that is so far from the truth. I am not ok, not by a long shot.

I have so much guilt. Guilt over the life I have wasted. I squandered everything I was given, and am now just an empty vessel that is incapable of doing anything meaningful. Mum always said I wasn’t smart like my brothers and I would have to work really hard to succeed. So why couldn’t I have pushed myself to make something of this life? Now I am in my mid 40s and I have nothing to show for it. A wasted life.

And there is guilt over the lives I have ruined by my inability to get it together. I was selfish enough to give birth to a child and drag an innocent soul into my mess. I totally ruined his life. I used to look at the other mothers and wonder how they did it. They seemed so well put together, so organised. They didn’t stress about having to attend the school for functions and for most of them it was a joy. But I was so wrapped up in myself, I would lay awake at night, fearing the next day when I would have to walk into his classroom. What that poor child had to go through, all due to my inability to be a mother. The knowledge I ruined his life by my selfishness is a burden I can never free myself from. And in truth, I never should. He has to live with the mess that was his childhood, because of my selfishness and I should as well.

Mum always said he would be depressed, because ‘our family was fucked’ (her words). And sure enough, he was diagnosed with depression. If I hadn’t had him, then he wouldn’t have had to suffer that. Better he not be born than have to live with the black cloud.

And it’s the depression that is the hardest to cope with, at least for me. The never ending torment of being surrounded by blackness, permeating into everything I do, everything I touch. There is no escape. After all these years, I realise I will never be free of it, of the pain, the misery. This is all I am.

** ** **

The depression was wearing her down, eroding the small amount of fight she had left. The black cloud was now an ever present addition to her wardrobe, and its weight enveloped her, weighing her down until she felt unable to do anything. Sometimes merely walking to the bathroom took everything out of her, and she found every step a painful shuffle that sapped any energy she had been able to muster.

She now knew she got close before, to succeeding in ending it all. She didn’t understand how it didn’t happen, how one minute she was there popping out pills, and the next she was in the doctor’s office. But she knew she was closer than she had been before. Why? What was different?

She remembered this last time she didn’t make plans. Was that how she did it? How she was closer to succeeding? That was the only thing that was different - she didn’t spend time planning it or writing letters of apology to her mother. She just started to do it. So, maybe that was the answer – just quickly do it. Get it done, and do something right for the first time in her life! How ironic that the first thing she would succeed in doing in her life, was ending it.

Maybe not pills. Maybe the pills were too slow. She needed something fast. She suddenly thought of hanging. Without wasting any time for fear of getting stopped again, she stood to get her dressing gown sash. That would do perfectly around the top wardrobe handle. Then she would just sit down and it would all be over.

Spurred on by the thought, she stood up and went to the bedroom. Grabbing the sash, she fastened a makeshift noose one end, and, reaching up, she tied the other end to the wardrobe handle. Testing it for strength, she wasted no time, putting her head in the loop and…

…She felt a whoosh, a strange sensation like she was dragged backwards through a tunnel. She couldn’t see anything, her world had gone black. She had no idea where she was but she could tell she wasn’t in her bedroom anymore. She heard a harsh rasp of a voice say “Don’t you fucking dare!” Suddenly she felt herself being lifted off the ground and thrown in the air. She slammed against something, a wall, and she crumpled to the floor. Before she could manage to move, she felt a hand on her neck, lifting her off the ground. She struggled to breath, tried to claw at the impossibly strong hand around her neck. But it was useless.

She felt like she was going to pass out, heard the same voice snarl “You fucking bitch” and was thrown again. She hit a wall once more, hard, her head slamming into it and she heard a crack. The wall? Her head? Again, she was picked up like she weighed nothing and held up off the ground by a seemingly impossible grasp. The instinct to claw at the vice that held her off the ground was there, although somehow she knew it was pointless. The grip just tightened and she heard the voice growling “Who the fuck do you think you are? I decide who lives and dies, not you!”

Jo wished she could answer, plead her case. But all she could do was dangle there, held up off the ground. She made one more futile effort to get the hand off her neck. Her breathing became more laboured as the hand seemed to tighten on her neck, squeezing her windpipe more.

She felt herself start to lose consciousness, and the last thing she heard was the voice growling “I am responsible for the Collective and I will not let you threaten our existence. This is the last fucking time you try this, you hear me?! I will personally rip you apart if you do this again.”