30 Day Writing Prompts

12

12. Suicide.

No one really suspected it. They never do though, do they? It's rather hard to tell who wants to live and who wants to die when everyone is so obsessed over themselves and not others. Yet, they noticed when she was sad though? But not when he was sad. It was easy to hide something no one even considered. Boys don't get depressed, right? No one could hear the muffled cries under the sheets at night when he walked the tightrope of sleep and death. He lay, caressed by pain and everyone just slept through it.

But in the bathroom of a high-class hotel, his mother stood in front of a mirror, her own reflection seemed disgusted by herself. She couldn't control her tears. Like a waterfall, the downpour just wouldn't stop. Taking a deep breath, she dabbed at the corner of her eyes with a silky handkerchief, sniffling slightly. She looked a mess, but no one expected her to look glamorous like she usually would. Her son killed himself. Did they want more? There wasn't a note, not even a single goodbye from him. Just a policeman, chapping on the door at quarter-to-eleven at night, his hat held in his hands as he broke the bad news.

The boy's father stood silently, glaring at his son's coffin. What good would anger do? Nothing, not really. He was angry though. He could understand. He gave his son the perfect life. He had money, he went to a good school, he was well-fed. Not to mention the things his father didn't help with. His Ian had a good job, lots of friends. He even had a beautiful girlfriend. Was that not enough for him?

His brother had locked himself in a stuffy bathroom stall, unsanitary but it was private. Of course they had fought as children, and there were arguments as they got older. They were always brothers though. Partying together. Drinking together. Playing video games together. Brotherly stuff. They weren't attached at the hip, but they might as well have been. Losing a twin is very much losing another part of you. He felt empty. He took another large swig of the vodka, the bottle getting lighter as he drank more. Would anyone come looking for him? It took them hours to look for his brother. And now, at his funeral, he sat in a bathroom stall drinking his sorrows away.

His friends sat at the back of the hall, silence floated in the air. They couldn't speak, it was too awkward. There was no one to tell unbearably cringeworthy jokes, laughing as he did so. There was no one to break that silence with random information he discovered whilst scrolling through Wikipedia at three in the morning. Everyone just sat in silence, someone shifting every once in a while. They didn't dare to look at each other, too afraid of breaking even more than they had already broke. They blamed themselves, definitely. Who wouldn't? They did nothing to save him, not that they could anyway.

At the end of the row, his 'girlfriend' twiddled her thumbs and stared at her feet. She examined the floor as if it was a great and historical work of art, newly discovered by her. It wasn't though. The carpet was slightly dirty, tread marks embedded into the grubby material. Her hair hung loosely, not even bothering to tie it into a tight ponytail like she usually would. They weren't really dating, she only pretended to. They both pretended. It was alright though, both him and her were still the best of friends. She thought so, anyway. However, as she sat there, tears streaming down her cheeks, she began to wonder whether she really knew him. She had always asked him why he had to pretend to date her, though he always changed the subject. It didn't matter, not really. All that mattered was that she should've been there for him and she wasn't. How selfish.

At the back of the hall, not even sitting on a chair, he leaned against the wall. His face was still, not a hint of emotion was visible. On the inside his heart was shattered. In fact, he may have been the most broken of all. The mother who cared more about her appearance than her own son may have thought she was broken by the death of her second child, but she was really just grieving her reputation as a mother. The father who had obvious anger issues and would take them out on the smallest son a little too often, but not too hard so that it wouldn't leave abuse. The brother who cared far too much for the girls he was fucking in the walk-in-wardrobe and not enough for the brother riddled with pain and suffering. It was okay when they were together though. A world of their own. Maybe it was only for an hour, a day, or a weekend. But it was still theirs and that's all that really and truly mattered to them.

It didn't make the pain better though. It didn't stop him being ignored by his mother and brother, and beaten by his father. His friends didn't even know the difference between his happiness and his sadness.

That was the issue. It's not that the signs weren't obvious. They were. He cried loudly. A great cry for help. He was hiding things from his family. Wearing long sleeves so often, even in the summer days. The problem wasn't that the symptoms of his suicide weren't obvious enough, it was that no one cared enough to notice. You can't save someone who's already gone. It was too late, even if he loved him.