Speak Up

Chapter 7

They say when you die you're supposed to see a bright light. I don't know if I believe in that. I mean, when you die, you aren't aware of what's happening around you. Maybe you do see it. I don't actually know because I never saw any bright light to cross over from the living to the dead. Yet even if I did, would I be able to recall the memory when I gain consciousness?

When I do gain consciousness, the only bright light I see is the ceiling lights above me. I squint my eyes so I couldn't blind myself. I lie there for a moment, listening to a continuous beeping noise. It took me a while to realise I wasn't lying on the tile floor of my bathroom. No. I was in a hospital ward. Why am I here? Shouldn't I be dead?

"Zach? Are you awake?"

I turn my head to the left to see my mother sitting in a chair beside my bed. As soon as she sees that I'm awake, she leaps off her chair, her eyes filling with tears. Her eyes were already red and puffy, and looked as if she may have not have slept for days.

"Thank goodness you're alright, Zach." She hugs me tightly for a long time before pulling away from me. She brushes my forehead with her hand. "How are you feeling, sweetie?"

I stare at her rather than saying anything. I then looked around the room, double checking that I was really here and I wasn't dreaming. But then I reminded myself that you can't dream when you're dead.

I turn back to Mom. "What happened? Why am I here? I shouldn't be here?"

Mom's face fell apart as soon as I said that, and it crushed me to know how much I was a fool to make an attempt to end of my life, putting her in so much pain. Why did I talk myself into overdosing on my anxiety medication?

"I'm so sorry, Mom. I didn't think this through."

Mom reaches for my hand and squeezes it. "Why didn't you tell me what was going on, Zach?"

"What are you talking about?" I ask in denial. I knew she was referring to Liam, but I couldn't bring it to tell her everything.

"You know what I'm talking about. Trey told me how some kid name Liam treats you."

I look away from her, unable to meet her eyes. "I didn't want you to worry."

Mom lets go of my hand and then rests it on my shoulder. "Zach, you know you could have told me. If you have been bullied, I want you to tell me. I don't want you keep it to yourself. Gosh, I don't know what I would have done if Trey didn't ask his mother to go over to our house to check up on you."

As soon as I heard her say Trey's name, I was really surprised. For someone who has only known me for a few days, I didn't think he would care if I had taken my own life. None of my other classmates would have cared.

I felt sick. Disgusted with myself for what I had just put my mother through. Why did I just decided to want to give up my life, not even thinking how much it would kill Mom if I was no longer here. Well, I did thought of her before I swallowed the tablets. I just didn't want to think about her at that moment. I was being selfish, only thinking about what I wanted. 

Mom had me at a young age when she was only seventeen, just two months before she graduated high school. My father denied it that he was the father. I was the only family Mom really had. She never got along with her father well as a teenager, and basically lost it when he found out that she was pregnant. He had wanted her to get an abortion, but of course my mother refused to do it. She was determine to raise me on her own. Her mother helped her with me after I was born. Seventeen years later Mom still doesn't have anything to do with her father, and her mother had died four years ago. She has two brothers and a sister, but she doesn't see them as often.