Lethal Ways Not To Kill Yourself

Acquaintance 4: Kal

Where shall I begin?

Kai messaging me a gazillion times to make sure I was alive or Kassy knocking on my bedroom door to make sure I wasn't dead?

I should begin with Kassy because she is standing in front of me.

"What was all the fuss about?" She crossed her arms but waited for my cue to sit on my bed. When it comes to mannerism, Kassy could have made a Victorian woman blush in indecency.

I asked her to sit because standing Kassy stood right on my nerves.

It was difficult for me to get out of my room for a couple of days. I so close, so close to this one thing that would have made me come to terms with all my failures, but I failed in that too.

I didn't want to kill myself in my room, each and everything would trigger the fear of not being enough in me. It'll also kick in the Kal who thought suicide was a way for cowards to escape hardships and problems in life. They just couldn't face it, such lazy and wimp they were.

Now I realise, they are the bravest people you'll ever know.

You would never take your life. Sure, you'll think about it, but the repercussions would pull you back. Your family will pull you back. The worst thing in the world for a parent is to see their child dying before they did. You know your parents haven't done anything like that to deserve your death.

Things get complicated for a guy like me, ambition was the only thing I was made of. To soar high, to see myself in the eyes of people who envy your success. To be the star of the motivation videos like Jack Ma is now. To be celebrated and discussed for your shining achievements you were as badges like a brigadier.

To die was essentially killing that person who imagined to be a diamond in the coal mine. It's not easy to kill him, he imagined you to be things your current self could hardly process. How can you make an optimist see the glass is entirely empty when he considers it's full of air of hard work and perseverance?

Had I been an average child from the beginning, the optimist, the dreamer in me would not have existed. Accepting my fate would have been easier, moving on to venture into a new path would have been easier. Dealing with failure and taking it as a lesson to be grateful for would have been easier.

How can you make a person eat the bitter pill when all he has tasted was the honey?

Just imagining failure would make me work harder. Just imagining someone is better than me would make me outshine them. I had heard that one of my classmates had learnt the periodic table up to krypton. The next day element 104 was on the tip of my tongue, with its molecular mass. Once someone had answered that Portugal's capital is Lisbon, the next day, the teacher had to refer to the atlas to make sure I truly knew all the 195 capitals or not. Once, a student learnt how to find the root of a number orally. Next day, I told what 345+476+841+630 was faster than the calculator.

How can you expect a kid like this to make peace with the fact that he won't be alive to see the future? How can you make the kid realise that the plans he made about the ski trip or the interviews he pretended to have in his bedroom would never be realised? How can you make that kid understand that a grown-up version of him would kill the younger self because of the mistakes the grown-up made?

I had drowned in the pit of self-doubt. Even though I thoroughly enjoyed the company of people who were still under the impression that I am invincible, I subtly sought validation.

I would vent to online friends about how I am not good enough and I have a proof for it. I knew this would make them bring proof that I am not as bad as I talk to be. A thousand cheers of appraisal can't shun the siren of self-deprecation. It was almost maddening. I stopped doing anything even before I gave it a try, thinking I am not good, thinking my friends would judge me based on it and would stop talking to me. It was difficult for me to detach my art from who I am and would take even a minor criticism to heart.