Jan 20 2006
I knew instantly something was wrong.
I came back to my office today after a meeting. I didn’t take my cell phone to the meeting because I am an irresponsible cell phone owner and I never remember to take it anywhere. I sat down at my desk and there were 2 missed calls. One from my 22 year old daughter, Katie, and then a moment later one from my 20 year old daughter, Amber.
I knew instantly something was wrong. I had that feeling of dread, a bolt of fear delivered directly into my heart. Any mother who has a mobile teenage child knows what I mean - it’s that feeling you get when your teenager is out and and about and the phone rings at 11:00PM. That feeling. Terror, fear.
I called Amber. I remember thinking “Who should I call first?” I chose Amber because she was younger, farther away (she lives at her college). She was crying, unable to compose herself enough to relay the news to me. I was paralyzed with fear, my heart was racing, and I couldn’t breathe.
“It’s Chris. He’s dead. He killed himself.”
Chris. My nephew. Well, he was my nephew when I was married to Katie and Amber’s father. My ex and I had our two girls and my ex’s brother and his wife had their two boys. My Katie was the same age as Christopher. My Amber was the same age as Zack. They grew up together. I might have dropped out of the picture in 1991 when I divorced their father, but my girls continued to be close to all of their cousins from their dad’s family.
Christopher. When I think of him, I picture a little boy with a bowl haircut and big brown puppy-dog eyes. He was always a serious child.
After doing what I could to console Amber (which, let’s face it, was nothing… what can one say in such a situation? I was as effective as a piece of furniture) I hung up and called Katie. Katie got the news after midnight last night and so her grief wasn’t quite as fresh as Amber’s. She seemed drained, numb, perhaps even in a slight state of shock. I talked to her, too, mumbling the same ineffective words as I did with her sister. Me, at work, in my office, trying to somehow comfort my girls. At the end of the conversation, as we were saying our good-byes, Kate said “Mom, I love you.”
I lost it then. I bawled in my office for a little boy with puppy-dog eyes and a bowl haircut. Christopher. Christopher… if I close my eyes, I can hear his mother’s voice, “Christopher, you share that frisbee with Katie!”
Suicide. I’m not sure if anyone knows why. There was no note. Whatever his problems were, there is no longer an opportunity for his mom or his dad or his brothers or his cousins to help him with those, to lessen the burden, to work through them.
Dozens of times since I heard the news, I’ve paused and thought about his mother and father. How is it that in the face of such a loss they can continue to breathe, to walk, to sit, to stand? How can they just continue to be? Or maybe they’ve not continued. Maybe they’ve done what I imagine I might do - slump to the floor, all systems shut down, unable to cope, sweet sleep taking me away to a place where I didn’t have to know, to deal, to cry, to be.
I feel so helpless. I don’t know what to do or how to do it. My girls; they will gather with their dad and uncles and aunts and cousins. Plans will be made for the body to be laid out, for a funeral service and burial. Is it appropriate for the ex-aunt to come? Even if it was appropriate, do I have the emotional fortitude to make that visit?
When I talked to my girls today, the first thing I wanted to do is tell them to please never do this thing, this permanent thing, to come to me first and let me try to help. I didn’t because I don’t believe the time was right for such a lecture. Instead, I came home to my three little girls and I’ve kissed and hugged them all evening and they don’t even know why Mommy is being extra-affectionate.
Good-bye, sweet little Christopher. I don’t claim to know what comes after, but whatever it is, I hope it gives you the peace you could not seem to find here in life.
