There was a thunderstorm on the morning you died. I couldn’t help but think it was fitting. Your loss deserved an explosion of the universe. Thunder muffled out my sobs, and the rain hid my tears. I mourned, and the world mourned with me.

Stewart.

I was unworthy. I am unworthy.

Your funeral was the first I’d ever cried at. I held it together until they showed your face on the screen. I looked down at my lap to escape your expression, and was met with your face again - smiling up at me from the pamphlet crumpled on my lap. You looked so happy. So full of life. I missed that.

It didn’t match the image of your emaciated body and grimaces of pain that haunted my mind whenever I thought of the last time I’d seen you alive. You looked so small. So timid. The clinical white of the hospital bed and room swallowed you whole. In my mind, you had always been larger than life. To see this so rudely contrasted as I witnessed part of your eventual trek to your death, was jarring. My memory of our last encounter unsettles me. I can’t think of it without my stomach churning, and tears welling in my eyes.

And I hate that. I hate that my last in-person memory of you evokes such negative reactions from my traitorous mind and body. How dare I cling to this memory. How dare I sit there, at your funeral, and cry at your smiling face from a time long passed? How dare I somehow make this about myself? For fuck’s sake.

Once the tears started, they didn’t stop.

Your casket was carried out of the doors to be cremated. Your loved ones stood up and began to move outside. I moved with them. And still, the tears persisted…

I’m sorry for my teen years.

I don’t think I’ll ever stop apologising for this. You are far from the first person I’ve offered this exact apology to. Multiple people, and I’m nowhere near done.

Regardless, I’m so sorry.

Sometimes I wonder what your reaction would’ve been if you’d known about my struggles with mental health if I hadn’t built walls to estrange all of the well-meaning adults from my life. It’s a pointless mental exercise at the age of 23, but I wonder nonetheless.

Maybe you would’ve taken back my camping knife for safe-keeping until I could be trusted with it. I’d want it back eventually. That blade has surprisingly deep sentimental value to me, mostly linked to you. But I think I would have (grudgingly) accepted a temporary rehousing until it was no longer an unhealthy temptation.

Maybe you would’ve forced me to spend more time camping. Maybe you would’ve worked with my parents to make attendance non-negotiable. The camping trips our families took together to the middle of nowhere will forever hold a special place in my heart.
I would’ve complained. I would’ve worn entirely black, despite the ridiculous heat in the remote bush, just to make a stupid point. I would’ve huffed, sighed, and eye-rolled. I would’ve dragged my feet and responded snarkily.

But, I also think I may have found closure. I may have found ways to connect desperately to the world around me instead of dissociating and depersonalising myself until I couldn’t even tell a therapist whether my body was feeling hot or cold. Until I couldn’t tell when I was hungry. When I was thirsty. When I needed to go the toilet. Because I was so disconnected from my body whenever I wasn’t actively mutilating it.

I lived like that for years, Stewart. Years. ‘The best years of my life.’ And I have no-one to blame but myself and my stupid fucking brain.

There’s also the possibility that I would’ve just shut down further and found a way to negotiate the non-negotiable. As happened consistently in canonical reality. But at 23, having lived a full decade (officially) with my clinical chronic depression, I’m tired of the negatives. Negatives are my default. What most people don’t understand about chronic depression, is that it never actually goes away. Even during ‘good’ periods, there’s always that voice whispering to you at the slightest inconvenience or misunderstanding. “Seeing blood on the outside of your body would help.” “If you just killed yourself, you wouldn’t have to deal with this shit.” The difference is, during a ‘good’ period, you have the energy to actively work at keeping those voices in the background.

But they’re always there. Waiting for the next slump when you’re most vulnerable. Perpetuating the frustrating cycle of major depressive episodes. It’s relentless. The negatives never cease.

So even if there’s the chance that your efforts could not have affected my mental health, who cares? What’s the harm in daring to cling to hope in a silly little story that you’ll never see? That most people won’t ever see? Here, in this safe space on an empty page, I allow myself to hope.

Hope is a dangerous and scarce thing. I must use it in moderation. But for you, Stewart, I’ll use some of it. It’s the very least I can do.

I’m so grateful that you were part of my family’s lives. That you accepted us into your paternal care. Although the end of your life brings me sorrow, my childhood memories with you bring me joy. Campfire horror stories about Red Ned. Canadian camping songs my sister and I would chorus - accents included. The ferro rod kits you gave to both my sister and I. Hunting for kindling from the natural landscape. Lighting our first campfires independently. Recreating classic board games with pebbles and rocks. The very important recipe for cooking bush turkeys that remains ingrained in my mind. The small arsenal of survival tips that live rent-free in my brain. Your brazen disgust with Bear Grylls (because he doesn’t have any credit as a real survivalist when a camera crew and TV show producers trail him, of course).

I wonder how you would’ve responded to me coming out as gay, and then nonbinary. I think you might have struggled with it at first. But I honestly believe, with whatever hope left in me, that you would have come around. Maybe it would have been awkward for a while. Both of us learning how to exist together. But my family and I loved you. And you loved us. And that, more than anything, makes me believe it all would have turned out okay.

I became a teacher, Stewart. I work in primary schools now, too, like you once did. I’m not doing great at the moment. I’m struggling with my brain again. And this is absolutely terrifying as someone who barely escaped with their life the first time.

I’m so tired, Stewart. The amount of energy it takes to get through each day is not sustainable. Not as a teacher. But I’d rather die than give up teaching. It is the only thing in my life that brings me any joy and purpose, despite the daily ups and downs.

My class last year was tough. They triggered my burn out, which triggered my depression, which triggered my suicidal ideation. My class last year literally made me want to kill myself (again). After years of relative peace since my last brush with suicidal ideation.

I never actually got over my burn out. I dived head first back into my job once my depression flared up again, desperate to cling to something, anything, to stay alive. I’m feeling the consequences of this hasty decision this year as the exhaustion of running-on-empty prevents my body from engaging properly in the admin portions of my job.

Anyway… This has become more about me than you, which is another selfish move on my part. I’m sorry. I didn’t start out with this intention. I sat down to write silly little queer short stories. Instead, I find myself writing a one-sided conversation with you that I’d give anything to have in person.

I miss you, Stewart.

I’ve never been a religious person. I don’t believe in faith or higher power. But for you, my friend, I hope to any and every deity listening that you are resting in peace. If anyone deserves rest and happiness, it is you.

Thank you for everything.

I miss you. We miss you.
Love, Ollie.
© O.M.A

#shortstory #story #mourning #reflection #MissingYou #personal #depression #mentalhealth #writco #writcoapp