We sit around my aunts brown kitchen table
A scene weāve done a thousand times before where I slinked unnoticed behind my hair until it was turn to recite my yearly accomplishments.
Back into the shadows.
This time is different.
This time my father is dead.
Suicide.
He went missing 24 hours before.
āYour fathers illness took himā
He was diagnosed with a neurological disease months prior.
We never spoke.
No it didnāt, my brain screamed.
Suicide.
I run to the kitchen in panic trying to find clonizapam which I almost never take cause Iām afraid of pills.
āWhat are you taking, doing drugs wonāt numb your painā.
Heās a cop, of course anxiety meds would be seen as ādrug addictionā.
āIām having a panic attackā I muster, angrily from the displaced shame.
I donāt take the pill out of spite and we donāt say anything on the 30 minute drive to his house.
Iām probably sheet white, I feel anxious.
I feel nothing.
I havenāt cried.
We had a terrible relationship, dad and I.
Terrible.
Suicide.
Hours pass.
Minutes?
I dunno, Iām dissociating into everyoneās grief.
Stop talking to me.
I donāt want to be here.
So many unanswered questions, ones I still donāt know nearly a year later.
Silence and awkwardness.
I sit at the head of their table and avoid everyoneās eyes except my little brothers.
Theyāre all staring at me, finally paying attention to me after so long.
I hate it.
I want to disappear, their eyes like pathetic little daggers of sadness.
Why the **** am I here?
Someone mentions my tattoos.
Yeah.
I have tattoos.
Tattooed hands, and a dead father.
I only cry when my brother does.
Telling him itās a suicide, a face Iāll never forget and my soul left behind at the death of his innocence.
Nothing left to protect.
Our father is dead.
6 days till the year death anniversary.
I donāt cry as much as I had after the veil finally shattered.
Iāve never known depression like that; though I was able to find myself after severe heartache.
A traumatized youth.
C-ptsd.
Pass me the join, I need to sleep.
Trigger warning: death & suicide
About the death of my abusive father.