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The day I died I drifted from my body. I stood before my lifeless corpse, empty. My face illuminated from the moonlight, I stared. Tears crawled down my face dripping, one after the other, a cycle that mesmerized me. My eyes dilated, they gazed back at me. I remember being confused. Confused on how I was still conscious. I thought just maybe it was some type of nightmare. Maybe a dream, one that has replayed in my mind for years but it couldn't possibly be real? Right?
So, then why was my body hanging from my bedroom beam? Why were there empty pill bottles on my bed? Why was there a note next to it all? A chair laid on the floor next to me. I had finally given up. I had finally ended it. I look down to my hands and feet. They didn't look transparent like from the movies, but a cool air circulated my body almost like where my blood would flow. I didn't look like some wispy cloud but my achy back didn't hurt anymore. The blisters on my hands from school work didn't hurt either. I didn't feel a thing
The rope I used was thick and durable. When I was 4 we used to have a tire swing. When dad built it we had a lot of extra rope so we stored the rest, and for years it sat in our garage collecting dust. By the time I grew out of that swing I had no longer determined that rope as just rope but as a back up plan. As an escape. That night I remember so vividly. Wooden beams spread along my cramped room looked so peaceful. Almost like they were calling out to me.
I had finally had enough. Mom and Dad were home that day for once in their lives. Ai fell asleep watching TV again. But it's not like they'd care either way. When I'm not drunk I always turn off the TV for her and use the little muscle I have to carry her to her bed. But this time I didn't bother to even wake her up. When Mom and Dad fell asleep I crept out the door and into the garage.
I took the rope and as I passed Ai I looked at her for one last time. I knew it was the end. I had already planned everything out. Collecting pill bottles from friends. Xanax, pain killers, Zoloft, anything. I stored them in my drawer with a bottle of my favorite beer I had saved from the last pack I gargled down the week before. And with a note ready to be planted, one that took me weeks to find words to write. I thought I'd back out. That I wouldn't have the courage to actually do it but there I was in front of my precious sister for the last time.
I covered her with a sofa blanket I found laying around and kissed her forehead. Feeling the walls as I walked off I felt my heart start to beat faster the closer I got to my room. I locked the door. Throwing one side of the rope over the beam, I tie it up into a noose. When I was in elementary school some kids taught me how to do it when the teacher wasn't looking. How they giggled as if we were talking about boys or a show on cable. I always hung out with the older girls. They taught me everything.
Advice and gossip, even how to protect myself when Mom and Dad were too busy to remember. I learned how to survive from them. I didn't need my good for nothing parents who only remembered I existed when they were bored. I sat on my bed with my pills and drink. I started with a handful of painkillers. With one foul swoop I tilted my head back, hand over mouth, and dropped the pills in. Without a thought I quickly crack open my beer and swallow hard. Knowing I couldn't go back, I threw back some Tylenol. And finally end it off with half a bottle of Xanax mixed with zoloft. The final course.
I chugged down what was left of my beer bottle and carefully set the bottle down on my carpeted floor, shaking. I read my note one last time. Despite it taking a while to make, It truly only consisted of a couple paragraphs. It read,
"I'm sorry Ai, I'm sorry I had to leave you but I couldn't take it anymore. I had decided on this for a while so really there wasn't anything anyone could've done to stop me. Even then you made my life better but I can't go on living like this. I wish you could understand how I feel though that would break my heart if you truly did so for now you'll have to take my word for It when I say I'm not abandoning you.
Just please don't be like me, never touch a bottle of beer, never look at a bottle of drugs, never give out like I did. I'm always proud.
And Mom and Dad, All I thank you is for the roof over our heads, and money that we both know I spent on anything but food, and for Ayia. Don't fuck her up too. -Aurora"
I stood up from my bed, placing the note right next to the bottles. I set up a chair from my old, creaky desk and pushed it right under the noose. The room was dark, and as I stood on the chair the window next to my bed caught my eye. The moon smiled above me, so very compassionately. A sympathy that melted me. I wrapped the noose around my throat, tightening it up. My limbs almost seemed blue under the full moon.
I took a deep breath. Inhaled with fear. The same way I cleared my mind and swallowed the pills, I shook my fingers and closed my eyes. Exhaling with contempt.
I jumped.