I flip the notebook open to the first page and it doesn’t surprise me that it’s blank. I wonder, if she had used the notebook like the therapist suggested, would it have made a difference?
I doubt it. I don’t know what could have saved Les from herself. Certainly not a pen and paper.
I pull the pen out of the spiral binding, then press the tip of the pen to the paper and begin to write her a letter. I don’t even know why I’m writing her. I don’t know if she’s in a place where she can see me right now, or if she’s even in a place at all, but in case she can see this . . . I want her to know how her selfish decision affected me. How hopeless she left me. Literally hopeless. And completely alone. And so, so incredibly sorry.
Chapter Two-and-a-half
* * *
Les,
You left your jeans in the middle of your bedroom floor. It looks like you just stepped out of them. It’s weird. Why would you leave your jeans on the floor if you knew what you were about to do? Wouldn’t you at least throw them in the hamper? Did you not think about what would happen after I found you and how someone would eventually have to pick your jeans up and do something with them? Well, I’m not picking them up. And I’m not hanging all your shirts back up, either.
Anyway. I’m in your closet. On the floor. I just don’t really know what I want to say to you right now, or what I want to ask you. Of course the only question on everyone else’s mind right now is “Why did she do it?” But I’m not going to ask you why you did it for two reasons.
1) You can’t answer me. You’re dead.
2) I don’t know if I really care why you did it. There isn’t anything about your life that would give you a good enough reason to do what you did. And you probably already know that if you can see Mom right now. She’s completely devastated.
You know, I never really knew what it meant to actually be devastated. I thought we were devastated after we lost Hope. What happened to her was definitely tragic for us, but the way we felt was nothing compared to how you’ve made Mom feel. She’s so incredibly devastated; she gives the word a whole new meaning. I wish the use of the word could be restricted to situations like this. It’s absurd that people are allowed to use it to describe anything other than how a mother feels when she loses her child. Because that’s the only situation in this entire world worthy of the term.
Dammit, I miss you so much. I’m so sorry I let you down. I’m sorry I wasn’t able to see what was really going on behind your eyes every time you told me you were fine.
So, yeah. Why, Les? Why did you do it?
H
Chapter Two-and-three-quarters
* * *
Les,
Well, congratulations. You’re pretty popular. Not only did you fill the parking lot of the funeral home with cars, but you also filled the lot next door and both churches down the street. That’s a lot of cars.
I held it together, though; mostly for Mom’s sake. Dad looked almost as bad as Mom. The whole funeral was really weird. It made me wonder, had you died in a car wreck or from something more mainstream, would people’s reactions have been different? If you hadn’t purposely overdosed (that’s the term Mom prefers), then I think people might have been a little less weird. It was like they were scared of us, or maybe they thought purposely overdosing was contagious. They discussed it like we weren’t even in the same room. So many stares and whispers and pitiful smiles. I just wanted to grab Mom and pull her out of there and protect her from the fact that I knew she was reliving your death with every hug and every tear and every smile.
Of course I couldn’t help but think everyone was acting like they were because they blamed us in a way. I could tell what they were thinking.
How could a family not know this would happen?
How could they not see the signs?
What kind of mother is she?