When I arrived home I noticed that the grass needed to be cut and the trash cans needed to be brought inside. I changed into shorts and took care of these domestic rituals. It’s rare that I’m home on a Thursday, a little after 12, with time on my hands to do such things. There’s the pressing need of the suicide matter, of course, but there’s civility as well. I can’t have the neighbors saying things like “his lawn was a mess,” and “the trash cans were still outside!” No wonder he killed himself. I even say hello to Lisa who lives across the street. She calls me over while I’m cutting the grass in my shorts. She tells me that she quit her job in order to stay home to help Timothy who is having difficulties at school. It’s either Timothy or her other son, Jonathan; I’m not sure which. I’m not listening to anything she says, but I smile. She’s checking out my hairy legs.
I put the lawn mower back in the garage, next to the trash cans. I strip of my sweaty shorts as I go upstairs to shower. I don’t know whether to use deodorant after I get cleaned up, but I definitely know that I should brush my teeth and put gel in my hair. My wiry mane is unruly without gel. I imagine there’s a right way and a wrong way to do this, but no one seems to have left any clues. For a few days now, I have searched the internet for suicide etiquette but most sites are devoted to suicides Do-Not’s, as in: “Don’t do it, you’ll regret it;” “Don’t do this to your family, they’ll never forgive you;” or (my favorite) “Don’t let this ruin your life.” How do you tell these internet sites that for the person who wants to kill himself, the last thing he cares about is how this will affect the rest of his life? Gentlemen, get a clue.
Since there’s no guidance on line, I develop my own plan of action. I sort all my keys and put them in plastic bags with labels. There are the keys to the front door and keys to the back door (because the contractor messed up and did not key all the doors to the same lock). There are two sets of keys to the new automatic garage door I had installed six months ago, when I was still optimistic that someday I would meet someone to share my home with and that he would need his own key to park his car in the garage. There are keys to my parents’ house which I never used but they entrusted me with in case anything should happen to them. Ironically, they don’t have a key to my house. There are keys to Anne’s house (of course), and keys to Mark’s apartment which I never returned to him when we broke up. He asked for them back but I told him I lost them. I was hoping that maybe we would get back together again, so I held on to them, secretively. He told me later that he changed his lock. Now the keys are useless to me or anyone else, so I trash them.
I lay out all the keys on the kitchen counter, clearly labeled as to source and function. They’ll find my body upstairs, but surely someone will check out the kitchen. I imagine a cop or a detective, or maybe even a snoopy neighbor (most probably Lisa), will open the refrigerator to get some water. They’ll place the water jug on the counter and they’ll notice the keys in their plastic bags. “Hey, here’s the keys!,” someone will say. “Problem solved!” They found the keys. Now they can sell the house and drive the car off the driveway. Make everything neat and tidy for the next owner.
Anne will probably be the first one here, but she only has the keys to the back door. I don’t want her to come around the back in search of me. I just cut the grass, and if it rains tonight the clippings will get wet and stick to her shoes. I don’t want her tracking grass clippings all over the house. My son Joey knows the combination to the automatic garage door, but maybe in a panic he’ll forget the numbers or the door opener will malfunction (as things always do when they need to work). I decide to leave the front door unlocked. My ex-wife lives in fear of open doors, and is always locking up locks and admonishing everyone to check theirs bolts and latches. She’ll be horrified that I left the door open all night, but I really have nothing to worry about. What’s the worst that could happen to me? Someone could come in and murder me.
Upstairs I sit at my computer, to write the infamous suicide note and make some final banking arrangements. It’s amazing how many bills are on automatic pay. It will take months for Anne to figure out that if I’m dead I no longer need cable, or cell phone, or even electricity or water for that matter. I stop automatic billing for all non-essentials, and I leave instructions in my “suicide note” as to the account number for utilities, mortgage and other essentials that either Anne or a prospective buyer for this house will need.
I imagine that most suicide notes are grandiose and moving. They are supposed to explain everything and make everyone feel sorry for the one who killed himself. I don’t intend to go this route. In the end, all my suicide note consists of are instructions to Anne and to my boss, Ronald, because even though he’s a prick he has a good heart and I know he’ll help out Anne. I tell them where my money is, what numbers to contact, where my important papers can be found. As to the rest, the reason why, I figure they already know. I messed up. I messed up everything I had because I needed to come out to the world as gay man. I knew nothing about being gay, had no idea what this really meant, but I thought that coming out and becoming gay (yes, becoming gay) would be what would make me happy. I had become straight to please my parents and society. I had become a father (twice) to please my wife. I had become a successful lawyer to please my employers. So when would I become what I want to be? I envisioned that other sensitive men, so alluring and attractive, would welcome me with open arms and make everything alright. But nothing has really changed. Now that I have become gay (as I always was, as I always will be), I realize that I am still not the man I ought to be. Instead I continue to be a frightened curly haired twelve year old boy who was beaten to a pulp by his parents and had the will to live struck out of him.
I go through the checklist one more time. Yes, I made a checklist for this event. Change clothes, turn off lights, pay bills, write suicide note. Done, done, done. I decide I should send Anne a payment from my checking account. I have about $20,000. I figure $15,000 should help her out while my estate is being probated. I send her an electronic payment from the handy bill payment service that my bank offers on line.
Back to the checklist. Cancel internet chat. Good thing I remember this. I have to cancel the subscription to all my dating services and my gay “cruising” sites. I have not used these in months. I would be mortified if anyone found these on my credit card statements. They appear discreetly as “Buddy Services” or “Talk 800”. You have to call the 800 number posted next to the name to find out what the service is for. When you call, you get a telephone operator that proudly announces that this is either “Sex-Man,” “Macho-hunt,” or some other equally provocative tell all name. Not the way I want my surviving friends and relatives to remember me.
I’ve marked everything off on my checklist, and I’m growing weary. The euphoria of the decision has almost warn off. I’m starting to have second thoughts. I won’t allow this. I open up my stash of sleeping pills and thoughtlessly put them all in my mouth to swallow in one gulp. Ninety pills. Fortunately they are very small. I run to the bathroom to drink water to chase the pills. I swallow hard. The pills are in my stomach. Now it is done. Now I have committed suicide.
I lay down in my bed. All I want to do these days is sleep. Sleep is my biggest comfort. I yearn for sleep. I fall asleep.
Sunday, June 25, 2006
C. B. Parkway
She called me on my cell phone at noon. Precisely at 12 noon. How did she know? How had she guessed that I was sitting in my office, 14th floor office tower, thinking about suicide? I knew how I would do it. I knew that I would go home and take 90 sleeping pills. I would change into jeans and a long sleeve polo shirt, the one that fits me most comfortably. The blue one. I would brush my teeth first (I don't know why), and put everything in order, and then take the pills and lay down in my bed and not wake up ever again. But she called me when I was thinking all this. How did she know?
Of course, she didn’t know. She called simply because she cares about me, and she knew that I was not doing well. I've lost thirty pounds, and I don't talk to anyone, and I worry. Even the children have noticed and my daughter who is six years old asloks incessantly, "Daddy, are you happy?" I lie to her, "Of course I am honey!" I say. But I know that I'm fooling no one, not even myself.
At work, I've told them that I have cancer, or that I think I have cancer. I survived a cancer scare last year, when they found a 5 centimeter polyp in my colon. That explained why I was bleeding all the time. And three years before that I had my thyroid removed due to cancer. So I think maybe I have cancer now too, because I'm loosing weight, and I have no energy, and nothing matters to me. Nothing that ever made me happy matters any more. When the kids come to my house on the weekends, I sleep. It seems that it rains every weekend, and I pull the windows open and listen to the rain drop while I stay in my bed. My girl and my boy jump on top of me, and they clamor, "Daddy, let's play! Let's go somewhere." But I have no energy, so I tell them that I need to sleep because I'm tired, because Daddy has no thyroid and he's not as energetic as other fathers who still have their thyroids. But it's all a lie and we know it. They and I know it's not my thyroid. It's my mind, it's my heart. It's my feeling of uselessness and hopelessness. So I call it cancer.
The kids have been going back home after visiting me, and telling her that I spend a lot of time sleeping. She wants to know what's going on. She's not challenging my parenting (though she should since I've simply not been there for the kids lately). She only wants to know that I'm ok.
"What's going on?" she says.
“I’m depressed. I can’t take it anymore.”
“Why? Is it work? What is it?”
“I don’t know. It’s everything. I don’t want to live anymore.”
“You’re not going to do anything stupid are you?”
I lie. I’ve become such a good liar. “No,” I say.
There’s silence on the other side. I hear one of her subordinates calling her. She’s back on the phone now. “Look,” she says. She sounds worried, but rushed. “ I have to go to a meeting, but you have to promise to take better care of yourself. There’s nothing wrong with your life.”
“If anything happened to me, you would be ok. Wouldn’t you?” I ask.
She doesn’t like this question. “Of course I would!” she says sharply. “But nothing is going to happen to you. Buckle up! We’ll talk later.”
“Bye,” she says, “Bye,” I say. But I don’t utter what I really want to speak. I don’t mention that even though we are divorced, that even though I’m the one that left her and “ruined her life!” as she once told me in raw anger, that even so. . . I still love her.
The phone call didn’t help. In fact, it gave me the courage I needed. She confirmed that she would be ok without me. I always suspected as much. She’s an intelligent and accomplished person, a loving mother, a good soul. I’m worth more to her dead than alive. With my 401(k), my insurance policy, the equity in my house, she could actually quit work and raise the kids comfortably. I’ve done all these calculations.
My phone is ringing incessantly. I’m working on two transactions at the same time. I need to walk away from them, and from everything else. My secretary is not at her desk; she’s at lunch. My paralegal is in her office. I feign a reason to speak with her, “Look,” I tell her. “I’m sick as a dog right now. If I don’t come in tomorrow, would you have my ex-wife check in on me? It’s a weird request, I know, but I live alone and I want someone to check in on me in case I don’t make it in tomorrow.”
Susana looks at me oddly. I’ve made a lot of odd requests before, but nothing like this. She’s a cool one though. It takes a lot more than one oddball attorney to ruffle her feathers. She figures it’s me being a drama queen again. “Go home,” she says calmly. “We’ll check in with you if you are not in tomorrow.”
“But you have to call my ex-wife too!” I reminder her.
“Don’t worry,” says Susana, still calm. “We’ll call Anne too. Now go home and rest. I think you’re delirious. Do you have a fever? You really don’t look so good.”
***
The C. B. Parkway is beautiful in April, particularly this April. We’ve had a lot of rain, and the trees are very full and colorful. I’m surprised that I haven’t noticed this before. Actually, I’m more surprised that I am noticing how beautiful the parkway can be. Lately, nothing has struck my attention. All I want to do is sleep.
There’s a very soothing calm that has taken hold on me in this last car ride. My last commute back home from the office. My last car ride ever. Every tree I pass, I consider, “I will never see that tree again.” When I cross the tiny little bridge that connects the parkway to Bethesda, I think, “I will never cross this bridge again.”
I wonder if the other commuters know what I’m thinking. Do they realize that this man driving on the C. B. Parkway, this man who drives a Prius because he cares about the environment, this man who once thought he would conquer the world with poetry. . . , do they know that this man on the C. B. Parkway is going home early, a little after 12 noon, in order to commit suicide?
Of course, she didn’t know. She called simply because she cares about me, and she knew that I was not doing well. I've lost thirty pounds, and I don't talk to anyone, and I worry. Even the children have noticed and my daughter who is six years old asloks incessantly, "Daddy, are you happy?" I lie to her, "Of course I am honey!" I say. But I know that I'm fooling no one, not even myself.
At work, I've told them that I have cancer, or that I think I have cancer. I survived a cancer scare last year, when they found a 5 centimeter polyp in my colon. That explained why I was bleeding all the time. And three years before that I had my thyroid removed due to cancer. So I think maybe I have cancer now too, because I'm loosing weight, and I have no energy, and nothing matters to me. Nothing that ever made me happy matters any more. When the kids come to my house on the weekends, I sleep. It seems that it rains every weekend, and I pull the windows open and listen to the rain drop while I stay in my bed. My girl and my boy jump on top of me, and they clamor, "Daddy, let's play! Let's go somewhere." But I have no energy, so I tell them that I need to sleep because I'm tired, because Daddy has no thyroid and he's not as energetic as other fathers who still have their thyroids. But it's all a lie and we know it. They and I know it's not my thyroid. It's my mind, it's my heart. It's my feeling of uselessness and hopelessness. So I call it cancer.
The kids have been going back home after visiting me, and telling her that I spend a lot of time sleeping. She wants to know what's going on. She's not challenging my parenting (though she should since I've simply not been there for the kids lately). She only wants to know that I'm ok.
"What's going on?" she says.
“I’m depressed. I can’t take it anymore.”
“Why? Is it work? What is it?”
“I don’t know. It’s everything. I don’t want to live anymore.”
“You’re not going to do anything stupid are you?”
I lie. I’ve become such a good liar. “No,” I say.
There’s silence on the other side. I hear one of her subordinates calling her. She’s back on the phone now. “Look,” she says. She sounds worried, but rushed. “ I have to go to a meeting, but you have to promise to take better care of yourself. There’s nothing wrong with your life.”
“If anything happened to me, you would be ok. Wouldn’t you?” I ask.
She doesn’t like this question. “Of course I would!” she says sharply. “But nothing is going to happen to you. Buckle up! We’ll talk later.”
“Bye,” she says, “Bye,” I say. But I don’t utter what I really want to speak. I don’t mention that even though we are divorced, that even though I’m the one that left her and “ruined her life!” as she once told me in raw anger, that even so. . . I still love her.
The phone call didn’t help. In fact, it gave me the courage I needed. She confirmed that she would be ok without me. I always suspected as much. She’s an intelligent and accomplished person, a loving mother, a good soul. I’m worth more to her dead than alive. With my 401(k), my insurance policy, the equity in my house, she could actually quit work and raise the kids comfortably. I’ve done all these calculations.
My phone is ringing incessantly. I’m working on two transactions at the same time. I need to walk away from them, and from everything else. My secretary is not at her desk; she’s at lunch. My paralegal is in her office. I feign a reason to speak with her, “Look,” I tell her. “I’m sick as a dog right now. If I don’t come in tomorrow, would you have my ex-wife check in on me? It’s a weird request, I know, but I live alone and I want someone to check in on me in case I don’t make it in tomorrow.”
Susana looks at me oddly. I’ve made a lot of odd requests before, but nothing like this. She’s a cool one though. It takes a lot more than one oddball attorney to ruffle her feathers. She figures it’s me being a drama queen again. “Go home,” she says calmly. “We’ll check in with you if you are not in tomorrow.”
“But you have to call my ex-wife too!” I reminder her.
“Don’t worry,” says Susana, still calm. “We’ll call Anne too. Now go home and rest. I think you’re delirious. Do you have a fever? You really don’t look so good.”
***
The C. B. Parkway is beautiful in April, particularly this April. We’ve had a lot of rain, and the trees are very full and colorful. I’m surprised that I haven’t noticed this before. Actually, I’m more surprised that I am noticing how beautiful the parkway can be. Lately, nothing has struck my attention. All I want to do is sleep.
There’s a very soothing calm that has taken hold on me in this last car ride. My last commute back home from the office. My last car ride ever. Every tree I pass, I consider, “I will never see that tree again.” When I cross the tiny little bridge that connects the parkway to Bethesda, I think, “I will never cross this bridge again.”
I wonder if the other commuters know what I’m thinking. Do they realize that this man driving on the C. B. Parkway, this man who drives a Prius because he cares about the environment, this man who once thought he would conquer the world with poetry. . . , do they know that this man on the C. B. Parkway is going home early, a little after 12 noon, in order to commit suicide?