by G, Sacramento
Everyone at one point in their life faces some sort of difficulty. That’s just my life. My father died six years ago, when I was eleven years old. And still just thinking about that right now makes me panic. I can’t stop the panic. I can’t think, I can’t breathe. It doesn’t stop and I try to ignore it and I get angry and sad and hopeless, and it doesn’t stop.
Cut, burn, scratch myself, pain, and it helps it to stop. My dad was nice, my dad was caring. I loved my dad.
I remember I was at my dad’s house, it was late and I was falling asleep. But I hear screaming. My dad’s girlfriend screaming for help and screaming my dad’s name.
She runs inside, crying, looks at me and holds me with her bloody hands saying, “it’s okay.” She runs back outside with a towel, and I stood there frozen, looking at the blood on my hands, on the floor, on the walls, everywhere. I just stood there frozen, thinking and panicking. And it won’t stop. I try to just think it’s okay.
I see my little sister starting to wake up, but I tell her to go back to sleep and “it’s okay”. Sirens sound and police come in and out. They tell me it’s okay. I was frozen and wanting to look outside, to see my dad. Every step, the pressure building on my body, barely able to move or breathe.
The door is just a few feet away. I look outside and see my dad, for what I didn’t know would be the last time. What I saw when I looked outside, I can never forget. My dad laying perfectly on that stretcher, it’s like I’m looking at it now. I’m unable to sleep that night.
My mom comes in the morning to pick me and my sister up. I don’t cry when I hear my dad’s dead, but my sister does. My dad was stabbed to death at 2:30am on October 31st, 2015. I don’t know if I have dealt with his death, but I’ve learned to accept it and move on, ignore it.
I don’t love anymore or care. I don’t think I feel anymore. I think I’m dishonest with everyone and everything, living life like a story, using fake emotions and a fake personality. But I can’t live any other way, I don’t know how.