“So you heard,” she said.
“I guess I did,” he said again hesitantly. “Is it true? Did he commit suicide?”
She started to cry even harder. “Oh my God,” she said, “it’s been the worst few days of my life.”
He looked at the list, noted no dates.
“When did this happen?” he asked.
“Just a few days ago,” she murmured. “I knew he was upset about something but to commit suicide, to jump? He was afraid of heights,” she cried out. “Why would he do that?”
Simon tried to console her as best he could, but not a whole lot he could say, and he was in shock himself. When he finally got off the phone, he sat down and pulled up all the information he could find, but there wasn’t very much available, and that was something else that just blew him away. When these suicides happened, did nobody keep track? Did nobody look into their lives to see why, or did it become just another statistic? Just somebody else who didn’t want to live and who took care of the job themselves?
More than a little stunned and upset, knowing that his friend had been a very vibrant guy, Simon couldn’t imagine why he wouldn’t have reached out and said something to him? Then Simon checked his email and looked at the last few he had from David and found nothing suspicious, absolutely nothing to suggest trouble of any kind. Simon didn’t know what to say; there wasn’t anything really, but it made him even more aware of the problem. Yet it was this big blank in his world.
He saw the result but didn’t really know what was causing the problem, and that bothered him even more. He did a bit more research and found a few more places that had support for spouses of people who had committed suicide. He emailed those to Louisa with a note.If there is anything I can do to help, please let me know. I had no idea that David was even in trouble.
And, of course, maybe she hadn’t either, so she’d be left with survivor’s guilt, something else that wasn’t fair to her as well. He didn’t even know what to say or to do and was still flabbergasted by it all, even when he woke the next morning.
*
Simon’s Friday Morning
Determined to findout more, he contacted a couple lawyers and asked them about the suicide issue.
The lawyers had very little information either, with one saying, “Suicides are suicides,” he said, “almost in a world unto themselves.”
“But these people need help before they start jumping off bridges.”
“I know,” he said. “Right now there seems to be a rash of them, and they’re getting in the news, and unfortunately that sets off a new rash of suicides,” he muttered. “But I’m not sure that it’s this bad all the time.”
“How bad does it have to get?”
Not liking the lawyer’s attitude about it either, Simon rang off and sat down, wondering if he could do anything further. He wondered about the women’s shelter. He made a couple phone calls and ended up talking to his contact there. “Lisa, is there any help for some of your women, if—um—if they’re really depressed?”
“There is some help,” she said. “We have a group of doctors who work with us, some counselors.”
“Good,” he said in relief. “I’ve just become aware of the rash of local suicides lately, and I’m finding it a bit shocking.”
“It is shocking when you first become aware of it,” she said, “but honestly it’s something that a lot of us have been dealing with for a long time.”
“That just makes me feel worse,” he said. “I had no idea the issue was so bad. I just found out a friend of mine, somebody I’ve known for years, jumped off the bridge a few days ago.”
“Oh, my goodness,” she said immediately, with sympathy. “I am so sorry. I think suicide is one of the hardest things for the survivors to deal with. It’s like,Why didn’t you say something? Why didn’t you tell me that it was that bad? I could have helped.”
“Exactly. I’d have sworn he wasn’t the guy to do something like that.”
“Well, unless you know exactly what was going on in his mind at the time, it’s really hard to say that.”
“I know. I know,” he said, “and now I feel like it’s too little, too late.”
“Hence the whole problem with suicide,” she said quietly. “Honestly, when you have a friend in trouble, it’s just important to even talk them down off the bridge, if that’s what they need.”
“The trouble is,” he said, “I had no idea this guy was even in trouble.”
“And that’s probably the same for his wife too.”
“Absolutely. I just got off the phone with her last night, and she was completely unaware of what could have been so bad that he would do this, and she’s beating herself up for it.”