Not Today (Hold On)

She stood on the stool with the noose around her neck and wondered why it was so difficult to let go, now that she was here. The noose was just slack enough that it would tighten automatically when she kicked the chair away. There was lots of space for her to dangle without touching the floor; she had made sure of it. There was nothing more to do: the letters were written, waiting on the table downstairs.

It had been so difficult for so long. And this last, awful slight of her by her workplace tormentors had been the last in a long line of straws that had been accumulating for months now. She was done; finished. The words kept repeating on a loop inside her head: I wish I were dead; I wish I were dead; I wish I were dead; I wish… a constant, daily litany. How could no one see how deeply mired she was?

The chair was solid – she would have to give it a good kick to knock it away. She spared a final thought for her child; her husband; her siblings; her parents. And as she stood there, thinking of each one in turn, the seconds turned to long, thoughtful minutes…

At some point, ever so slowly, she loosened the noose; untied it; climbed down from the chair and just stood there, looking up. Gently, in a kind of dream, she drifted down the stairs, found the letters and threw them into the fire. “Not today.” She whispered to the empty house.

Two days later, it was Christmas: the best they had had in many long years. A truly magical day. She gazed silently around at her happy, laughing family. With equal parts horror and wonder, she fully comprehended what she had almost done; what she had almost thrown away. This family was what was precious to her; the rest truly did not matter…

“Never again,” she vowed in a quiet, fervent, grateful voice.

It is a promise she will never break.

Everybody Hurts, REM

Source of photo

Patti Moore Wilson/© wednesdayschildca.wordpress.com

 

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