Brownies On My Counter

I have a confession to make. It’s been sitting here, in my head for years now, slowly eating me up inside.

Here it goes: that day you committed suicide, I had this feeling in my heart. It was a type of heaviness–an ache, if you would. It felt like I knew what was going to be, like I knew that you were going to kill yourself later that day. It was the scariest feeling to have, but I brushed it off as if it was nothing.

I had made brownies the day before. That fateful November morning, I had stared at those brownies for the longest time, thinking that there were too many for my family alone. As my mom drove me to school, I wondered if maybe you’d like some of those brownies. I almost asked her what she thought, but I didn’t. I really wish I did.

The rest of the day was uneventful, save for that wretched feeling in my heart. When I got home from school, I considered the brownies again. And still, I didn’t bring them over. I was scared.

Scared that it would be too awkward, scared of what I might say, and even more of what you would say, too.

When I saw the flashing lights in our street, I hoped it wasn’t for you. When I saw the EMTs enter your house, I prayed to let it be your mother. While my mom went into your house to check, I stayed out on the porch, pleading with God. “Don’t let it be him. Please, not him.” But God didn’t answer.

I watched in devastating shock as my mother walked out of your house, her sobs echoing in the numbing autumn air. I’ve never seen her cry like that before. The moment your name left her trembling lips was the moment my heart broke. That scene still haunts me in my dreams.

Do you know what heartbreak feels like? Everyone thinks that they do, but what we imagine is nothing like what it really is. It’s not just sadness or grief–it’s the most genuine, painful, stabbing feeling deep in your chest. It’s when your throat seems to close up and you’re trying so hard to breathe but you just can’t. It’s when the whole world around you seems to go down in flames and it feels like you’ve been teleported to another planet, an unfamiliar, hostile planet.

I’ve been hurt many times in my first twenty years. But few compare to that kind of pain.

I cried for hours after that. Or maybe it was minutes. I don’t really know. My memory of that night is shrouded in a haze that I cannot bring myself to wipe away. I do remember the crying, though, and the million questions my baby sister had been asking in between her tears. I had told her to shut up. She was crying, I was crying, we were all crying. I cried so much that I made myself throw up. By that point, I was weak–too weak to keep crying.

After that came the numbness, then the overwhelming realization that my intuition was right. From then on, there has only been guilt.

Everyone told me that it wasn’t my fault, that there was nothing I could’ve done. And they were both right and wrong. It’s true, it wasn’t my fault. But there was something I could’ve done. There was something anyone could’ve done. I just assumed that someone else would do it. I should’ve brought you the brownies, but I didn’t. Because I was scared.

I’ve been called a coward twice in my life. Once by the other person who broke my heart and once by myself, after you died. I was a coward for not bringing you those brownies. It was something so minuscule that might’ve made the biggest difference. All I had to do was walk across the street and knock on your door. It would’ve been so easy. You would have done it for me.

And, you know what? It was never about the brownies. It was about you. I wanted to see you, to talk to you, to be sure that you were okay–because I loved you. Not romantically, maybe not even platonically. I loved you like I love the wind, like I love the trees outside my window. I loved you like I love the sound of the train as it goes by my dorm building every hour. I loved you because you were always there. Maybe I love too easily, but how can I not? In all my memories, all my life, you were there. How could I ever live without your steadfast presence?

So when you died, a part of me went, too. Suddenly, you were just gone.

I went to prom, you didn’t. I graduated, you didn’t. I went to college, you didn’t. I continue to grow and change. I meet new people, I learn so much, and I live the dreams I had as a child. You never will.

Your mom recently moved out of that house. A different family lives there. It is all just too real.

One of the best teachers I’ve ever had told my class something I’ll never forget. I think about his words a lot. I ruminate them, let them linger in my mind til it’s lost all meaning. Then I take those meaningless words and twist them into something new. Another perspective, another way of seeing them. He told us, “You guys think you’re immortal at this age, but you’re not.”

Dr. Baran, such a wise and thoughtful man, had been so wrong. At least, in my eyes he was.

I never once thought that we were immortal. I had been thinking about death years before yours, wondering if it would be me. For some time, I wished it could be me. After you, I begged the universe to let me take your place instead. And some people have no idea what it feels like when you’re there, but I did and that just makes it so much worse. I went through the same agony, I knew the same depression, and I understood exactly what you were feeling. I got through it and I should’ve saved you, too. Maybe you did what you did because you thought no one else knew the way you felt. And now it’s too late to tell you that I knew.

And you can tell me that it wasn’t my moral obligation to look out for you. No one expected it, no one could have seen it coming. But that feeling in my chest felt it before it came and I will always regret not trusting it sooner.

That’s the last time I’ve ever chosen head over heart.

My wretched head–too anxious, too weak. Afraid of social experiences, it makes me hide away from most opportunities. I’d rather stay in my shell, sheltered and alone. My heart, it yearned to go to you, to offer you love and support in your darkest of times. But my head said no, it said that was weird, that you wouldn’t want to hear me.

If I had listened to my heart, you might still be here.

And I know that’s not a guarantee–I could’ve brought you the stupid brownies and we could’ve had a pleasant conversation and I could’ve told you that I loved you in some way and you still might’ve done it anyway. But you also might not have.

Like I said, you would’ve done it for me.

My therapist tells me that there’s no point in fixating on the “might’ve” and “should’ve”. She’s right–I know she’s right. But I can’t help it, not when I had that ache in my chest so long ago. Was it a warning? Was it God telling me to fulfill my Christian duties and support you? Is that why I cannot move on, is God punishing me?

There are so many questions that I’ll never get answers to. Everyone tells me to move on, but do they know how hard it is to do such a thing?

That feeling in my chest haunts me to this day. It’s something I’ll never get over and I’ve accepted that I’ll take it to my grave. But this confession, it’ll help lighten the load. So thank you for hearing me out.

God, and the brownies. Such a simple gesture, yet it could’ve changed everything. I guess those are best staying in the past, right?

I’ve hated baking since then. I tell people that it’s because it’s too much work, too tedious, or I don’t have time. But the truth is that I can’t stand myself. Because every time I bake, it reminds me how I’ll never be able to bring you some brownies.