The Heartbreak Factor - Part Four

Chapter Forty-Four.

George let go of my hand and slid across the sofa to sit right next to me. Draping his arm over my shoulder, he held me tightly. I needed to be held.

“Primary school was a complete blur. I didn’t really bother with friends. The only friend I had, and needed, was Chloe. The teachers always felt sorry for me but I didn’t need sympathy or their help. If anybody needed their help it was mum.”

George looked at me with a confused look on his face.

“You can’t tell nobody this,” I paused. “Not even Michael knows this.”

George nodded. “I promise.”

“I was only about seven. It was the one year anniversary since my dad’s death and mum wasn’t coping at all. She pretended to be coping in front of everyone but I knew her better than everyone. She was just putting a brave face on like we all were. During the week I was stopping at my grandparents’ house and then on a weekend, I’d spend Saturday night back at home but I really wanted to be back at my grandparents’ house. Mum was an amazing mum before dad died, but once he died, it was like something left her. Something changed her and she wasn’t my mum at all. She tried to keep it together for my sake but she failed. I was only seven but I knew that she wasn’t okay. This one Saturday afternoon, my grandparents had dropped me off at home and mum seemed fine. After we made pizza for lunch, she said I could go outside and play with the neighbour’s cat who had grown to be my best friend when I was home. The cat, Daisy, got bored and went away after a while so I went back inside to find mum asleep on the sofa.”

“She wasn’t asleep, was she?” George asked, intertwining our fingers.

“Nope,” I shook my head. “She had overdosed on anti-depressants. I was seven years old and I was on the brink of losing my mother to suicide after losing my dad just 12 months before to terrorism. I didn’t know what to do. I tried to wake her up by shaking her but she had overdosed – she was completely out of it. I just did what they did on television and dialled 999. Once the ambulance came, one of the paramedics stayed with me while they tried to get in contact with my grandparents. I saved my mum’s life and I didn’t even know what it meant to ‘live'. The sad thing was I had saved my mum's life and she didn't want to live anymore." I paused for a few moments to catch my breath as a lump appeared on the back of my throat. "As soon as I realised that she didn't want to live anymore, I realised not even I could make my mum live. She couldn't even see through each day for me - her only daughter, the only thing that actually remained of my dad's."

George held me tighter in his arms.

“After that, I went to live with my grandparents full term and we sold the old house as it was filled with too many memories of dad. Mum met Michael and completely turned her life around. I thought we were finally gonna be happy until I started high school. Chloe went to a different high school to me so I was completely alone. I had no confidence at all. Every 11:11 wish was to be more confident but it just didn’t happen. I started bunking off school and being completely reclusive from the world,” I explained, reliving the painful memories in my head. “On the seventh anniversary of dad’s death and the sixth anniversary of my mum’s suicide attempt, I’d decided enough was enough and I wanted all the pain and heartbreak and loneliness to go away.”

“Don’t say you did what I think you did,” George pleaded, close to tears.

I nodded my head. “I was thirteen years old and I decided to end my own life.”

“What did you do?” George asked, stuttering slightly as if he didn't want to hear but needed to hear.

“Mum and Michael were going to a barbecue at a friend’s house and as soon as I heard the car reverse off the drive, I went into kitchen and grabbed the bread knife.”

Looking at George, I could see the look in his face change as I described how I felt. 

“As soon as I slit my wrists, it was like all my worries had gone. All the people that teased me in school had left me alone. All the heartbreak and devastation in my life had disappeared. I collapsed on the kitchen floor and with my wrists dripping with blood, I slipped unconscious. I suppose it was lucky that my mum had forgotten the bottle of wine they planned to take with them to the barbecue as she walked back into the house just as I fell unconscious.”

“I still have the scars,” I smiled to George, showing him the faint lines across my wrists. 

“Why haven’t you told me this before?” George asked, taking hold of my wrists and pressing them on his chest.

I completely ignored his question and continued. “Once I woke up in hospital, I was admitted for psychiatric observation for a week and when I was released, mum wouldn’t leave me alone for more than a minute. They got rid of everything that I could have used in the house to kill myself with and mum even withdrew me from school to home school me herself. My depression got worse as I got older and the more medication the doctor prescribed to me didn’t make the slightest difference. When I finished my GCSEs, mum let me attend the local college and that’s when I began to get confident. Through those years, I never thought once that I’d get happy again. I auditioned for the X Factor and met you, and then life got better and now, I couldn’t be any happier.”

“You deserve to be happy, more than anyone does,” George smiled. “And I’m gonna be the one, Sammy, who makes you happy. Your happiness is something I put in front of everything else. You and Katy - you’re my first priorities. You two go in front of everything else in this entire world. I promise I’m never going to hurt you. You or Katy."

"I know," I smiled. "And that's why I love you."

George held onto me tightly as we sat on the sofa. The whole house turned silent. It felt as if a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders now that I had let someone in on my biggest secret. Only a few people knew about my depression and suicide attempt but even fewer people knew about my mum's. It just made me think of my mum with even more proudness as she managed to get through it all - just like I managed to do. 

"Don't treat me differently now you know that though," I insisted. "I don't want you to think of me as weak or vulnerable."

"I don't think of you as weak, Sammy," George reassured. "You're the strongest person I know. For what you've been through, you're strong. But I promise this won't change how I treat you. You'll still be annoying."

I giggled to myself. "Good. I wouldn't want to be anything but annoying."

"You aren't," George laughed, kissing my forehead as he pulled me even closer to him, letting me rest of his chest. "You'll always be my really annoying little Sammy."