Gone

It’s funny how in life, you can turn around for just a second, and when you turn back everything you have known and loved has disappeared. One minute you can be standing on top of the world, full of love, full of laughter, and full of joy, and the next minute, someone has taken everything away from you, and you’re falling down an endless pit of sorrow. It feels like there is nothing left to live for. It feels like everything is gone.

Some people can’t remember much of their early childhood, but I do. At the age of three, I remember being cradled in my mother’s arms, and I remember my father crawling around on his knees, playing with me. I have memories of my parents, memories of joy and memories of sadness. I remember being fed, I remember being played with, and I remember being loved. At the age of four, I know my family was happy. I had parents who loved me and parents who loved each other. I remember some things, but there are some things that I wish I could forget, like the day I was picked up from preschool and taken home to my father. He was sitting on the couch, slouched over and crying. I had never seen my father cry before, and as I remember it made me cry too. When he saw me, he picked me up and held me in his arms for a long time. Finally he sat down with me and told me what had happened. My mother had been in a terrible car accident, and had died. Just like that, on November 22nd, 1997 she was gone.

Even though I was only four years old, I knew my father would never be the same. It seemed like every time that I looked at him he was either crying or just sitting there with a sad look on his face, while drinking from a glass bottle. I tried to cheer him up by showing him how well I could read, or by doing silly things that kids normally do, but no matter what I did he wouldn’t even smile. For a little while things got better. My dad started living again. He started taking me to the movies and to the park, he began painting again, and he even went shopping. Sure, he wasn’t as happy as he was when mom was around, but at least he was making an effort. When I turned six years old, my dad surprised me with a new bicycle, and my grandparents even flew in from New York to celebrate. It was the happiest I’ve seen my dad in a long time, but as I’ve grown to find out, nothing can last forever.

It was three months after my sixth birthday, and the date was November 22nd, 1999. As I was only six years old, I didn’t remember the significance of this day even though I did remember my mother. I think I was sitting on the carpet listening to my teacher tell me and my classmates a story, when my principal walked into the classroom to take me to his office. He gave me a hug and told me to wait there for a little bit. A few hours later my grandparents showed up to the school, both of them welling up with tears when they saw me sitting there. My grandma sat and held my hand while my grandpa explained to me that my father was gone.

Most people would say two funerals within two years are too many for a six year old to attend. I tend to agree with this statement. Before I was even seven years old, my mother had died in a car accident, and my father had killed himself. I don’t remember much from the funerals, just sitting with my crying grandparents and not understanding why people would want to look at a dead person. After both funerals I remember standing at the front of the chapel with either my father or my grandparents while people bent down to give me a hug. I didn’t understand why people kept saying, “I’m sorry for your loss.” Why should they be apologizing for the reason that both of my parents are gone?

Now that both of my parents had passed away, I was forced to move to New York with my grandparents. Even though I was only six years old, I was still old enough to realize that everything in my life was changing. My parents were gone, and now I was being forced to leave my home and my friends. Most people would agree that all this could be traumatizing for a young child and I think it did traumatize me. I was living with two old people I barely knew, and my whole old life was gone.

Just when you think things can’t get any worse, they do. For nearly two years I lived with my grandparents in New York, and I was happy. My new school and my new friends were all good, and I was a truly happy eight year old child. On my eighth birthday, my grandparents told me they had planned a trip to Disneyworld for my birthday. I don’t think I had ever been so excited in my life. We were to leave on September 17th  2001, and I couldn’t wait. Little did I know that I wouldn’t get to go.

My grandparents met when they were teenagers, got married and had my dad when they were only eighteen years old and they even worked together. They both worked in the World Trade Centers, and on September 11th, 2001, they went to work together just like they did every Monday to Friday. On that Tuesday morning my grandma dropped me off at school like she did every day, and then went to work. Soon the planes would crash in to the towers, taking the whole world, including me, by shock. By 10:30 am, September 11th 2001, I had lost both my parents, and my grandparents. All my family was gone.

To this day, the one thought that makes me happy is that my grandparents died together and did not have to go through what my father did. Since I had no family left, I was forced to go into an orphanage. For three years I watched other children come in and out, being adopted by families, one after another. It seemed like every time I made a new friend, they were adopted. Why does everything I grow to love disappear? Why is everything I care about gone?

During my three years at the orphanage, I made a very close friend. Her name was Ivy, and we were truly inseparable. Unlike me, her parents had left her on a curb when she was a baby and no one had ever adopted her. Ivy had never had the experience of somebody loving her and to me that was very sad but she always looked on the bright side. She said that even though she had never been loved, at least nobody’s love had ever been taken away from her. Ivy and I were truly best of friends and I will never forget her. After I was at the orphanage for two and a half years, Ivy was adopted. I cried for three days straight, but perhaps it was good luck that she left, for a few months later I was also adopted. I thought that maybe my bad luck was gone.

I could never look at the Gibsons, the family who adopted me, as my family. They already had three other foster kids along with two kids of their own. The Gibsons seemed like the type of people who wanted to help too much and had bitten off more than they could chew. The house was full of screaming children which lead to yelling adults. For four years I put up with hell and that family and even though I really appreciated them taking me in, I couldn’t stand it anymore. I took everything I owned and left. Most people would say that a young teenager living alone on the streets with barely any money isn’t a good idea. Again, I tend to agree with these people.

My years living on the street have been tough. For the first little while I was doing well. I had enough money to eat, made a couple new friends who seemed like good people, and could even depend on the Gibsons for cash every once in a while. I would crash at the houses of my friends from school every couple of weeks, and even stayed caught up in school. For once life was good and even without a real home and a family, I was happy.

The next year was rough. I dropped out of school, was abandoned by my friends, and didn’t have the courage to go crawling back to the Gibsons. I was living in a box and was in desperate need of money. Once I was so desperate to eat I even tried to get in to the business of male prostitution. That was a very bad experience. Soon I was able to pull myself together and contacted a couple of my old friends to get in to the drug dealing business. For my first few months as a dealer I was doing quite well and as you can imagine the other established drug dealers did not like this. One night as I was walking down the alley to get to my small and disgusting apartment, I was knocked unconscious by a large person who leapt from the shadows.  When I awoke I was being beaten with a baseball bat by two of the most powerful drug dealers around and was told never to deal again. My dignity is gone.

Today, I woke up to a spring from my bed jabbing me in the back. I get up and walk to my bathroom just to look in the cracked mirror at my beaten and bruised face. As I look at myself in the mirror I wonder what has happened to that happy four year old boy that I used to be. Is this how my father felt before he pulled the trigger? He lost his wife, my mother, his one true love. What have I lost? I’ve lost my parents, my grandparents, my best friend, and now my dignity. Is it time to do what my father did and take my own life to save myself from anymore pain? The gun feels heavy in my hands as I think about how easy it would be to pull the trigger. As I raise the gun to my chest I think of how appropriate it is that I shoot myself in the heart because of all the love I have lost. It’s time for me to say good-bye to the world for I too, as like everything I have ever loved, am gone.