The Time of Your Life After Death
To my 13-year-old self
Hey Soph, things are hard right now, I know. Papa doesn’t get out of bed some mornings now and you can’t understand why. When you open the bedroom door to say bye before you go to school you get annoyed when he doesn’t answer. You think he’s being lazy. He’s not. He’s really sick, Soph, more than you know, more than anyone has told you and your brother.
I’m going to warn you about what happens next because I never got a warning when I experienced it, and darling, it changes everything from this point on. I’m going to tell you, but it’s something really hard that you’re going to go through very soon. Trust me when I tell you that you are more resilient than you could ever imagine right now, and you will pull through with more strength than you ever knew you could possess. Okay, now that I’ve cleared that up, here we go.
In about a week’s time from now, you’re going to say goodbye to Papa as you leave for school. As you know, he stopped working for a bit a couple of weeks ago. All you know is that he’s just “having some time off while he gets his meds sorted”. He hasn’t gone back to work by this day. He doesn’t go back to work, Soph.
You know how he’s gotten really pale and skinny lately? Yeah. It’s sad. It’s so weird to think what a big, healthy, imposing figure he had just…
