EPILOGUE
My eyes fluttered as I felt Sean kiss across my shoulder, along the curve of my neck, up my throat and along my jaw to my ear.
“Wake up Gia, it’s time to go baby.” I sighed and reached out until my hand found his hair, and I ran my fingers through it.
“No, I’m so tired, I want to stay here, let’s just stay in bed.” I hear him chuckle.
“We can’t G, you need to go, it’s time to open your eyes and go.” I try, I really try, but my eyes are just so heavy I can’t open them. He kisses me again and I breathe him in.
“I love you,” I whisper.
“I love you more Georgia Rae, but it’s time for you to go.” I shake my head.
“Gia, I’ll be with you baby, always, every single day, I’m not asking you now, I’m telling you, open your f*cking eyes.”
“Alright I will, just not yet, in a minute.”
“Now G, open you’re f*cking eyes right now.”
So I did and in an instant he was gone, the room was too bright and it took ages for me to be able to open them fully.
My Dad was sitting at the end of a two seater sofa, my Mum was lying with her head in his lap, they were both sleeping, Marley was in a chair right next to me, his head on the bed and my hand in his.
And then the pain punched right through me and my breath caught. Why, why was I here? I didn’t want to be here breathing and feeling I didn’t want to be alive.
***
I lay on the on the warm and worn leather sofa and stared up at the ceiling, my hand was inside my pyjama shorts, tracing over the very feint indentations on my lower belly, they’re barely noticeable now. Most women probably can’t wait for their bodies to bounce back into their pre-baby shape and for their stretch marks to fade but the very few that I have, I want to remain with me forever, the very fine silver lines and the scar from my surgery are the only physical reminders of what I had and what I lost.
I let out a loud sob and let the tears roll down my face and into my ears. I pull my knees up to my chest and wrap my arms around myself, squeezing myself tight, holding on, it doesn’t ease the pain, it doesn’t stop the ache and doesn’t do anything to fill the massive gaping hole that’s been punched through my heart, through my life, through my existence. But for a few short seconds it stops the sensation that I continuously have of falling but only for a few short seconds and then its back, I rock from side to side, just to give me something else to focus on. The tears that have collected in my ears escape and run all the way around to the back of my neck. I sob louder, my throat aches, my chest aches, but it hurts more to hold it in and the counsellors, the shrinks and every other expert that I’ve been made to sit and listen to for these last three months have all agreed on one thing at least, it’s good to cry, it’s better to let it out than to keep it in. Personally, it makes no difference to me either way, it all still hurts just as much and they’re still gone, my Husband and my baby, our little boy, my handsome, vibrant, clever Husband and our beautiful baby boy, gone, snuffed out, in just a few seconds of complete and utter carnage. Carnage, how ironic is that? That it’s the perfect word to describe the circumstances of their deaths three whole months ago.
Three months, I can’t believe it’s been three months, I don’t really remember December. In January my family had me committed to a private mental health facility after my second suicide attempt, they kept me there for almost three weeks, I don’t know what they thought it would achieve, other than stopping me from once again taking my own life, but what did they think I was going to do once I was out? I wasn’t insane, I wasn’t mentally unstable, well no more than the next woman that’s just had her Husband and Child killed in front of her. I just didn’t want to live, I don’t want to live but I convinced those that needed convincing that I wouldn’t attempt to take my own life again and they let me out into the care of my family and I had every intention of ending it all as soon as I got the opportunity… and then Jimmie came to see me and she brought all of the kids with her, my nieces and nephews.
I was sitting on my Mum’s sofa when she came in, she carried Harley in her arms, Jimmy, Paige and Ziggy trailed in behind. I knew as soon as I looked at her that she was pissed off. Ziggy overtook her and threw himself into my lap; he’d just turned six and was the absolute image of my brothers. I held him close and breathed him in, it hurt and it healed me a little all at the same time. Just like my brothers, he’d taken to calling me Porge after learning the Georgie Porgie nursery rhyme.
“Auntie Porge, we’ve missed you so much.” He almost strangles me as he wraps his little arms around my neck so tightly.
“I missed you too Zig, I’ve missed you all.”
“But not that much George?” I looked up at her from the sofa, my Mum stood from where she’d been sitting in the armchair, my dad, Len and Marley all walked into the room.
“Not in front of the children please Jamie,” my Mum said to her.
“Erm, yes, actually Bern, I think the children need to hear this. I think that George needs to tell the children why they aren’t important enough to her? Why they mean so little to her, that she doesn’t want to hang around and see them grow up?”
Lennon walks over and takes Harley out of Jimmie’s arms, Marley walks over and takes Ziggy from my lap. My eyes don’t leave Jimmies. My bottom lip trembles as I try to swallow down the lump in my throat, my tears escape freely, with no effort from me, down my cheeks.
“Why don’t we count George? Why does it not matter to you what you are putting us all through?” She swipes tears away with the back of her hand.
“Sean was like a son to your Mum and Dad, he was like a brother to me, Ash and the boys, he was a favourite uncle to all of your nieces and nephews and we love him, we didn’t get the chance to get to know Beau, but we already loved him regardless, his cousins love him, his aunts and uncles love him and his Grandma and Pops love him and we all lost him and we all lost Sean and it hurts.” She sobs as she speaks and can barely get her words out. “It hurts so f*cking much George, we are hurting for our loss and we are hurting for your loss, which we can all only try and imagine but let me tell you now, what you are doing, by keep trying to top yourself, it’s so selfish. You’ve watched us all suffer George; you’ve seen what everyone has been through these past couple of months. Marley is barely hanging on, Len is in bits and all you want to do is add to that. Where does it end a George? Where does it stop, you kill yourself, then what?” She looks around the room at my parents and brothers, there’s silence, except for the sound of sobbing and it’s my Dad that’s sobbing the loudest and that hurts what’s left of my heart so much.
“You kill yourself, how does that leave your Mum and Dad feeling? How does that leave your brothers feeling? How do you think it will leave me, Ash and Sam feeling and what about your nieces and nephews, my babies, Ashley and Sam’s babies, when they grow up and realise what you did, how do we explain to them? Can you imagine the issues that could leave them with, have you, for one single second, thought about anyone other than yourself?”
She kneels down in front of me and looks down into my lap at first, she draws in a breath as she tries to compose herself, I don’t bother, I just let the tears and the sobs and the other awful, inhuman noises that I’m making, come at will. “We need you George, getting you through this, is what will get us through this. Sean would be so f*cking angry with you George, so f*cking pissed off.” She lifts my hands out of my lap and holds them in both of hers. “No one, no one ever should have to go through what you have, but you need to look at the bigger picture, you need to consider the consequences of your actions. Can you die, knowing that Marley will probably be right behind you, that you will be leaving Ash without the love of her life, that you will be leaving Joe, Con and Annie without their Daddy, after losing their uncle, auntie and baby cousin, you are quite happy going to your grave, knowing that you are probably taking their Daddy with you, are you?” I let out another loud sob. “Are you George, f*cking answer me?”
I shake my head. “No,” I whisper. “No I’m not.”
She wraps her arms around me. “Then this shit stops now, we will love and mourn for Sean and Beau for the rest of our lives, we’ll never forget them and we will help each other deal with their loss the best we can but we will not, none of us, add to the untold grief, this family is already suffering. Are we understood?” I nod my head slowly and take in a few breaths. “I love you George and I don’t want to lose you. You need to go and live your life and you need to live it large, you need to live it for Sean and for Beau too and you need to make every day count.”
If I thought listening to Jimmies words was hard, it was nothing compared to Ashley’s silence, she arrived at my Mum’s later that same afternoon. I was leaning against the worktop in the kitchen, watching my Mum make a cup of tea, Marley was sitting on a bar stool talking to us both about how well Joe was doing at football, when Ash walked in, the kids were with her but they’d all gone straight to the playroom. She ignored Marley as he said hello and strode purposefully toward me, then smacked me hard around the face as soon as I was in reach.
“Ash,” Marley shouted at her, she held up her finger for him to shush, she looked back at me. “That’s the last time George, the last f*cking time you put us through this shit. Your Husband would be so ashamed, so f*cking ashamed of you right now.” She then pulled me in for a cuddle and told me how much she loved me.
That all happened three weeks ago, three weeks in which I’d been alive, but dead, I didn’t die, I didn’t try and die, but I was dead anyway, death without dying is the worst kind of death.
The door to the soundproof studio at my parents’ house swung open and Marley walked in. “Up ya get George; I’ve got something out here for ya to see.”
I wipe my tears on my sleeve and stand from the old Chesterfield where I’ve been spending most of my days and follow my brother outside. There on the drive is Hilda, I turn and look at Marls. “Where did you get her from, have you been to my house?”
Marley hooks his hand over my shoulder and kisses my head. “I did, hope you don’t mind, I thought you might like to take her out for a drive?”
For the first time since December, I feel something other than pain in my chest, it’s like a tiny, tiny flicker of warmth and I look up at my brother and smile. “I don’t want to drive her out on the roads Marls but I’ll drive her around out here.”
“Yeah?” He grins down at me.
“Yeah.” I grin back.
“Well it’s a f*ckin’ start I s’pose.”
And it was, more than he could ever know, in that moment I realise, it was a start, a very, very small start but a start nonetheless, the tinniest of steps forwards, the very first time this year that I have actually wanted to do something. It wasn’t much of a something, but by getting in that car and driving, my mind would have to focus on something other than my Husband, my Son and my own death and as I stand with my brother’s arm around me, staring at my beloved Hilda, I suddenly feel the merest glimmer of hope, hope that I might just get through my empty, painful, black hole of a life.
CARNAGE
PLAY LIST
The Jam, Liza Radley
The Jam, Start
The Jam, English Rose
Queen, Crazy Little Thing Called Love
Dire Straits, Romeo & Juliet
Gloria Estefan, Don’t Wanna Lose You
Alexander O’Neal, Fake
Soul 11 Soul, Back To Life
I owe so many thank yous with regard to this book, firstly to my family for once again putting up with unwashed clothes and an unwashed Mum and Wife as well as lots of uncooked dinners and un-mopped floors, they are slowly but surely realising that ‘Feral’ is the way things are in our home whenever I’m writing but they love and support me regardless and I love them beyond measure for it.
Kaylene, I really cannot thank you enough only you and I know exactly what you did and I’m eternally grateful!
To my Beta readers, I thank you for your time and your honesty.
To my SC ladies, Vix, Kaz, Tash, Nic, Chell and even Wendy who couldn’t bring herself to read Carnage unless I could assure her of an HEA, which sadly with this book I couldn’t, I thank you all regardless, for your love, support, unprintable conversations, your humour and just for always being there, despite the miles, I love ya lots, like Jelly Tots.
To my Twitter Pimps, Ally, Peita, Mags, Sara, Nellie, OfficeLady, Gi Gi, Susie and everyone else that has tweeted, retweeted and recommended my books, I thank you.
To Rachael from DCT Promotions and Rebecca @ www.thefinalwrap.com for my amazing cover, I thank you all for your patience.
If you are new to my work, you can find my other books Saviour and Resolution @ amazon.com and amazon.co.uk
You can find me on Twitter @Lesley__Jones
On facebook @ https://www.facebook.com/saviour.lesleyjones or just search for
Lesley Jones Author
On Goodreads @ https://www.goodreads.com/author/list/7061349.Lesley_Jones
Lesley was born and raised in a small working class town in Essex, just outside of East London. She’s married with three sons and in 2006 they all moved to the other side of the world, settling on the beautiful Mornington Peninsula, about fifty kilometres outside of Melbourne Australia.
Lesley is currently ‘a stay at home mum’, but in the past she has worked at ‘good old Mark & Spencer’ for thirteen years and as a teacher’s assistant.
As well as writing, Lesley loves to read and has been known to get through four or five books a week, when she’s not writing that is. Her other interests are watching her boys play football… the round ball version. She’s happy to admit to being an addict of social media and owes a lot to her Face book and Twitter family in promoting her book. Lesley is also rather partial to a glass or bottle of wine, a nicely chilled Marlborough Sav Blanc being her favourite.
Being a born and raised Essex girl, she will happily admit to be being a big fan of spray tans, Shellac and is regularly, waxed, tinted and sculpted, although she doesn’t own a pair of white stilettos…
If you are affected by any of the issues covered in this book and need to talk, please contact :
Lifeline Australia 131114
The Samaritans UK 08457 90 90 90
The Samaritans USA 1(800) 273-TALK