In Loving Memory

There’s not much there to look at now. Just a small pile of rocks on a windswept cliff top. Josie and I put the rocks there to mark the spot – to do something to commemorate what happened – because it seemed clear that no-one else was going to. After all, who commemorates a suicide? We felt like we had to do something. Josie said it felt as though if we didn’t do something to remind us of Gareth, that there’d be nothing to anchor him to us, that our memory of him would just float away on the breeze. Hence the rocks. It had the sensation of weighing him down, stopping him from flying away and leaving us. Leaving us for a second time.

Standing there now, nearly eight months later, neither of us really know what to do or say. We’re left just kind of standing there, looking at the rocks, looking past the rocks, out over the edge of the cliff into the air beyond. I glance across at Josie, with the wind playing a wisp of her dark brown hair across her cheek. She brushes it away impatiently. I always thought she could do better than Gareth. That's a hard thing to say about my brother, particularly now he’s gone, but it’s true. When I used to see the two of them together, something used to jar inside me. It just wasn’t right. I tried persuading Gareth that she wasn’t for him, but he wouldn’t listen. He said I was jealous. He had a point.

The one good thing that’s come out of Gareth’s death is that it brought me and Josie together. You know how it works – two people leaning on each other, talking things over, grieving – I suppose it was bound to happen.

‘Let’s go,’ Josie says. She smiles bravely, turns to head back to the car, and takes my hand. In a funny way, this has all turned out for the best. Far better than I expected when I did what I did. I was right. Josie could do better than Gareth. That’s why I pushed him.

[Inspired by the image 'Memorial' at www.elephantwords.co.uk.]