[Zedebee]

" March 14th 2007

14:07
“Rosie… Rosie!”
Rosie’s eyes drifted open as her eyes scanned her surroundings. She was still in the park, Louise was knelt down beside her.
“Are you okay? Everyone’s looking for you! Jack’s really worried! He said you looked really pale, and Sophie said she looked like you were about to cry, apparently you just ran out of the lesson?”
Louise’s words washed over her as the cold hard words of reality brought her back to life and with this realisation she leapt up to the side of the path and was sick.
“Gosh, Rosie, you’re really not well are you? Come along with me and we’ll get you to the nurse”
“No. You’re alright. I think I’ll just go home, get some sleep y’know? I’ll be fine.”
She felt Louise’s eyes scrutinizing her pale face and the realisation flicker across her face that she wasn’t going to win any argument she tried to put up against her, so with a resigned “okay,” she helped her back to her car and agreed to let the school know that she’d gone home.
Rosie sat in her car contemplating the days events when she heard her phone buzz, reaching into her pocket, the device indicated fourteen missed calls and six texts, the most recent from Jack reading, “I’ll give you a call when I’m out, I hope you’re okay. x” She read the text and turned off her phone, she wasn’t going to be answering any calls tonight.
In a daze she drove home, narrowly missing the cat next door as she pulled into her driveway. In the house nothing stirred, no one was home. She made her way up the stairs and into her bedroom, once again placing herself onto her bed and staring at the swirls that the paint made in the ceiling…

March 14th 1997

17:00
Her eyes swum to the ceiling as the lady continued talking. Pretty patterns the ceiling made, she thought, pretty swirls...
“Rosie? Do you want to say anything?”
“The ceiling’s very pretty.” Rosie replied.
“Rosie, do you understand what we’re telling you?”
“Mummy’s ill, you’re going to make her better.”
Rosie felt two hands on her shoulders as her uncle turned her towards him, he had tears in his eyes, “Rosie, mummy’s not coming home.”
“I know, I didn’t come home when I was ill either for a bit, I had to stay to make sure the doctors could make sure I was getting better.”
“No, Rosie, mummy’s not getting better. Mummy…” he faltered as he tried to put what he had to say in words that a child would understand. He knew she didn’t understand what ‘suicide’ meant, nor what ‘counselling’ was, he needed to put his mind into a child’s, and yet he couldn’t seem to find the words. They had discussed what to tell the child, that she deserved to know the truth now rather than finding out in some other way later on, despite her young age.
“Rosie, mummy was very sad, she didn’t feel like mummy anymore and she hated it. Can you understand that?” Rosie nodded. “Mummy wanted you to have the best mummy in the world, and she didn’t feel like the best mummy in the world. She wanted everything to be perfect for you, Rosie, so do not think that any of this is your fault.” Rosie looked at the man sitting in front of her, her Uncle, and saw a different man than the one she’d always known sitting there, strained for the right words to say.
“Cathy, I mean mummy, didn’t feel she could be alive anymore, Rosie. She…she…” he faltered again, stuttering his words out, “she’ll be going to a happier place now… she hurt herself badly so that she could go to the happier place…she-killed-herself.” The last words came out all in a tumble, and he regretted at once not being able to find an easier way to put them when he saw the look on the little girl’s face. That face he wouldn’t forget for the rest of his life…"