Recovery Ritual by Annie Hwang

Author:Annie Hwang [Hwang, Annie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Virtualbookworm.com Publishing
Published: 2012-08-22T00:00:00+00:00

CHARLIE [PROLOGUE]

I know this is terrible, but I have a theory. He might have killed himself for the sake of it. It sounds insane, and maybe you’re ready to take me in, but it’s the truth. He was spontaneous. He was radical sometimes. He explored death to a frightening extent. Read his poetry. Read his stories. He writes about death more than half the time. He is fascinated; he is not frightened.

One time, he told me that he contemplated suicide, but I didn’t have to worry for him because of some strange depression. He said everyone lived with a certain degree of depression. He lived with the same degree. He just knew how to manipulate it with logic to know that death was the most plausible route. Route to happiness? I asked him. I don’t remember his answer. I only remember my powerlessness.

One day, I tried an experiment. I became Charlie. How would he face himself - his ugliness, his beauty, his strange, surreal existence in my life? I became real; I became fake; I became suicidal; I became enthusiastic. Charlie took it rather well. Anything I did rarely fazed him. It frustrated me, and I thought it was severely unfair because he treated others much more lovingly. Was this the cost of being close to someone? Knowing that they will act more coldly toward you in hopes that you will always understand?

When I acted very depressed, he messaged me that day with a single sentence. This sentence verified my previous suspicions and relaxed me.

“You have the power as long as you are alive.”

He told me he appreciated the thought of suicide, for it was the ultimate wisdom of self realization. But he concluded that it was a cowardly act, for death could not correct anything or make anything better. It would simply make things cease to exist. And that wasn’t enough. As long as we are alive, we humans have the power to change anything – and there’s a greater chance for the better than the chance to go to heaven.

So why did he do it? I am not sure. But he contradicted a lot of what he said many times.

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