Sam Henry laid in a bath of cold water feeling his life slip away. He hoped that 10 pills would do the job and free him from the pain and torment of his miserable life.
He felt relief as the emotional pain subsided while his eyes drooped from the pain-pills flooding his bloodstream-wreaking havoc and pulling him to the brink of death.
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This is the end. Sam thought.
He had enough of the gay slurs and rude comments. He wished he could see everyone’s faces as they found out the kid they tortured committed suicide.
Peace came to Sam as the world blackened and all sensations flew away like a buzzard startled by an oncoming semi-truck while it pecked on the rotting flesh of road kill.
Finally, relief from everything. Sam thought in his last moments of tortured consciousness.
Somewhere between life and death, his mind scurried over the causes of his emotional pain.
The feelings started just over a year ago. At first, his shameful attraction to guys, then his urge to see another guy stripped of clothing, showing everything God gave him.
The craving grossed him out but he could not escape it. Back then, he hated the thoughts and wished he could scrub them from his mind.
He spent much time in resentment as he did everything he could to convince himself he liked women.
The attempt to purge his homosexuality failed, as he spent hours looking at nasty images of women doing forbidden things only to find the man’s part more appealing.
His gay thoughts appalled him, but eventually he realized he could not escape them.
It took a great deal of thought and soul searching to find solace in his sexual orientation and he feared he would never be okay with it.
He spent hours scrolling through blogs and news articles that supported his preference to males and slowly he gained comfort and pride with who he was.
When he decided to tell the world he was gay and proud of it, nerves overcame him, but every fiber of his being hoped it would bode well.
Unfortunately, the world did not accept him as he hoped. He shook as he told his parents, watching his mother cry as his father cursed.
They desperately made every effort to convince him was not gay. But he had already put a heap of thought into it. He was gay and just wanted to be accepted.
Sam felt relieved as he announced it to everyone. However, the elation ended when the torment started. His best friends abandoned him and refused to speak to him. The even stopped making eye contact.
As he walked through the halls, students called him names like fag, fanny bandit, and sissy Sam.
Sam got used to nights of crying himself to sleep and waking up in the middle of the night to a damp pillow. He became miserable and life sucked.
Like weeds creeping in and choking a garden, thoughts of suicide ran rampant through his head. The searing sorrow and gut wrenching emotional pain led to the life seeping from his body as he lay in the cold water.
This is hell. It’s not as bad as I thought. Sam said to himself as he stood in a veil of darkness with the only light emitted by a dusty cracked television screen replaying static filled visions of his life. .
He saw it all. He gagged as he watched his birth, wretched seeing his parents changing his diapers and cringed while he saw himself learning to ride a bike, crashing then crying on the pavement with a scraped knee.
His first day of kindergarten sent hot waves of anger as he saw the first encounters with those who would later betray him and the others who made his life a living hell. He no longer wanted to watch and turned away from the screen.
As he escaped the glow of the dreadful visions, a face he had not seen in 3 years shined from the darkness.
He never thought he would be lucky enough to see his grandpa again and he smiled at the round, wrinkled face.
“Sam-Sam, why did you do this?” The deceased man said with downtrodden eyes and a sorrowful frown.
“You have so much life ahead of you. How dare you throw away your life because some little punks can’t see how great you are. So what if you are gay?”
He walked up to Sam, placing a gentle hand on his shoulder. “It doesn’t matter to me because I love you and want you to be you. Your mother has learned to accept it and you know that.”
A warm smile grew on his grandpa’s aged face as he said his last words. “You have another chance, so use it well. Life will get better and happiness waits. I hope not to see you again for many years. “You hear that? Goodbye Sam.”
At that moment, a heavy jolt of electricity slammed into Sam’s chest. He shot up, gasping for air, as doctors and nurses surrounded him.
His mother stood nearby with her face red and glimmering from the heavy flow of tears.
His insides burned and he struggled to breathe as a nurse relieved him as she attached oxygen mask over his face, basking his aching lungs with sweet, life-giving oxygen.
Wow. I actually survived, Sam thought as he lay still, while his mom stood over him kissing his cheek and forehead repeatedly.
As a nurse blinded him by shining a light into his eyes, thoughts fluttered in every direction like a flock of hummingbirds taking flight on a journey south. Today I start living and life will be better.