The End is Where We Begin by Maria Goodin (open ebook .txt) 📕

up. I want to tell him that I may not have spoken to him in well over a decade, but that I’ve thought about him every day, that I wish he was still here, that he deserves to still be here. Instead, I say what feels easier.

“Tom’s a bit of a fat bastard now,” I tell him.

Behind me, I hear Tom chuckle quietly, his conversation with Michael over. Now they’re both hovering behind me, listening.

“And Blondie’s covered in tattoos.”

And you, Jay Boy? I hear Max ask. What about you?

“And I’m…”

Losing my mind? Not who I thought I was?

“I’m sorry,” I say, feeling a lump rise in my throat. “I’m sorry that I let you down. That I didn’t manage to get help fast enough. That I made bad choices—”

“Hey,” warns Michael firmly, crouching down beside me and gripping my shoulder, “that’s not what today’s about. It’s not about who did what or—”

“This is about saying goodbye,” interrupts Tom, crouching down on my other side. “It’s about closure, not digging up old ground.”

“But I don’t know how to do that,” I tell them, my throat tightening. I can feel my heart rate starting to accelerate, my palms starting to sweat. I suddenly feel scrutinised and judged, like I’m sitting a test I’m going to fail.

I await instructions from my friends. For a second it seems like they’re both about to speak at once, but then neither of them says anything. Because the truth is they don’t know how to do this either.

“Is there nothing you’ve ever wanted to say to him?” I ask somewhat desperately, turning to Michael, searching for reassurance that I’m not alone in this struggle.

Michael looks thoughtful for a moment, but then he shrugs. “I guess I feel like I’ve said it all. In my music, my songs. I’ve written it all out.”

I remember some of Michael’s early songs, those from his darkest days, ones I haven’t heard in years, that I would happily never hear again. The slow, miserable ones I always knew were connected to Max’s death.

If I could take your hand and lead you to the light,

Then we could start again and it would be all right.

But when I reach for you, you fade again

Into the dust, into the pain…

“There are songs you don’t even know are about him,” continues Michael, “some of the ones I’ve written recently. ‘Soar’? That’s about him.”

I wrack my brain. When the tune comes to me – upbeat tempo, all slamming guitars and rapid drum fire – then so do the lyrics.

Fly, just let your spirit rise,

you’re beautiful inside, now I can see you in the light.

Fly, inside me, I believe

that you can soar beyond the stars and let yourself be free.

“I don’t ever stop writing it out,” says Michael, “because it’s always there, it’ll always be inside me. But every time I write it out, I work through it. And I’m in a different place with it now. All the guilt and sadness… it’s been replaced by something much more peaceful. I like to remember him now for who he was, for his spirit and humour, and if I can write about that, then that’s my way of talking to him, I guess. Of remembering him.”

I study Michael’s face like he’s someone I barely recognise, wondering how we’ve never had this conversation before.

“Plus,” he adds, “I’ve spent a lot of time talking about Max with Catherine. That’s also been a way of saying goodbye; talking about him. I’ve described Max to her, laughed about him with her, remembered him with her.”

Tom looks past me to Michael.

“Girlfriend?” he asks.

“Therapist,” Michael corrects him.

Tom cocks an eyebrow and nods approvingly.

“And what about you?” I ask, turning to Tom. “Don’t you have anything you want to say to him? Don’t you feel the need to say goodbye?”

Tom shakes his head, thoughtfully. “In all honestly, no. Because I don’t think he’s gone. Not in the traditional sense. I practice Buddhism now, so I look at death with a lot more acceptance than I did at the time. I don’t mean that what happened was okay, because it wasn’t. It was fucking horrible. And the way I coped at the time wasn’t healthy. But now, I don’t know… like Michael said, I’ve already found a way to make my peace with it. Now you just have to find yours.”

I close my eyes and shake my head.

Come on, Jay Boy, I can see Max saying, better out than in.

But all I want to say is sorry, over and over and over again.

I don’t want to say goodbye. I just want to turn back time and make it right.

Just say something! I tell myself, angrily.

Come on, Jay Boy, coaxes Max.

“I can’t do this,” I say standing suddenly. “This is stupid. I don’t know what to say—”

“Jay!” calls Michael as I stride away.

“Just leave me!” I call, my chest suddenly tight, the air suddenly feeling too thick to pass through the tiny passages to my lungs.

“Why haven’t you been to the doctor?” asks Tom, once I’ve managed to regulate my breathing. We’re standing under the oak tree, the leaves rustling gently in the breeze.

I shake my head dismissively, my legs still wobbly, my hands still trembling.

“Because it comes and goes. It sometimes takes hold when I’m really stressed out and rundown, but generally I’ve been okay for a long time. It’s just these last few months it’s got really bad.”

“So, again, why haven’t you been to the doctor?”

“I honestly don’t know,” I sigh.

Tom stands square on and takes me by the shoulders.

“Yes, you do,” he says.

“Will you stop telling me I know stuff!” I snap, shrugging him off. “You’re the damn shrink. If you think you know why I’m doing something, then just say it!”

“Do you want to let go of any of this?” asks Tom, making a vague gesture towards Max’s grave. “I mean, do you really want to let go of it?”

I look at him as if he’s mad.

“Why haven’t you been to the