Michael Ford - Suicide Notes

“You know what my father said when I told him I wanted to quit?” Rankin asked me.

“I wasn’t there,” I said. “You’ll have to fill me in.”

“He said if I wasn’t going to play football, I wasn’t his son.”

“He did not,” I said. “Why would he say something so stupid?”

“Because it’s how he feels,” said Rankin. “That’s all he sees me as, a football player. He was a football player. His dad was a football player. His dad was a football player. That’s what the guys in my family are.”

“But you’re his kid,” I said, still not believing him.

“And as far as he’s concerned, his kid plays football.” He laughed. “Why do you think I’m here?”

“Because you get down sometimes,” I said, remembering what he’d said the first time in group.

“Yeah,” said Rankin. “But that’s not the real reason I’m here.”

“Then why’d you say that?” I asked him.

“Come on. Nobody says why they’re really here,” Rankin answered. “Not at first. Nobody wants to be the biggest freak. Didn’t you?”

“Didn’t I what?”

“Lie,” he said.

“It’s kind of hard to when you’ve got these,” I said, showing him my wrists.

“But that doesn’t say why ,” he reminded me.

“So we both lied,” I said. “Why are you really here?”

“Because my father wants to know what’s wrong with me.”

“He sent you to the psych ward because you don’t want to play football? You’ve got to be kidding.”

“I’m not,” said Rankin. “That’s why I’m here.”

“That’s messed up,” I told him. “Supremely messed up.”

Rankin nodded. “Yeah, it is. So what’s your question?”

I told him. “And I think you know the answer to that one already,” I added, knowing I was probably turning a hundred different shades of red.

“Your wrists,” he said.

I looked at him. Did he really not get it? No, not my wrists , I wanted to say. It was walking in on you pulling your pork .

Rankin either didn’t think that was embarrassing, or he was trying to pretend it never happened. But I don’t think that was it. I think he honestly didn’t think it was a big deal.

I would. Seriously, I’d rather have someone walk in on me cutting my wrists than have them see me doing that. Between you and me, I think Rankin’s priorities are a little screwed up.

I told Sadie. About seeing Rankin in the shower. I wasn’t going to, but I couldn’t stop thinking about it, and I thought maybe if I told someone, I’d get it out of my head and into someone else’s. You know, like that movie The Ring , where the characters have to pass along the haunted videotape to someone else so that the ghost girl in the video won’t come out and kill them. They know the girl will kill the person they give the tape to, but they do it anyway because they don’t want to die more than they don’t want to be responsible for someone else dying.

Not that picturing Rankin would kill me, but it was giving me a pretty bad headache. So bad that I couldn’t sleep. I went into the lounge, and there was Sadie. I don’t think she ever sleeps. I think she just watches TV all night.

“It was so weird,” I said after I told her the basics.

“Why?” she asked me.

“What do you mean why ?” I asked back. “Because it’s weird.”

“Please,” she said. “Like you don’t do it too.”

I almost said I didn’t, but that would have been an obvious lie. I mean, come on. I bet even the Pope does it.

“But he wasn’t even embarrassed,” I said.

“Is it big?” asked Sadie.

“Is what big?” I said.

“You know,” Sadie said, looking down with her eyes. “ It . He’s a big guy. I bet it’s big.”

“I didn’t exactly notice,” I told her.

She grinned. “Yes, you did,” she said.

“I did not!” I protested.

She rolled her eyes. “You know you did,” she said. “Guys always look. They have to compare. So, is he bigger than you?”

“You are such a perv,” I said.

“What is it with guys?” she asked me. “Girls always compare.”

“Big deal,” I said. “It’s not as if there’s a lot of difference between…” This time it was my turn to look down in the general area of her, you know, girl parts.

“How do you know?” she shot back. “How many of them have you seen?”

“Enough,” I said.

“Like Allie’s?” Sadie asked, surprising me.

I felt myself turning red, which totally made me mad. “All right,” I said. “So I saw it. I guess it was pretty big. Are you happy?”

“Are we talking about Allie or Rankin now?” said Sadie, grinning again.

“I should never have brought this up,” I said.

“Relax,” Sadie said. “Let’s get back to the problem. Why are you so freaked out about this?”

“What if…” I started.

“What if what?” asked Sadie when I didn’t finish.

I took a deep breath. “What if he wanted me to see him?” I said.

Sadie laughed. “So what if he did?”

“That’s kind of creepy,” I said.

“Please, it wasn’t like he asked you to help out or something,” she said. “You just wandered in.”

“But he didn’t seem to care that I saw him,” I said.

“Why should he?” Sadie asked. “It’s no big deal. You guys are always walking around with those things sticking out and touching yourselves and whatever. It’s like you’re so proud of them that you have to show them off.”

“Sure,” I said. “It’s like a dog show. Sometimes we even have talent contests.”

Sadie shook her head. “Guys are so fucked up. You get all freaked out about people thinking you’re gay if you look at each other. Girls aren’t so hung up about that.”

“What do you mean?” I asked her.

“Well,” she said. “Have you ever practiced making out with one of your guy friends?”

“No!” I said.

“See,” said Sadie. “But girls do it all the time.”

“You do?”

“Sure. I’ve made out with lots of my friends. Sometimes more than that.”

“More how?” I asked her.

“You know, a little touching and stuff. No major lesbo action or anything. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. I mean, I’d probably do that with the right girl.”

I didn’t know what to say. To be honest, she was freaking me out a little bit.

“I don’t think guys do that kind of stuff,” I said.

She laughed. “You just don’t admit that you do,” she said. “Trust me. Guys do it, too.”

I don’t know about that. I can’t imagine many of the guys at my school playing around with each other during a sleepover. But maybe they do. They sure slap each other’s butts enough in the locker room and on the field. I always thought that was weird, by the way. Guys are so afraid of people thinking they’re queer, but the jocks are practically feeling each other up out there.

I didn’t want to think about it anymore, so I changed the subject. Actually, I suggested that we play the dialogue game. I figured that might distract Sadie from the whole sex subject.

It didn’t. As soon as we started playing, I knew I was in trouble. The movie was one of those really bad teen slasher movies. It took place at a summer camp (don’t they all?), where someone was offing all of the counselors for no apparent reason.

The scene we were watching was about two of the counselors, a guy and a girl. For some reason that would only make sense in a bad teen slasher movie, they had decided to go camping in the woods when there were perfectly good cabins right there. They were inside a tent, sort of half in and half out of their sleeping bags, and they were talking. It was perfect for the dialogue game.