I Swear You Will Be Fine

I often try not to think about the day Josh passed, or the days after it. But other times, when I feel more ok than I should, I force myself to imagine it. Even the things I wasn’t there for. It’s like I say to myself, “Don’t forget. Josh still isn’t here. Your little brother killed himself.” If not, I’m worried I’ll fool myself into believing he’s still here. Sometimes when I talk about him in present tense, I try not to make eye contact with friends around me. I don’t know if they may think I’m insane or if I’ve forgotten. But it’s easier to pretend like Josh is still doing the things he always did.

The night Josh passed, it was New Year’s Eve. We had a dinner none of us wanted to go to. The sky was so grey and gloomy. I was in a rubbish mood and wanted to get the night over with. When we studied Julius Caesar in school, one of the big themes was all the omens to warn of Caesar’s imminent murder. Now I wonder if these were all signs I ignored. Josh was meant to come with me for the dinner, but changed his mind at the last minute. He assured me he was ok. Before I left the ask, I remember asking him if he was ok. He said yes, and the last words he said to me were, “Bye Jess, love you. Drive safe.” I replay the last time I saw him so often. I don’t know what I missed. He was just in his boxers, swerving around on his gaming chair using his phone, like I’d seen him do a million times before.

I got the call when I was on the train. It was like there was a sense of stillness before. For once in my life, I didn’t have my headphones and was staring blankly at my phone. It’s like I was waiting for something to happy. Mum was wailing on the phone. There’s no other way to describe it. At this point, I had been on the train for at least 15 minutes. All the other passengers knew I was sane – I was with Auntie J for the first few stops and had given up my seat to an older man. But even though I started screaming, all they could do was stare at me. I still remember getting out of the train and falling to my knees on the platform. Again, people staring just stared. When running of the train station and calling the police at the same time, I nearly tripped and fell. To be fair, falling is quite commonplace for me when I’m in heels (or not). Still, all people did was stare. I can imagine Josh being like, “Jess, this is Singapore. What did you expect?” But honestly, I still hold this against our home country.

In the taxi home, I couldn’t stop crying. I begged the taxi driver to go faster because I thought my brother was dying. I couldn’t accept that he may already be gone. To be fair to the taxi uncle, he did speed. I was on the phone with my Mum the whole time and just kept saying I would be there soon. I heard my grandparents screaming on the phone. When I tried to get out of the taxi, my card payment didn’t go through and the driver stopped me. Honestly, I feel like he should have let it go. I knew what the ambulance outside my lobby was for, surely he did too.

I made the mistake of looking at myself in the mirror on the lift up. All my NYE party make up was long gone. I unclipped my heels so I could run into the house. All the way home, I kept repeating, “I just need to sit with my brother.” Honestly, I don’t know why. But maybe that’s because the essence of my relationship with Josh. We didn’t do most of life together, but we did it alongside each other. I don’t know how to do life without watching him doing it next to me.

That was the worst night of all our lives. We sat in the dark for hours and hours. No one could turn on the lights, we didn’t want to see each other. It’s like it would become real if we could see everything. I can’t complain about the paramedics, but I can complain about the police officers. I am patriotic, so is Joshua. We identify as Singaporean above all else and recognise how much our country has given us. But my God, I will hold how this was handled against Singapore for the rest of my life. It was when idiotic IO W started asking my mother incredibly inappropriate questions that I was shaken from my grief. I am the bitchy one in my family, so I took over the interrogation. I can imagine Josh laughing at me giving the police officer attitude, but I know he would have wanted me to handle it so Mum wouldn’t have to.

A few hours in, I asked the paramedics if that was it. If there was really nothing else I could do. They did look at me like I was slightly insane, but they told me what I had to hear. I needed to heard it. We’re taught at university how important it is to actually say the words to family. I realised it that day. I had to call Joshua’s beloved girlfriend to tell her what happened as well. I always assumed if I heard the equivalent of my sister-in-law scream, it would be because of something stupid my brother said. I really wish it had been.

We slept less than 2 hours that night, even after taking sleeping aids. Mum and I woke up screaming, holding each other. We only calmed down when her best friend came in. She was in our house before 7pm. I don’t know if we would have stopped otherwise.

Mum and Shalini found the strength a long time ago to write about this day. I’ve been really busy this week and the distraction + fatigue do help. I had planned to write about the following 48 hours as well, but I don’t have the capacity to write it yet. I think about that day several times daily. I would often get flashbacks of those hours until my therapist worked with me through it. It’s not that it sits well with me, but it’s far less likely to cause the visceral reaction it did. I stopped avoiding trains in Singapore but I still haven’t worn heels yet.

It still creeps up. At night when I can’t sleep, dreams I can’t control or when a patient mentions suicidal tendencies. But the grief has changed into something so much deeper than the horror of those 24 hours. The sudden loss is like being stabbed, but remembering all the things I won’t see Josh do again feels like someone twisting the dagger constantly. I’m glad it’s changed. Someone online who lost a loved one to suicide said they worry that people will assume they were miserable and unpleasant to be around, but the truth is so far from that. I completely feel that way. Sometimes, when I think of that day, I imagine what my brother would have said. And honestly, it helps so much. So I do it several times a day, because it makes me feel like Josh is a lot closer that he may physically be. I’ll confirm it with him when we see each other again.

Love, Jess