Sunday.

I found out today that your cousin passed away on Friday.
"I have some bad news" you said, looking me straight in the eye.
Like a punch to my stomach, i felt the news crash into my orbit.
Your eyes! The truth was in your eyes and for a split second i wondered when i had seen you look like that before....
Bad news? For you to call it bad, i knew it must be terrible. I knew what was coming. I have been waiting for the other shoe to drop since your mother died. Every time i speak to you, i feel like something awful is going to come out of your mouth. Some tragedy, some pain, some shocking, slapping reality check about the world being not-so-great-after-all. "She's dead, I'm leaving." What's next? When you call my phone more than once in a day i assume that you have an inoperable cancer and that you are phoning from the hospital, to blurt the news out in a rush of garbled sounds, no regard for the woman on the receiving end. My radar is set to Panic when it comes to you, my dear. I hear it in my head seconds before you say anything. You are always calling about your tax return or to ask what the cats date of birth is and i am bracing myself for a side swipe.
Not this time though.

Your family, is no longer my family. The ties of marriage have been severed, responsibility absolved. i will not be flying up to Sydney with you. i will not stand by your side during the funeral. i will not shake my head about a life so tragically cut short. I will not hold your hand through this one.
I just squeezed your arm and watched from a distance as grief warped your features (again.) I know it was hard for you to say the words. So sickeningly familiar.
Because it was suicide. And that makes me sick. It makes me cry and feel numb all at once. How much does one family have to withstand? Is it genetic? Why does this keep happening?
The last conversation i had with him was about karaoke. We drank beer and talked about your mother. Fuck.

I have no words. i have no answers. I have nothing to offer you in this. I am just sorry for you. I am sorry for his parents. I am sorry for his sister and his brother and your sister and your brother and everyone in the whole wide world who ever goes through this.
It challenges my world view. changes my ever evolving belief system. Bad things do happen to good people. This is life. And sometimes it is just fucking unfair.