The Note

Julia stood in her bedroom, her hands shaking as she held a single piece of paper. She looked down at the thirteen words written in her son’s loopy handwriting:

I can’t handle this life anymore.

I love you Mom.

Please forgive me.

There was only one way to interpret these words, but her mind refused to accept such horror. Mason had seemed fine this morning – a little sullen, but he was fifteen. She was used to the way his moods twisted and turned in the wind. Her mind raced back through the past few days, desperately searching for a clue that would explain this note.

Julia stumbled backwards and the note fluttered to the floor and slid under her bed. She turned, almost blind with panic and fear, and raced downstairs to where her phone sat on the kitchen counter. Her trembling fingers dialed Mason’s number, but the call went straight to voicemail. Where are you, Mase?! She stood at the counter, breathing hard, trying to think clearly. She knew Mason wasn’t home – she had walked through the entire house looking for him before finding the note beside her bed – so where would he have gone?

Julia dialed 911, her hands shaking so badly she could barely hold the phone. “I think I found a suicide note from my son. He’s only fifteen. Please . . . please help me …” She couldn’t say anything else. She only knew that she would give her own life to put her arms around Mason at that moment.

Somehow, Julia made it to the kitchen table and sank into a chair. Images of her son flashed in her mind like a chaotic, disjointed movie reel: Mason as a newborn, snuggled on her chest, mewling like a kitten. Mason as a toddler, raising his arms to her and saying, “Pick you up?” Mason as a sweaty, stinky nine-year-old, running to give her a hug after school and not caring if his friends teased him. Mason!

Twenty minutes later, Julia sat at the same table with two police officers, one a young woman with sympathetic eyes, the other a man in his fifties who looked like he’d seen too many tragedies for one lifetime. The smell of cheap coffee wafted from the Styrofoam cups in their hands.

“I’m sorry, ma’am,” the older officer said to Julia. “I know this is difficult. But is there anything else you can recall from your last interaction with your son? Anything that would indicate suicidal ideation?”

“No, nothing,” Julia whispered. “He’s never said anything like that.”

The young officer’s phone rang, and she stepped away to answer it. Julia couldn’t help but strain to listen.

“Are you sure?” the officer said, her eye darting to Julia, then away again. “Where’d they find him?”

Julia knew at that moment that her son was gone. She began to scream, and everything went black.

+++

No sooner had her world gone dark, then suddenly it was light again. The scream that had been in her throat seconds ago was gone – she heard only silence. Julia found herself not at the kitchen table, but on her living room couch, a blanket over her legs and a book in her lap. She leaped to her feet, heart hammering. Why am I in a different room? What the hell is going on?

She ran into the kitchen, but the table was empty. No police officers, no aroma of cheap coffee. She snatched her phone from its spot on the counter and scrolled through the call log. No outgoing calls to Mason or to 911. Had the past half hour been a dream? Was she having a mental breakdown? She was about to go upstairs when she realized there were footsteps already coming down. A lanky teenage boy came around the corner. Mason.

“MASE!! Oh God, honey!” She launched herself into him.

“Mom? Whoa! What’s wrong?”

Julia could only sob with relief.

“Mom! What happened?”

“I don’t know how to explain,” she gasped. She pulled back and gazed into his face. “Are you ok? Are you hurt? Did you hurt yourself?”

“What? Mom, I’m fine. Seriously, what’s going on?”

“Your note . . .”

“What note? I didn’t leave any note.”

Julia took a shuddering breath as the panic slowly began to drain from her body. Maybe it was just an incredibly vivid dream. It had felt more real than anything ever had, but how else to explain Mason standing here? Then she thought about the book she was reading, the one that had been open in her lap a few moments ago. It was about a popular theory in quantum mechanics that said there were endless universes coexisting at the same time. Was it possible that she had found Mason’s suicide note in another universe, and somehow experienced a flash of it here? Or maybe the trauma of her son’s death had jolted her into a different timeline where he was alive and well? She didn’t know, but in some ways it didn’t matter. She had her son back.

Later that night, after making Mason’s favorite dinner and showering him with so many kisses he declared her “annoying” and escaped to his room, Julia went upstairs to bed. She'd had a long talk with Mason, and he'd categorically denied any depression or thoughts of suicide, but had agreed to see a therapist the next day to appease her. She felt almost sick with relief. It had been a crazy day, one that started as a nightmare but ended in the sweetest dream. She didn’t know if she had imagined the whole thing, or if there really was a multiverse, with endless possibilities for both her and Mason. But she wasn’t going to think about that now. She was just thankful her son was alive. She would do everything in her power to make sure he stayed that way.

As she pulled back the covers, Julia’s foot brushed against something under the bed. She bent to pick it up – and her blood ran cold. It was a single page, with thirteen words:

I can’t handle this life anymore.

I love you Mom.

Please forgive me.

“No,” she whispered. “No. Mason!"

With a shriek, she ran to his room and flung the door open. It was dark and empty. Mason was gone.