Reflections on Suicide : What If ...

Story by Cherubim Infernalis on SoFurry

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The agony of existence weighed against the horror of nonbeing


Reflections On SuicideWhat If ...This is the story of the life of Ben. Ben was a timid and easily intimidated young man. Raised in a small town in a once happy family, once his family had lost their strength they fell apart like a house of cards in the wind. Ben moved with his mother to the only place they could afford in the city. The gritty inner city. He no longer had a home, he merely lived in a house. A home is something to be filled with love and friendships and celebrations of life. A house is a hollow construction used for dwelling. A house is empty of love and void of friendships. A house is cold when a home would be filled with warmth. Ben came a long way with his mother, into a new world unfamiliar to him. His mother needed money and found slim pay with a nearby factory. Ben abandoned all his friends in his small town, of whom he was raised with and knew for so many years, in exchange for a tough time of isolation among a city of millions.Life had changed for Ben. School became very difficult for him. Where he would normally be expecting a A- at the very least was now becoming a C+. Ben could no longer concentrate, he was not used to such a big school. He was not used to the crime of the inner city: the drugs and sex and abuse so common to them all but so foreign to little Ben. Ben was raised with values honoured only in the small time towns of the rural country. These city kids don't share the same attitude, they saw Ben as weak, vulnerable, and took absolute advantage of him. Ben had no confidence in himself, he saw himself as what was said about him: small, weak, and foreign. He was robbed, beaten, and belittled daily. He went home each night and was strong in front of his mother, but was only hiding the pain within. He sobbed silently each night before he went to sleep. Once upon a time Ben used to enjoy school and used to have fun learning, but life is not a fairy tale. There are no happy endings in this world. Life is brutal pain and suffering followed by death, and Ben, upon realizing this, went into his room one night and hanged himself by the neck.

 But what if Ben had stood up for himself?What if ...What if...Ben came to school one day and when the biggest bully asked him for his lunch he said no? What if...Ben came to school one day and when the toughest bully went to beat him up he fought back?What if...Ben came to school one day and the smartest bully made fun of him and he only ignored it?Would he survive? (Well, he didn't survive anyway)So Ben said no one day, and got a swift punch to the face and lost his lunch for a black eye.So Ben fought back one day, and went home with a broken nose but so did the bully.So Ben ignored him one day, and instead of these bullies feeling the satisfaction of subjugating Ben below them, they felt anger within themselves,

because Ben had just showed them who they really are: they are in no way better than Ben. They only wish to drag Ben down to their level because they know deep down within that Ben is the bigger man, the tougher man, and the smarter man.And Ben overcame his fears. Ben grew bigger. Ben grew tougher. Ben grew smarter. Ben graduated that school of hell and became a strong businessman, tough in the face of his competition and his bosses, and smarter than them all. Those bullies all ended up with nothing. Ben made enough money to move him and his mother back to the peace of the rural country town where they came from.

 And so he lived happily ever after, but he had to work long and hard for it. He had to persevere and struggle for a very long time, and through those tough times his determination eventually took his life back from the devils who tried to take him away from us.