Title: Letting Go

Book- undone by Cat Clarke

Blurb- "Sometimes holding on hurts more than letting go"

Book Summary

Jem's best friend Kai committed suicide because few of his classmates film his video in which Kai gets intimate with another guy. The video is leaked and people gets to know that Kai is a gay. Due to all the humiliation, he commits suicide. It breaks Jem. She decides to commit suicide, but she had a plan of ruining the people who did this is to Kai before she dies. She ruins the reputation of the 5 people in their school because she suspects they were the ones who filmed Kai. In the process, she falls in love with one of the group members named Lucas. After realizing that all the people she ruins were all innocent, she is devastated. Her guilt of not being able to save Kai from committing suicide and ruining the wrong people makes her attempt to suicide.

Jem's point of view

I stood near the railing of the bridge embracing the few moments I am alive. I cannot live with this guilt. I destroyed people's lives, no one will ever forgive me. I failed to save Kai. Everything is my fault and there is nothing left for me to live for. My parents and Lucas's face flashes in front of my eyes, but I pushed all the images away.

I step up, as I am about to move forward I am yanked behind into someone's chest. I immediately recognized the person, his scent of cologne instantly calms me down. I tried to move away, but he tightens his grip on my waist and buries his head in the crook of my neck

"Why Jem?", Lucas whispered.

I was unable to meet his gaze, feeling embarrassed about what I was going to do. What would have happened if Lucas was seconds late. I realized his hands were shivering, and his eyes swelled up.

I wrapped my arms around his torso. He embraced me as if I was going to disappear into the thin air. He gripped my chin to make me look him in the eye.

"Why the hell Jem? Was it not enough for you to hurt me, that you want to break my heart all over again. What would have happened if I was late? I would have freaking lost you. Are you out of your mind? You never even considered that how much I love you"

"But you hated me. Why do you care?"

"God Dammit Jem. I was hurt. I never stopped caring about you. I was angry, but I couldn't hate you even if I wanted"

"I am sorry", I whispered.

Suddenly, it sinks in. It hits me that I was about to commit suicide. Thinking about suicide is one thing, but when I was doing it, it was scary. I have wanted to do this for one year since my best friend died. Being this close to death made me realize that this is not what I want. This is not what Kai would have wanted for me. He will twist in his grave, knowing I was about to give up my life.

I didn't realize till now that the guilt I have been carrying of being unable to save Kai was eating me alive. This guilt made me seek out revenge from innocent people. I wanted to inflict pain upon people, who did all wrong to my best friend. I thought hurting people would make me happier and relieved, but it's the opposite I feel. I stooped down to their level. I was blinded by revenge, hate, guilt, that I hurt the people who had nothing to do with Kai's death.

I wanted to die the day Kai took his last breath, but I lived the entire year without him to seek vengeance. I don't feel better, I feel worse.

I never dealt with Kai's death well. I was so determined to seek revenge with people who filmed Kai, that I didn't rationally think. I suspected the wrong people. I have been taking revenge from the people who didn't do anything. I befriended Lucas and his entire group cause I thought they were the ones. I destroyed their reputations in school. In the process, I did love Lucas, but my guilt outweighed the love I had for him. I miss Kai and everything about him. I wanted to die and be with him.

"I miss him so much, I just want him back, Lucas. I want my best friend back. I miss him", I sobbed hugging Lucas tightly.

"He never left. He is still there. He is still there Jem you are just not letting him in", Lucas said.

My eyebrows scrunched together in confusion. I guess this whole idea of letting go was foreign to me since all I ever did was cling onto his memories. I never accepted Kai's death. Those memories haunted me daily but they were also what kept me alive, even though they were slowly killing me, charring my soul, and blackening my soul on the inside. Kai's memory made me determined to seek revenge from people who caused this.

"What do you mean?", I asked slowly, blinking a couple of times to push my tears back.

Sighing heavily, I ignored the soothing feeling I was getting from how he is tracing patterns on my palms. I looked at him, sucking in a breath at how intoxicating his gaze is.

"You're trying so hard to hold onto him when what you should be doing is letting him go. Only then will he return to you in the form of peace and acceptance.", he said

The concept of letting go was just too hard for me, but holding onto Kai hurt more because I was just constantly searching for somebody that was never coming back. It's

like stumbling around in the dark, blinded by grief and tripping over your own feet. I was so desperate to be with Kai, that I wanted to commit suicide and be with him because imagining living in this world without him was hard. I made so many plans with Kai. My best friend will travel the world, go to the same colleges, and do so many more things. Now I not only have to let go of the past but also the future I wished to spend with him.

"I c-can't," My voice was raspy, "I can't let him go."

Leaning forward, I could now make out the blue in his eyes and it wavered, shifting like the tides of an ocean whilst his unshed tears shimmered like glass droplets.

"Why not?", he breathed.

"I know it is the right thing to do, but I just cannot", I said.

"I am with you Jem. You are not alone, we are on this journey together. Even though you did some unforgivable things, someday I will have it in my heart to forgive you completely. You did some bad stuff, but you're not a bad person. You deserve to be happy", he said

I looked at him, and for the first time, there was hope in me. I wanted to live.

"Will you help me? Do you think I Can do this?"

"As long as you don't give up on yourself, I won't give up on you, promise ?"

"Promise", I whisper holding onto him tightly.

2 years later

Some people will tell you that grief eases over time, that it becomes less of a burden as you learn how to live your life again, the way you did before. Sadly, it doesn't work like that, at least with me it didn't work like that.

Life will force you to carry on, that part is crushingly true, but the grief will gnaw at your memories, making them hazy and dull.

Soon, all you'll be left with are faceless figures and voices that don't match up the same way they used to. So you'll cling onto photographs, hoping they'll jog your memory and they will suffice for the time being until you need something stronger to remember them by. Eventually, you give up and force yourself to move on. This may happen at any point: months, years, or even decades. Sometimes never at all.

It took me almost two years to distinguish the difference between grief and guilt. Allowing my psychologist and with Luca's support. I managed to do it. I did it. I overcame my guilt by accepting that it wasn't my mistake. I couldn't stop those people from filming Kai. It wasn't my fault that Kai committed suicide, I wish I was there to stop him, but I have understood that it was Kai's wish to commit suicide, and there is nothing I could have done. I regret that I hurt a lot of people in the process. I hurt Lucas and his friends, but over the years I have improved and they have forgiven me for my wrongdoings.

I have realized that acceptance is a tricky thing. I realized that trying to accept the guilt all in one go will not help a lot. So, I dealt with things one day at a time. I'm working on accepting my guilt, and in hindsight, I can see it happening. I can see myself getting rid of it once and for all.

But most of all, what Lucas managed to make me believe is that it's okay not to be okay as long as you're not giving up. Nobody says we have to be happy all the time because there comes a point in the grieving process when you have to choose between turning the page

or closing the book forever, and I've chosen to start a new book. A new life. A new me.

Right now, sitting beside Lucas and celebrating my birthday. I'm smiling. I'm smiling because finally, after three years of aching, numbing, blinding misery, I am happy. I am happy.

And I am guilt-free.