"When the day is long and the night , the night is yours alone ,
when you're sure you've had enough of this life , well hang on.
Don't let yourself go, everybody cries and everybody hurts sometimes......
...when you think you've had too much of this life , well hang on.
Everybody hurts . Take comfort in your friends .
Everybody hurts . Don't throw your hand . Oh, no. Don't throw your hand ."
REM- Everybody Hurts
It was Tuesday morning and Liberty was setting up an empty classroom to do the interviews with students. She had decided to do mini-interviews first; short interviews with people who barely knew Emma or didn't know her at all. Liberty had gone on the Degrassi school website the night before and posted a message about her interview for other students to see, giving them the times to come. She had also called Mr. Raditch (A/N: I don't think I spelled it right.....) and he had told her about the empty classroom and had given her permission to use it.
She sighed and looked around. She had pushed all the things she wouldn't need along the walls. In the center of the room was a chair and a video camera. The chair was directly in front of the camera, so that when the person talked they didn't have to worry about standing in a certain place. They could just sit and talk freely while Liberty taped them. Liberty heard a knock on the door and went to open it. A short boy with dirty blond hair stood nervously staring at the floor.
"Is this the room for the interview?" he asked, still looking at the floor.
"Yes," Liberty answered smiling. "Did you come to talk about Emma?"
The boy nodded. "My friends and I did. We all heard what happened and we felt sorry for the people who knew her. Tonya read your post on the school website and thought we should come."
"Tonya?" Liberty asked. The boy made a hand gesture to the people behind him, whom Liberty had not noticed. There was a tall, lanky brown-haired boy, a short, chubby black girl, a girl with long brown hair and freckles, and a small, meek looking boy with fiery red hair.
"Tonya is the one with the brown hair," the boy said. "My name is John." Liberty nodded.
"I'll have to see you one at time," she said, looking at John. He nodded.
"I'll go first," he said and Liberty led him into the classroom and shut the door.
"Sit there," she said, pointing to the chair. John did as he was told and sat down. Liberty went and positioned herself behind the camera, pressing the ON button. The camera hummed to life. "Anytime you're ready," she said, smiling at John. John nodded.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* A/N: Okay, I decided to try something new. You're going to hear all the interviews piece by piece. For the sake of speeding things up I'm going to let them do the interview in random order and quotes. You know how on movies when people have to get interviewed and it shows all of them, but after one person says something it goes to another person; that person says something and it goes to someone else and so on and so forth? It's gonna be like that. You'll see what I mean and hopefully it won't be too confusing for you. Here I go. ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"I guess the only question a person can ask after what's happened is 'why?'" Sam, the tall brown-haired boy said. "Why would a person kill themselves? Even if life does get bad, there's always a different solution. Dying won't solve anything. It'll only give the people who loved you grief."
"I knew this girl once," Tara, the black girl, said, playing with her necklace. "She used to go around talking about suicide all the time. She'd do the whole 'woe is me' thing and go around mopping. But when you asked her what was wrong, she wouldn't say anything. So anyways, she moved a year ago and no one ever found out what was wrong with her. I, personally don't think there was anything wrong. I think she did it all for the attention."
"For a person to take their lives, is just, wrong!" Tonya said forcefully, looking straight into the camera. "It's a sin! Life is the greatest gift of all and to throw it all away like that..... I mean, sure life gets rough, but there's always an upside to it."
"I had a friend who killed himself once," Scott, the red haired kid began. "He was a great guy. Always goofing off and making girls laugh. We were all shocked when we heard he'd done that. Tommy, uh, that was his name, was the guy I admired most. I remember wishing I was just like him. And then when I woke up one morning and heard that he'd hung himself..... I couldn't believe it! I thought for sure I was still dreaming. But I wasn't. Tommy was really gone."
"I feel sorry for her friends," John said, still not able to bring himself to look at the camera. He stared intently at the floor instead. "They're the ones who are gonna have to deal with this now. And that's the funny thing about suicide. While you're dead set on believing the whole worlds against you and no one knows your pain, you're inflicting more pain on those who love you. They want to help you and you think no one can help you and it's a no win type situation. And then when the person finally goes and kills themselves, their friends and family are now the ones feeling like the worlds against them. And before you know it, it could turn into this whole chain reaction. I heard the girl, Emma, was smart and everything, but I don't think she thought everything out clearly. Cuz if she had, she'd still be here right now."
"I keep wondering what was going through Tommy's mind while he put the noose around his neck," Scott continued. "Did he feel regret? Pain? Was he even thinking? What if he saw the solution to his problem right before he died? What if he thought, 'Oh, no, what have I done,' at the last second when he couldn't turn back?" Scott paused and looked around the classroom. Sighing, he began again. "I know I'm rambling, but I've needed to get this all out for so long. Tommy's suicide really hurt me, just like Emma's suicide hurt the people who cared about her. I just hope that people who watch this, if they're thinking about suicide or knows someone who is, really think about everything. Really see the world for more than just a hateful place. Really see their friends and talk to someone and get help. Because the death of a loved one really does hurt, more than you know. Until you lose someone, you never know how horrible it feels to wake up and know that they're not there anymore; that you can't call them up on the phone and ask them how life's going or go hang someplace and just chill. They're gone. And they're never coming back."
"I don't think that Emma did it for attention, though," Tara said. "I think she had a reason. Even though there's really no reason to take your own life. Still, maybe it all just got to her. Maybe she saw that the world had suddenly changed from the innocence and care free living of childhood, to a cruel, unfair place of hatred and sorrow. And if she did and I had known her I would've told her, 'Well, sweetie. That's what being a teenager is all about.'"
"I get picked on all the time by my brothers, my dad's a drunk, my mom could care less about her kids and my fifteen year old sister is pregnant," Sam said angrily, clenching his hands into fists. "On top of that, kids at school are always on my back about the way I dress, or the way I act, I have few friends, I work two hard jobs trying to help my sister out, and my dad, that prick, goes and spends most of the money I make on booze. Our rents due and we might be getting evicted. So, yeah, I have major problems as well, but you don't see me going and committing suicide. I just wish I had known this girl. That way, she could've seen how hard I struggle and maybe she would have changed her mind."
"I guess, all I'm trying to say is," Tonya said, looking sadly at the camera. "Life is worth living no matter how hard it gets and I feel sorry for that girl, because she never gave herself a chance to live. Maybe nobody ever told her just how special she was and how much her life meant to other people around her. Or maybe she never listened." Tonya sniffed and blinked back tears. She hadn't expected it to be this hard to give an interview on someone she hadn't known, but other people HAD known her. They had loved her and she was gone. "My message to people is don't give up, no matter how hard or painful it all seems. Like I said before, there's ALWAYS an upside. You just have to look for it. That's all."
Liberty smiled at Tonya as she hit the OFF button on the camera. "Thank you," she said. Tonya nodded and left the room.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"So, you guys wanna do something after school today?" Paige asked, staring at her group of friends hopefully. Ever since Emma's death everyone had been acting differently. They had all been drifting apart. To Paige's disappointment, her friends, Hazel, Spinner, Jimmy, Marco and Terri all shook their heads no. Paige sighed. "Are you sure?" she asked, though she knew it was hopeless.
"Yea, I'm sure," Marco answered. "I don't really feel like hanging out or having fun what with all that's happening." The other's agreed with Marco.
"I was gonna give an interview today for Liberty," Jimmy said quietly. "Maybe we could all do that." Again everyone shook their heads.
"I really don't want to talk about what happened," Terri said sadly. "It's just hard." Jimmy nodded in understanding as the rest of his friends headed out of Degrassi on their way home. Jimmy went to find Liberty and the classroom where she was doing the interviews. He had wanted to come that morning, but was too tired. So he had decided to do an interview with her after school.
Finally, Jimmy found the classroom. He knocked on the door and entered before anyone could answer. He saw Liberty sitting in a corner at a desk working on something. 'Homework probably,' he thought. Liberty smiled as she saw him and Jimmy smiled weakly back.
"Are you here to talk about Emma?" she asked hopefully. Her smile widened as he nodded his head. "Sit there," she said, pointing at the chair. She put down whatever she had been doing and walked over to the camera. "I'm gonna turn it on now. You ready?" Jimmy nodded and Liberty turned the camera on.
Jimmy looked around the room, unsure of himself. He had wanted to say something, anything, but words escaped him now. "I, uh.... I, um," he began, rubbing his sweaty hands on his jeans. He looked at Liberty who gave him a small smile of encouragement. "I never really knew Emma that well," Jimmy said, feeling a bit more comfortable. "I mean, sure I saw her around a lot and even kinda talked to her on occasions, but I never really knew her. But from what I did see of her, well, she always seemed so confident. So okay with her life. You can pretty much imagine my shock when I heard she'd, uh.... she'd killed herself." Jimmy hung his head remembering the terrible feeling he'd had after Manny's outburst. He'd gone through the rest of his morning in disbelief. "I couldn't believe it. I mean.... Emma?! But then another name went through my head right after. Sean." Jimmy laughed a bit before continuing.
"Once upon a time me and him were the best of friends. But everything changed when he got held back. We ended up fighting. I remember Emma had tried to stop us, but we were too head strong. We didn't listen. But right then I felt sorry for him. I knew this was hurting him. When he blew up at school, I was the one who ran to him first. I tried to calm him down. But there's was nothing I could do and he didn't listen to me. He ended up being escorted by the cops out of school. I felt so bad. I've been planning to visit him, but it'll be a while before I do. He's got so much to handle with Emma and everything." Jimmy put his head in his hands and began massaging his temples. He was starting to get a bad headache which was probably from all the pain and guilt he was feeling. He felt guilty because he couldn't be there for Sean. Jimmy sighed.
"Emma seemed like a real nice girl and I know everybody's gonna miss her. I went to her funeral on Saturday. That was probably the saddest thing that's ever happened in my life. So many people miss her. And Manny..... when she passed out at the funeral I wanted to help her so bad. But I felt so helpless. It's scary, you know. Not being able to help someone." Jimmy cleared his throat and looked back up at the camera. "I um.... I'm sorry to everyone who knew her. And I.... I guess.... I'll miss her, too. Goodbye Emma. Sorry everything ended the way it did." Jimmy did his best to smile, but found it hard. Liberty hit the off button on the camera.
"Thank you," she said, blinking back tears. The interviews were turning out to be harder than she thought they would be. Jimmy smiled.
"Anytime," he said, before leaving. Liberty went back to sit at the desk she had been working at before Jimmy came. Instead of completing her work, though, she struggled to hold back tears. This documentary was turning out to be harder than she thought.
"I don't think I can do this," Liberty said, letting the tears spill out from her eyes. Never before in her life had Liberty thought she wouldn't succeed at something. But then again things had never been so hard. All of the sudden everything felt so real to Liberty and it hurt. "I really don't want to fail, but I can't do this." The thought of failing only made Liberty cry harder. But Liberty knew she couldn't give up. She owed Manny. She owed Emma. Wiping away her tears, she picked up her assignments and began working again. She had to finish it before she awoke tomorrow to come to school for more interviews.
A/N: Seems to be an author's note on every chapter, eh? How are you all liking the story so far? It's really sad, but that's the way I wanted it to be. I want to make people think. Thinking is good for you!!! Lolz. Next chapter will be Spinner's interview. Trust me, this will be so unlike Spinner it'll make your head Spin! Lolz. Make your head Spin..... get it? ::shrugs:: Well I thought it was funny. Review, please. Love, Kris Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo
P.S. Manny visits Sean in the chapter after Spinner's interview. Be prepared for a lot more tears. As for the Manny and Craig thing.... hmmm, what do you all think? Should Manny and Craig try the love thing again or should I just let it go and let them have that one kiss? Review and lemme know. Love you all!!!!!
P.P.S. Remember all you impatient people. The more you read the closer you get to Emma's reason. I know the suspense sucks, but what's a good story without a little suspense?
Update: I don't know if I'm going to post the Spinner chapter. It seems a little too un-Spinner-ish. We'll see....
when you're sure you've had enough of this life , well hang on.
Don't let yourself go, everybody cries and everybody hurts sometimes......
...when you think you've had too much of this life , well hang on.
Everybody hurts . Take comfort in your friends .
Everybody hurts . Don't throw your hand . Oh, no. Don't throw your hand ."
REM- Everybody Hurts
It was Tuesday morning and Liberty was setting up an empty classroom to do the interviews with students. She had decided to do mini-interviews first; short interviews with people who barely knew Emma or didn't know her at all. Liberty had gone on the Degrassi school website the night before and posted a message about her interview for other students to see, giving them the times to come. She had also called Mr. Raditch (A/N: I don't think I spelled it right.....) and he had told her about the empty classroom and had given her permission to use it.
She sighed and looked around. She had pushed all the things she wouldn't need along the walls. In the center of the room was a chair and a video camera. The chair was directly in front of the camera, so that when the person talked they didn't have to worry about standing in a certain place. They could just sit and talk freely while Liberty taped them. Liberty heard a knock on the door and went to open it. A short boy with dirty blond hair stood nervously staring at the floor.
"Is this the room for the interview?" he asked, still looking at the floor.
"Yes," Liberty answered smiling. "Did you come to talk about Emma?"
The boy nodded. "My friends and I did. We all heard what happened and we felt sorry for the people who knew her. Tonya read your post on the school website and thought we should come."
"Tonya?" Liberty asked. The boy made a hand gesture to the people behind him, whom Liberty had not noticed. There was a tall, lanky brown-haired boy, a short, chubby black girl, a girl with long brown hair and freckles, and a small, meek looking boy with fiery red hair.
"Tonya is the one with the brown hair," the boy said. "My name is John." Liberty nodded.
"I'll have to see you one at time," she said, looking at John. He nodded.
"I'll go first," he said and Liberty led him into the classroom and shut the door.
"Sit there," she said, pointing to the chair. John did as he was told and sat down. Liberty went and positioned herself behind the camera, pressing the ON button. The camera hummed to life. "Anytime you're ready," she said, smiling at John. John nodded.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~* A/N: Okay, I decided to try something new. You're going to hear all the interviews piece by piece. For the sake of speeding things up I'm going to let them do the interview in random order and quotes. You know how on movies when people have to get interviewed and it shows all of them, but after one person says something it goes to another person; that person says something and it goes to someone else and so on and so forth? It's gonna be like that. You'll see what I mean and hopefully it won't be too confusing for you. Here I go. ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"I guess the only question a person can ask after what's happened is 'why?'" Sam, the tall brown-haired boy said. "Why would a person kill themselves? Even if life does get bad, there's always a different solution. Dying won't solve anything. It'll only give the people who loved you grief."
"I knew this girl once," Tara, the black girl, said, playing with her necklace. "She used to go around talking about suicide all the time. She'd do the whole 'woe is me' thing and go around mopping. But when you asked her what was wrong, she wouldn't say anything. So anyways, she moved a year ago and no one ever found out what was wrong with her. I, personally don't think there was anything wrong. I think she did it all for the attention."
"For a person to take their lives, is just, wrong!" Tonya said forcefully, looking straight into the camera. "It's a sin! Life is the greatest gift of all and to throw it all away like that..... I mean, sure life gets rough, but there's always an upside to it."
"I had a friend who killed himself once," Scott, the red haired kid began. "He was a great guy. Always goofing off and making girls laugh. We were all shocked when we heard he'd done that. Tommy, uh, that was his name, was the guy I admired most. I remember wishing I was just like him. And then when I woke up one morning and heard that he'd hung himself..... I couldn't believe it! I thought for sure I was still dreaming. But I wasn't. Tommy was really gone."
"I feel sorry for her friends," John said, still not able to bring himself to look at the camera. He stared intently at the floor instead. "They're the ones who are gonna have to deal with this now. And that's the funny thing about suicide. While you're dead set on believing the whole worlds against you and no one knows your pain, you're inflicting more pain on those who love you. They want to help you and you think no one can help you and it's a no win type situation. And then when the person finally goes and kills themselves, their friends and family are now the ones feeling like the worlds against them. And before you know it, it could turn into this whole chain reaction. I heard the girl, Emma, was smart and everything, but I don't think she thought everything out clearly. Cuz if she had, she'd still be here right now."
"I keep wondering what was going through Tommy's mind while he put the noose around his neck," Scott continued. "Did he feel regret? Pain? Was he even thinking? What if he saw the solution to his problem right before he died? What if he thought, 'Oh, no, what have I done,' at the last second when he couldn't turn back?" Scott paused and looked around the classroom. Sighing, he began again. "I know I'm rambling, but I've needed to get this all out for so long. Tommy's suicide really hurt me, just like Emma's suicide hurt the people who cared about her. I just hope that people who watch this, if they're thinking about suicide or knows someone who is, really think about everything. Really see the world for more than just a hateful place. Really see their friends and talk to someone and get help. Because the death of a loved one really does hurt, more than you know. Until you lose someone, you never know how horrible it feels to wake up and know that they're not there anymore; that you can't call them up on the phone and ask them how life's going or go hang someplace and just chill. They're gone. And they're never coming back."
"I don't think that Emma did it for attention, though," Tara said. "I think she had a reason. Even though there's really no reason to take your own life. Still, maybe it all just got to her. Maybe she saw that the world had suddenly changed from the innocence and care free living of childhood, to a cruel, unfair place of hatred and sorrow. And if she did and I had known her I would've told her, 'Well, sweetie. That's what being a teenager is all about.'"
"I get picked on all the time by my brothers, my dad's a drunk, my mom could care less about her kids and my fifteen year old sister is pregnant," Sam said angrily, clenching his hands into fists. "On top of that, kids at school are always on my back about the way I dress, or the way I act, I have few friends, I work two hard jobs trying to help my sister out, and my dad, that prick, goes and spends most of the money I make on booze. Our rents due and we might be getting evicted. So, yeah, I have major problems as well, but you don't see me going and committing suicide. I just wish I had known this girl. That way, she could've seen how hard I struggle and maybe she would have changed her mind."
"I guess, all I'm trying to say is," Tonya said, looking sadly at the camera. "Life is worth living no matter how hard it gets and I feel sorry for that girl, because she never gave herself a chance to live. Maybe nobody ever told her just how special she was and how much her life meant to other people around her. Or maybe she never listened." Tonya sniffed and blinked back tears. She hadn't expected it to be this hard to give an interview on someone she hadn't known, but other people HAD known her. They had loved her and she was gone. "My message to people is don't give up, no matter how hard or painful it all seems. Like I said before, there's ALWAYS an upside. You just have to look for it. That's all."
Liberty smiled at Tonya as she hit the OFF button on the camera. "Thank you," she said. Tonya nodded and left the room.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
"So, you guys wanna do something after school today?" Paige asked, staring at her group of friends hopefully. Ever since Emma's death everyone had been acting differently. They had all been drifting apart. To Paige's disappointment, her friends, Hazel, Spinner, Jimmy, Marco and Terri all shook their heads no. Paige sighed. "Are you sure?" she asked, though she knew it was hopeless.
"Yea, I'm sure," Marco answered. "I don't really feel like hanging out or having fun what with all that's happening." The other's agreed with Marco.
"I was gonna give an interview today for Liberty," Jimmy said quietly. "Maybe we could all do that." Again everyone shook their heads.
"I really don't want to talk about what happened," Terri said sadly. "It's just hard." Jimmy nodded in understanding as the rest of his friends headed out of Degrassi on their way home. Jimmy went to find Liberty and the classroom where she was doing the interviews. He had wanted to come that morning, but was too tired. So he had decided to do an interview with her after school.
Finally, Jimmy found the classroom. He knocked on the door and entered before anyone could answer. He saw Liberty sitting in a corner at a desk working on something. 'Homework probably,' he thought. Liberty smiled as she saw him and Jimmy smiled weakly back.
"Are you here to talk about Emma?" she asked hopefully. Her smile widened as he nodded his head. "Sit there," she said, pointing at the chair. She put down whatever she had been doing and walked over to the camera. "I'm gonna turn it on now. You ready?" Jimmy nodded and Liberty turned the camera on.
Jimmy looked around the room, unsure of himself. He had wanted to say something, anything, but words escaped him now. "I, uh.... I, um," he began, rubbing his sweaty hands on his jeans. He looked at Liberty who gave him a small smile of encouragement. "I never really knew Emma that well," Jimmy said, feeling a bit more comfortable. "I mean, sure I saw her around a lot and even kinda talked to her on occasions, but I never really knew her. But from what I did see of her, well, she always seemed so confident. So okay with her life. You can pretty much imagine my shock when I heard she'd, uh.... she'd killed herself." Jimmy hung his head remembering the terrible feeling he'd had after Manny's outburst. He'd gone through the rest of his morning in disbelief. "I couldn't believe it. I mean.... Emma?! But then another name went through my head right after. Sean." Jimmy laughed a bit before continuing.
"Once upon a time me and him were the best of friends. But everything changed when he got held back. We ended up fighting. I remember Emma had tried to stop us, but we were too head strong. We didn't listen. But right then I felt sorry for him. I knew this was hurting him. When he blew up at school, I was the one who ran to him first. I tried to calm him down. But there's was nothing I could do and he didn't listen to me. He ended up being escorted by the cops out of school. I felt so bad. I've been planning to visit him, but it'll be a while before I do. He's got so much to handle with Emma and everything." Jimmy put his head in his hands and began massaging his temples. He was starting to get a bad headache which was probably from all the pain and guilt he was feeling. He felt guilty because he couldn't be there for Sean. Jimmy sighed.
"Emma seemed like a real nice girl and I know everybody's gonna miss her. I went to her funeral on Saturday. That was probably the saddest thing that's ever happened in my life. So many people miss her. And Manny..... when she passed out at the funeral I wanted to help her so bad. But I felt so helpless. It's scary, you know. Not being able to help someone." Jimmy cleared his throat and looked back up at the camera. "I um.... I'm sorry to everyone who knew her. And I.... I guess.... I'll miss her, too. Goodbye Emma. Sorry everything ended the way it did." Jimmy did his best to smile, but found it hard. Liberty hit the off button on the camera.
"Thank you," she said, blinking back tears. The interviews were turning out to be harder than she thought they would be. Jimmy smiled.
"Anytime," he said, before leaving. Liberty went back to sit at the desk she had been working at before Jimmy came. Instead of completing her work, though, she struggled to hold back tears. This documentary was turning out to be harder than she thought.
"I don't think I can do this," Liberty said, letting the tears spill out from her eyes. Never before in her life had Liberty thought she wouldn't succeed at something. But then again things had never been so hard. All of the sudden everything felt so real to Liberty and it hurt. "I really don't want to fail, but I can't do this." The thought of failing only made Liberty cry harder. But Liberty knew she couldn't give up. She owed Manny. She owed Emma. Wiping away her tears, she picked up her assignments and began working again. She had to finish it before she awoke tomorrow to come to school for more interviews.
A/N: Seems to be an author's note on every chapter, eh? How are you all liking the story so far? It's really sad, but that's the way I wanted it to be. I want to make people think. Thinking is good for you!!! Lolz. Next chapter will be Spinner's interview. Trust me, this will be so unlike Spinner it'll make your head Spin! Lolz. Make your head Spin..... get it? ::shrugs:: Well I thought it was funny. Review, please. Love, Kris Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo
P.S. Manny visits Sean in the chapter after Spinner's interview. Be prepared for a lot more tears. As for the Manny and Craig thing.... hmmm, what do you all think? Should Manny and Craig try the love thing again or should I just let it go and let them have that one kiss? Review and lemme know. Love you all!!!!!
P.P.S. Remember all you impatient people. The more you read the closer you get to Emma's reason. I know the suspense sucks, but what's a good story without a little suspense?
Update: I don't know if I'm going to post the Spinner chapter. It seems a little too un-Spinner-ish. We'll see....