“Suicide is a form of murder – premeditated murder. It isn’t something you do the first time you think of doing it. It takes getting used to. You need the means, the opportunity, the motive. A successful suicide demands good organization and a cool head, both of which are usually incompatible with the suicidal state of mind.”

----Susanna Kaysen, in Girl, Interrupted.  

Sunday is gloomy,

With shadows I spend it all

My heart and I have decided to

End it all.

Soon they’ll be flowers and

Prayers that are said I know.

Let them not weep let them

Know that I’m glad to go.

----Gloomy Sunday.  

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“Do it John. Do it!”  

And the struggle began, renewed. Every night, it was the same. As he lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, a little voice spoke.  

“Do it John Do it!”  

There were so many possibilities of how to do it. He wandered the expansive house, turning over each alternative in his head. A gun. He could point a gun at his temple. He could put it in his mouth. He could aim it at his heart. He knew where the guns were kept, in the bottom left hand of the old bureau in the basement. This led him to his next choice.  

The stairs. He could fling himself down a flight of stairs. Hell, he could go three flights of stairs if he got his timing right. But if he didn’t… He would be back where he started: suffering.  

“Do it John. End the suffering.” 

It was May. He had been suffering for a long time. He had become addicted to his painkillers, he was suffering so.  

Drugs! The big bottle of Bayer aspirin in the medicine closet. How many of the small pills would prove fatal? Fifty? Sixty? No better make it one hundred; he didn’t want his stomach being pumped. He had seen people having their stomachs pumped. It was a disgusting task.  

Razors. He could easily slit his wrists. He was a doctor, he knew exactly where the artery was. One swipe… And it would be over.  

“Yes John. Remember Lucy.”  

Lucy. Ah, he himself was the cause of all this. He was already guilty of one murder. Why would one more matter?  

Perhaps he should end it with poetic justice: a knife. Those were by far the simplest to get at.  

But why. Why should he? Why hadn’t he? There were opportunities everywhere. Especially at work. The hospital itself was tall enough to jump from. The El ran right by the hospital. What if he were “accidentally” pushed in? If he were unsure, he could bang his wrists on some relatively blunt or rounded object. Sooner or later the artery would give. So, what was he waiting for? Why was he hesitant?  

“Do it John. Do it!”  

There was that voice again. Was this voice like the one Paul Sobriki had heard? Was it a voice like that that had told him to seek revenge? The voice had killed Lucy. What if he listened to his voice? Were all people who committed suicide condemned to hell? If they were, what good would his death do? Was he doing this for himself, or Lucy?  

“Not tonight,” he told the little voice.  

The sun was rising. As if the voice were a vampire, it shrunk away, leaving him to deal with his life. He sat down on his couch. He had won the struggle tonight. But tomorrow, the struggle would be renewed.  

The scary thing was, if the voice ever won, the war would be over.