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In the days following Mark’s death, I came across something he had written when he was in second grade. Time was running out and Mark filled in the gaps.
I could imagine him smiling as he wrote: bent over, stung, and sure he would laugh at his classmates. One evening in August, I had been without her for almost eighteen months, so I took the first “my sister” written in my hand and tattooed it on my forearm, under my elbow. It hurt and then it did. The tattoo artist put black plastic tape on my arm.
Maybe I was crazy about this school work the week before; maybe he thought I’d be shocked to see his answers on our kitchen bulletin board. Most of the time there was love between us. Mark’s struggle with depression began in middle school. Some things helped; others do not. The depression came back again and again.
Being her siblings, we changed roles and took turns. One worried, the other cautiously optimistic, the third hesitant. And then we would negotiate without ever discussing it. As things got worse, we read the signs and exchanged theories. Sometimes we all agreed and it was Mark who wasn’t there. Mark refused to go to the hospital because Mark would not meet the last doctor. He was a child of our family, but he would no longer be a leader. He did so many things, he tried so hard, and he didn’t feel that anything would give him lasting peace. When he died, at the age of 21, he committed suicide.
I really enjoyed the short afternoon I spent walking around Brooklyn and riding the train with that black plastic applied by the tattoo artist. It looked like a traditional mourning arm. I was, I am. I wanted a tattoo that would make Mark laugh.
I didn’t know the tattoo was going to be scratched and bleached, but it left small stains on my arm, on the sheets and once on my boyfriend’s forehead. “Hold on,” I said, holding his hand. “I think my tattoo is coming off you.” It was harsh but gratifying, the way he fell to reveal a more enduring version of himself.
Times are no longer right for my family. Sometimes people think it’s a coup “How are your brothers?” and I know they mean two, not three. But every once in a while, I take away the opportunity when I see it, when someone doesn’t know it. I love my dentist, but when he asked I lied to him. Good, good, they’re all pretty good. I drew on the map: I put it in Andrew Harlem, Robert Queens, and Mark I in Brooklyn, next to me, where he lived the last summer of his life. “Seeing how much time has passed, I look forward to seeing someone else,” the dentist said and we shared a laugh.
Six years later, it’s amazing that Mark isn’t yet here or there, wondering if I want to go swimming, sending him a message that made him laugh. I have three siblings, but I don’t always know how to talk about Mark’s travels, while at the same time I notice the presence of Robert and Andrew. I want to keep the same phrase, at the same time, not two-thirds good and one-third dead, not sitting in a toothbrush and not saying we’re lost and Mark.
It’s hard to stop counting how long it’s been since the dead lived, but there’s little satisfaction. In “____________”, The poet WS Merwin compares it to carefully pulling out a ropeless comet. I can’t get Mark back to me, no matter how clearly I define his distance.
Merwin died at the age of 91. He spent the last few decades “negotiable.”[ly] restored[ing] The depleted flora, including hundreds of palm species, has made its home in the far-flung Hawaiian pineapple plantation, ” According to a New York Times obituary written by Margalit Fox. There are so many ways to live in this world, and I wish Mark could find one that works for him. If Mark were still here, I would send him this sentence and the following: “He lived there, in the loneliness of happiness, since the 1970s, he refused to answer the phone.”
I could imagine that he was not dead in the first days after Mark’s death, somewhere else. There were days when I woke up and didn’t remember and then the knowledge came to me as cruel as ever. I’d like to think that Mark watches over his palms while a phone rings in the distance, but that doesn’t take me very far. Today, those lines about Merwin are sure to make him smile. I can imagine a trace of joy spreading across his face, almost as if he were here.
A few weeks after I got the tattoo, I closed my eyes and ran my hand over it and felt no more letters, which meant they would last forever. My sister. No time.
It’s Alex Ronan writer and investigative journalist From New York. Her work has been published by Elle, New York Magazine, Vogue and The New York Times. He lives and lives in Brooklyn Instagram (too much) and Twitter (sometimes).
PS Why suicide is not selfish, and how to write a condolence note.
(Photo by Nina Zivkovic / Stocksy)
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