**Graphic** The Final Moments

I sometimes lie awake into the late hours of the morning and picture Sean’s final moments and the aftermath in my head, replaying all possible scenarios in great detail until I make myself physically ill. The police refused to let me into the vault to see him despite my asking. Though I was angry with them at the time for denying me, I am grateful they protected me from what I now realize is something I’d never be able to “unsee”. My therapist asked why I do this and truthfully- I don’t know. It doesn’t bring me any peace to torture myself imagining the possibilities until my anxiety and emotions spill out into the toilet bowl. But I just can’t help but wonder.

When he left the house, he was wearing a red cotton t-shirt, black sweat pants and the blue running shoes he’d bought two weeks earlier to help prepare for an upcoming PT test. Why would he buy new running shoes to prep for a PT test if he’d planned to kill himself? Maybe he didn’t plan to. Maybe he just got tired and sick of fighting so hard to just be OK. Maybe he was just drunk and decided to say “fuck it” when he left and stayed in that mindset as he walked to his death.

The police report said there was a lot of blood, the same red as his t-shirt?

What did he think about as he walked the twenty minutes to the unit? Did he think about me, or Luke? Or his unborn daughter?

No…probably not.

Did his fingers shake as he accessed the weapons vault or was he steady-handed because he was so sure of his decision?

He only put one bullet in. I wonder why.

Or not.

I guess it only takes the one.

Did he sit there and mull it over, or did he do it right away?

I hope he did it right away.

How long did he lie there before we found him? Had he already started to become cold and hard?

Did he scream or cry before he did it? Did he say any “final words” aloud? I wonder what he would have said.

Or did he die in silence?

I suppose it doesn’t matter either way.

If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it- does it make a sound?