"Cosmo, honey, wake up, your father and I have some bad new." On that, Isaac and Duke walked into room. Duke sat next to Cosmo on his bed.
"Boys, there is no easy way to tell you this. Last night, Matt tried to kill himself."
"What?!" Duke asked. Cosmo gasped in fear and shock.
"I found him in his room downstairs, he had slit his wrists. Now, before we go into anything else, he's going to be fine. He lost a lot of blood, but he's going to be okay. However, he's been admitted toe psychiatric hospital. Matt needs a lot of help, and we think that he can get it there." Isaac went and got some tissues for the two crying boys, while Babsie sat down on the bed between them and wrapped her arms around them both.
"The two of you need to understand that this is not either of your faults, okay?" They silently nodded. "I think that when he's ready to talk to us about it, we'll find out that there was no one thing that caused this, I think that Matt's had a lot of stuff piling up, and he just didn't know how to handle it." The three of the just sat there, Babsie rocking them, for ages, just crying and thinking. Nobody is ever prepared for something like this, and when it does happen, everyone always blames themselves.
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Later that afternoon, everybody knew. Not only the people staying at Isaac and Babsie's house, but Taylor and Mackie's families as well. So Isaac wasn't too surprised when Taylor came over to visit. Taylor came into the room and immediately gave his older brother a hug.
"Isaac, just remember, this is in no way your fault." Isaac sniffled.
"I know that, Taylor, but I can't help wonder if I could have stopped it. Why didn't I come downstairs earlier? Why didn't I see how depressed he was? Why didn't I know?" Isaac was clearly distraught, and Taylor knew what to say, though he was afraid to say. Taking a deep breath,
"Ike, you didn't see how depressed he was because he was hiding it, just like I was when we were teenagers."
"What?" Isaac asked, confused and surprised.
"Ike, way back in 2000, I tried to kill myself, three times, actually. The first time I was about to overdose on some pills I had, but Jess came in to talk to me, and I never did. The second time I was just about to jump off a cliff, but I saw Rita's face in the water below, so I didn't. That was during that time when I was so upset with "Her" that I could never jump toward an image of her face. And then the last time, I was going to slit my wrists. I had a sharp piece of glass and I was ready to do it, and then all I could think of was Rita, though I hadn't met her yet. I couldn't understand why she'd care, I didn't even know if she existed. I was so confused, Ike. That was the night that I threw the glass through the big canvas portrait I was making of Her and then freaked out. Damn, Ike, I was so depressed. Everyone thought I was crazy, even me. I just kept seeing this random girl I had never met before, and her face was everywhere I looked. Even to this day I think that Rita was lucky I was famous, at least she knew for certain that I existed." They both chucked a little at that, but in reality Isaac was shocked.
"Taylor, why didn't we ever know? How come I couldn't see how depressed you were?" Taylor shrugged.
"I don't know, but I think it's better that you didn't. I don't exactly know why, I just think it was. And I think that Matt's going to be okay. He needs a lot of love, but don't try to make him talk about it too much, he'll talk when he's ready. He probably feels unbelievably guilty and really scared. I know I did. Just love him Ike, that's all you can do." Finally, the tears that Isaac had been holding back all day couldn't last any longer, and the fell like a flood. Taylor wrapped his arms around his older brother and let him cry on his shoulder. He needed to cry, most men need to cry, but they think that they can't. So Ike sat there, his back wracked with sobs as he soaked his younger brother's shirt. Together, in that living room, the two men cried over the loss of innocence of a child. Not only Matt, but his brother's and sisters, and the loss of their own naive thoughts that they would be spared this pain. Together, they cried.