My last post was a frank and open statement about my depression and the first time I tried to take my own life; but something that I did not post because it was still to raw to talk about was the mental health of someone very close to me; a very dear and valued friend from boarding school. Li (Not her real name) had been suffering from mental health problems and sadly she gave in to her inner demons and took her own life shortly after lockdown began.

I was devestated to hear of Li’s suicide and as equally heartbroken to know that I had lost a valued and loved friend whose funeral I could not attend. It absolutely tore me to shreads that I could not attend Li’s funeral because of lockdown, so I did the best that I could; I fasted for one day and one night and prayed to the Gods in Asguard and asked them to watch over Li and make sure she got to Valhalla with the honoured dead.

I first met the Welsh firebug known as Li at boarding school; she was one of those girls who you noticed right away 3 days later as she was quiet but when she got talking it was hard to stop her, not that I ever would have done or ever did. My first interaction with Li was at lunch the day after she started at school, she thought it would be funny to throw a tennis ball at me. From that moment on and until the school closed down, I had a somewhat tempestuous relationship with Li; meaning we had a love-hate relationship. We loved to hate each other and we hated to love each other.

For the time that we were at school together, despite outward appearances Li and myself did get along very well. What today would be called a ‘badly kept secret’ or a ‘secret that everyone knows’ we called it ‘Going out on the sly’. We kept it on the low, thinking no-one knew but when the school closed down, it was revealed to me just how badly kept our secret was.

One of the care-staff at the school Mr. Grent, whose name I’ve changed to protect his privacy, told me it was obvious to everyone even Stevie Wonder, that when Li and myself lagged behind everyone else between classes or if we managed to get ahead of the others when leaving class or going to the residential block, it was so we could steal a quick kiss. He also told me that when Li and myself were in the resources room, we would steal a quick kiss or two when we thought no one was looking or would catch us. When I asked him how everybody knew about us, he said that it was obvious we had a thing for each other and he had never seen two people so diametrically opposed spend so much time near each other.

When we were told that the school would be shut down, I was heartbroken at the prospect of never seeing Li again. When that fateful date came and the school closed down, I said a very tearful goodbye to Li, slipped her my address so we could keep in contact then stole what I thought was my final kiss, which at that time I did not realise that it WOULD be my last kiss and would be the lat time I ever saw her. We did indeed keep in contact for a few months but as so often happens with friends from school, we slowly lost contact.

It was not until the age of Facebook that Li and myself were able to reconnect; which we did a little over 4 years ago. For the next few months, we rekindled our friendship and it was soon evident that there were still smouldering feelings between us. Due to various personal reason we each had, we could not meet up as she lived in Newport down in Wales and I live in West Yorkshire; but this did not stop us rekindling over Facebook the friendship we once had.

A few years passed and the friendship rekindling continued, and then came the day of our first School Reunion. I was hyped beyond beliefe for the Reunion where not only would I be able to see some old friends again, I’d be able to see Li after so many years apart; but this was not to be. I found out that Li could not attend the reunion due to ill-health. I kept in contact with her for a few more months until just before lockdown began; when she sadly lost her battle with the inner demons and took her own life. I wish I could have been there for her but this dammed Chinese Flu prevented me from doing so.