anastasia

William Atchison's suicide note

(My best attempt at transcribing it)

maybe you think you have nothing else in your life, so you may as well take others down with you. i promise you, you’re wrong. when you’ve destroyed other’s lives and wrecked your own, you discover very quickly that you took a lot of good things for granted. you will definitely miss those things. yes, you will lose every material thing you care about. you will lose freedom, and will spend the rest of your life following other people’s orders. (you think you’re already doing that now? trust me, it can get much worse.) i’m sure you expect that. what you don’t expect is missing other things. one of those things is self-respect. another is innocence. you will miss being innocent. you will miss being able to look at yourself in a mirror and see a person, someone who has rights, someone who deserves something. you will miss having a soul. that is what you truly give up.

there is no coming back from this. it will never, ever go away. it’s there every time you look in the mirror, every time you think you can enjoy yourself. you will become a thousand times worse than anyone you claim to despise. some people are jerks? you are a bigger one. some are losers? you live off tax money. do others lack honor? you hurt a bunch of children. that will be your legacy, and it will be the best you can hope for.

if you hold on, you’re going to be okay. i promise you, the life you want is out there for you.”

— barry loukaitis