I killed my father (Anglais)

When I was 15, we had this school training, this training paramedics held. It was a first aid training.
If I had had the choice to say no, I would have just said "No thank you, no thank you, I ain't gonna die like this."
But My mother insisted and I took the training.
It was fun and all, fake blood and bad breath.
They taught us CPR, the Heimlich Maneuver, and basic stuff to prevent someone from bleeding to death.
It was fun and all, laughter and electrocution.
It's fun and all until somebody gets hurt.
I have to admit I am ashamed I do not exactly remember the date, the time, the temperature it was outside, but I do remember it was cold as hell.
I remember the steam on the windows, and I know it was around the 19th of January, because you remember these stuff.
I don't remember how the day went, how I woke up, what classes I was attending that day.
I remember waking up though.
I was a junior in high school and I think I had a chemistry test this day.
I remember crying in class. And I remember my teacher, helpless, trying to figure out what could have possibly gone so wrong that a 15 year-old was crying so much in class.
She was a nice teacher. She had blonde hair and she was barely 23.
I think I had a crush on her, because it was hard for me to imagine a teacher could be attractive (no offense).
She had freckles and a very pale skin and she reminded me of those 18th century "Mademoiselles", who didn't care about the King, the Queen, and the Court.
The kind of girl you imagine wearing a flannel dress and who has got 15 Papillon dogs around her.
She tried to help, me, my tissues scattered all over my lab table, my lab coat collar soaked in salty water.
Salty salty tears.

Thinking about that day doesn't hurt me much. Well, it does, because people reflect a vision of death that is sad. I never thought what happened that day was sad.
I don't think it was sad for me at least. It was sad for my mother, my sisters, my dog and my friends.
It was sad for the newspaper people, and for the priest. For the song we played at the funeral, and for anyone that likes to reflect death as something tragic.
But not for me.

I do realize what I am going to say right now has never been said before, and I also understand that my family members could take offense for telling that story, but it's only life after all, and the ashes always scatter anyway.

There's a song that goes: "I've been trying to live without now. But I miss you sometimes. The more I know, the less I understand, and all the things I thought I'd figured out, I have to learn again."

I think I fully know what happened that morning now. And the more I know, the less I understand what I have done. Or haven't done for that matter.

I don't remember my alarm clock going off. I remember getting up. In the cold and insipid January light. It was very dim outside, and the sun hadn't risen yet. I remember walking down the hallway, trying to aim in the direction of the bathroom, to take my morning shower before going to school.
I only shower in the morning, because it wakes me up. If I shower in the evening, I feel dirty when I wake up (that's a rather trivial information).

I showered. I did shower. I remember the water going down my head, my face and body. Shaking like a frozen leaf, because the water used to take a while to get hot enough.
I remember washing myself.
I remember being clean when it happened.
I was clean. I was so fucking clean.

I walked back to my room to get dressed, a towel wrapped around my hips.

But he never woke up. He never woke up. He wouldn't wake up.
He kept sleeping.
And I can hear my mother in the distance begging him to wake the fuck up. shaking him.
I remember my sister. My sister's face.
My sister always knew.
My mother didn't.
My mother wanted him to wake up. She was shaking yet steady. Yelling at him.
"Wake up! Hey wake up! Wake up, please wake up!"
He never did.

I was 15. I was not ready. I was not ready. My sister came into my room.
I knew what she wanted. I knew what she was going to ask from me.
The thing I had to do.
I had a very practical thing to do. Something any-fucking-one would have done in this kind of situation.
And she looked at me. And I looked back; And we stared at each other for a fragment of time that seemed to be eternity in my poor little 15 year-old eyes.

And she asked me. She said "Julien, we're going to do CPR. Are you ready?"
It was a very simple question that required a very simple answer.
It was three words. Subject, verb, object. SVO.
Three letters.
Three fucking letters.
CPR.
I still don't understand why I refused.
I still refuse to admit I'm responsible.
Or maybe I am.
I am not looking for forgiveness.
Just acknowledgment.
I want someone to stand up for me and say "He was not ready! No one is ready for this kind of thing!"

One, two, three, four, five... thirty.
Universal compression-ventilation ratio (30:2)
And she compressed and ventilated.
She did.
And I was deaf dumb and mute, staring at life escaping the human body. For every breath she took was a breath she gave away.
For every single atom of oxygen she gave him was the purest act of abnegation I had ever witnessed.
For every time her hands compressed his ribs, she was giving all that she had inside of her to bring life back into that body.

The !!param!!edics arrived. Did you know that in London a pizza reaches your home faster than an ambulance?
It's a funny fact.

Paddles. Charge. Clear.
Paddles. Charge. Clear.

He never woke up.

My uncle picked me up after school. He said he had something to tell me. Damn right you have something to tell me.
He was silent. He was shaking. At this very moment I realized that he was as capable as me.
I realized he was as ill-equipped as a 15 year-old kid when it comes to facing death.
That it can take three letters to change your life.
That it's only about compression.
Ventilation.
Just a last breath.
Just a last cough.
Just a last heartbeat.
Just a last

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