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now the old fella’s dead
me nephew, too – her brother
you’ve got a bit of a look of him, actually
has she said? I guess she wouldn’t
I dunno if I should tell you, really
but I guess you’ll find out sooner or later
he wasn’t a very happy kid
& it kept on getting worse as he got older
needed constant looking after, cheering up
they had to send him to the hospital in the end
but that wasn’t no good either
& then when they sent him home she had to look after him
Annie was like that, always giving things up for other people
helping out
it got so’s she was the only one he’d talk to , come out to see even
I think he got violent with her sometimes, but she never said
knew that if she let on he’d go back in there
only this time they wouldn’t let him out
so she put up with it
It must have been years
let’s see – at least three years, maybe more
and then he did it

– Did what?
– killed himself
oh, nobody ever proved it wasn’t an accident
but there was lots of pills in his stomach when they found him
maybe he’d mistaken the dose
he was on pills
& Annie was good at making sure he took them
& hiding them away afterwards
the funny thing was, there was nothing missing from the bottles
he must have got the stuff from somewhere else
it was a shame she had to find him
I guess that was one of the worst things about it
she took it pretty hard