The guilty feeling comes from not going to see her when I had a chance to, though of course I wasn’t to know it would be the only real chance I’d have. My brother found me when I was a teenager, and only a few days later, his fiancé bumped into me on the bridge and invited me over. I didn’t go, because I wasn’t a confident teenager (especially socially) and stupidly thought something disastrous would happen, because I’d been told sketchy details about her mental health issues (bipolar) and in my (possible) ignorance, I felt it would overwhelm her if I just turned up like that.
I felt maybe if I got to know my brother better I might feel more comfortable meeting her, but our relationship just broke down rather than progressing. In the end, he was being elusive and was hostile/passive aggressive even when I did get to talk to him.
Thinking back, I wonder if his fiancé had told her she’d seen me but I didn’t want to come. I know a few weeks after this my brother said her health had been bad, so he hadn’t been able to speak to me (I wrote everything I could in my diary at the time). She died several years after this, but I wonder if not going to see her had caused her to have another breakdown of some kind at that time. If she was even told anything of the encounter on the bridge. I’m not sure I’ll ever know, but thinking I might have hurt her that much is painful.
Overall I feel awful that I didn’t just go when I was invited. I do feel she still loved me; my brother said she kept a picture of me as a tiny baby. If I could go back in time knowing everything I do now, I’d be marching my sorry butt down to her house.