Mercury and Me

by Jim Hutton

One of the lines from Freddie’s song ‘I Was Born to Love You’ was: ‘It’s so hard to believe this is happening to me, an amazing feeling coming through.’

Another thing he’d often tell me, right up until the night he died, was: ‘I love you.’ And it was never an ‘I love you’ which just rolled off the tongue; he always meant it.

But, in time, Freddie tore them all down.

You can have all the friends in the world around you, yet still feel agonisingly lonely,

I wanted to give Freddie something very special for a very special birthday: a gold wedding ring.

‘Sshh,’ he whispered, ‘my husband’s asleep. Don’t wake him.’

‘I love you very much,’ he said. ‘I know,’ I said. ‘Do you love me?’ he asked. ‘Yes, I love you,’ I said.

Even though thousands of fans around the world loved him without ever having met him, the only person he seemed to want to know really did love him was me.

We said some terrible things to each other in the heat of the moment during arguments like these. We’d both say things we didn’t mean. They could become a battle of who was going to hurt the other most. This time Freddie had the upper hand. Then we made up and lay next to each other on the bed. I was crying. For

the first time since he had told me of his condition Freddie brought up the subject of his death. He asked me a very odd question, the gist of it being: ‘What are you going to do when I die?’ ‘I don’t know,’ I said, still crying. ‘I can’t handle it all.’ ‘Well, how do you think I feel?’ he replied. I looked over and Freddie was crying too.

‘My make-up may be flaking but my smile still stays on.’ That was true. No matter how ill Freddie felt, he never grumbled to anyone or sought sympathy of any kind. It was his battle, no one else’s, and he always wore

a brave face against the ever-increasing odds against him.

It was during that visit that he made the important decision to come off his medication and die. He decided not to let any of us know what he was doing. The fight against his disease was over; he was ready to slip away without any further struggle.

stopped the tiny fly-wheel of the wind-up carriage clock by the bed. I’d given it to Freddie because he told me he’d always wanted one. It read twelve minutes to seven. I’ve never started it again.

Others were taken, yes I know But you were mine, I loved you so. A prayer, a tear till the end of time, For a loving friend I was proud to call mine. To a beautiful life, a sad, sad end, You died as you lived, everyone’s friend.

‘Those were the days of our lives, the bad things in life were so few. Those days are all gone now but one thing’s still true, when I look and I find I still love you.’

Freddie was the greatest love of my life; I know I’ll never love that way again.