quote:
(Iqaluit) Crouched in the darkness of her bedroom closet, choked by the belt she'd looped around her throat, Elisapee could sense her life ebbing away. "My left side, I couldn't feel anything," recalls the Inuit teen in a voice barely above a whisper. Elisapee, fading, knew her mother was just steps away reading the suicide note she'd left behind. She began thinking about how her death would hurt her friends and family.
Then she stood, loosening the noose. She opened the door and walked into the light, into her mother's arms.
"She saw the red marks around my neck," says Elisapee (not her real name). "She said, 'Don't ever scare me like that again.' "
That was 13 months ago. Today Elisapee, a pretty 14-year-old with braces and a shy smile, is a successful Grade 9 student who loves math and writing. She has a part-time job and a full-time grasp on life.
And maybe, just maybe, she's a sign that Nunavut is gaining on its deadliest and most tragic killer.