“Why me and not them? », the guilt of the children who survived

One could not say the most trying in this eighth day of the trial of the drama of Millas. On the one hand, there are the heartbreaking words pronounced in a suspended and moved silence by the survivors, the tears swallowed at the bar, the tributes of the families to these deceased teenagers, whose photo is displayed on the big screen, when it is not is not the class photo. So many moments that transform the criminal court of Marseille sometimes into an outlet, sometimes into a place of memory.

But there is also the litany of these same appalling stories, a sort of pile of distress that explodes in the face of the court for eight hours, as if to better remind us that in a handful of seconds, dozens and dozens of people saw their broken life, this December 14, 2017. That day, an accident between a school bus and a TER on a level crossing was going to cost the lives of six schoolchildren, and injure 17 others.

Gauthier is one of them. The slender teenager evokes the accident for the first time in court. “I’m not used to feeling emotions, it’s weird,” sobbed the young man, who refused any outside help, including psychological, despite his condition. “I was really badly affected. For the doctors, I was practically dead. After months of combat and rehabilitation, Gauthier survived, regained the use of his legs, but the scars remain. “After the accident, in progress, at the stroke of 2 p.m., like a PC crashing, Windows shut down. I slept on the table and it was very hard to wake up. I have been out of school for a year. I got my certificate and my baccalaureate, and since then I haven’t done anything. “By his own admission, this tall blond guy explains that he created” a protective bubble “by taking refuge in video games.

“I started to feel guilty for being alive”

“The day of the accident, Thursday at 3 p.m., we were children, he continues, in tears. Next [quand l’accident se produit, N.D.L.R.], me, I became a man, which meant that we grew up too quickly. “I was a girl who lived her life as a quiet young girl, abounds Assia, also a survivor of the accident. I feel like I’ve lost my innocence, my teenage life. I feel like I grew up very quickly. I had to worry about things like my health. At 13, you don’t necessarily think about that. The young girl has problems with concentration, memory and eyesight since the accident, so much so that she has not been able to pursue law studies as she wished.

She, who has also lost her sense of smell, confides, with great emotion, that she has promised herself to go and see her deceased “friends”, once she is back on her feet. “I never succeeded,” she explains in tears. I don’t feel worthy of going to see them knowing that I survived. “And to remember:” In rehabilitation, I began to feel guilty for being alive. Why me and not them? »

“This accident changed my life”

“This accident turned my life upside down,” says Lina. I was 14 at the time of the events. I already thought my life was over. At that time, I survived. But at what cost ? At the cost of long years of depression with suicidal thoughts, at the cost of cognitive and psychological sequelae with which I must live all my life now, headaches that require significant rest periods. I find it unfair to have lived through this and that the others are no longer here. »

Trembling at the helm, Sylvain, a father, relates a conversation he had with Enzo, his surviving son who has just celebrated his birthday. “I recently understood that his scar is a symbol,” he explains. For him, it’s the memory that connects him to his friend Alan [qui est décédé durant l’accident, N.D.L.R.]. Three days ago, since Enzo is of legal age, he asked me: if he could get a tattoo in memory of Alan. »

“I will never mourn my daughter, sighs Stéphane, father of little Ophelia, who died in the accident. I will learn to live with the pain and this one is invisible. We pretend to be. But in our flesh, we have a scar. “Despite the suffering and the emotion, the father of the family addresses the surviving children, after a question from the president: “These children must not feel guilty, he begs them. Somehow, they have nothing to do with it. I want to tell them that if Ophelia is no longer there, it’s fate. This is how. Ophelia is no longer there. She no longer suffers. But they must continue to live in memory of these deceased children. They have to fight until the end. »

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