There's a video getting about on Snapchat that's "classic Whitey", his dad reckons.

"He's catching flies upside down on the couch," Tim White recalls with a small smile.

That's how this grieving father likes to remember his wild and wonderful son.

A kid "who never shut up", who was easy to be around, who loved a laugh, who had plenty of mates, who was mad on motorbikes ... a proud new dad himself who could turn his hand to anything mechanical.

William David White - "Buffalo Bill" as his friends fondly called him.

Bill, 26, "whose demons got the best of him".

Bill, who took his life on January 5, 2020.

Tim is sitting hunched in a quiet corner of a cafe at Lavington in his farm boots, jeans and workshirt with a battered Akubra beside him.

He's drinking coffee, strong and black; he's uncomfortable but determined to talk about this, the unspeakable grief of losing a child to suicide.

The grief is etched into his craggy, weather-beaten face and reflected in piercing blue eyes he passed on to his beloved son.

"We were going to do so much this year," Tim offers.

"He'd just finished rebuilding his bike (a Yamaha YZ125); it was in a million bits and a mate in Wodonga helped him put it back together.

"We'd talked about doing the Hooligans Speedway, which he rode in last year, and he was organising footy tipping on Facebook.

"He had a lot to live for and a 10-month-old daughter - if that's not enough, well ..."

But, Tim concedes, those closest to Bill knew he had battled with mental health for years.

Behind the popular lad who was the life of the party, who loved a yarn and a drink, and who was always there for his mates, was a young man struggling with depression and thoughts of suicide.

Bill had been in counselling since he was 12, he first tried to take his life at 13 and then took an overdose of pills at 18.

He found it hard to sleep and smoked pot.

"He'd go on anti-depressants and they would work but they didn't agree with him - he said he couldn't be himself," Tim explains.

Bill was "trying to work it out".

"But he was trying to fix stuff we couldn't help him with," Tim admits.

"His body ached, he was tired all the time, and he would go to the health food shop to find something to help his depression and stimulate his appetite."

Often he would simply say, "I'm over it".

Tim spent hours on the phone to Bill, having long chats about everything, anything and nothing, trying to help his son see a way through.

He recalls one particular day he headed out on a 20-kilometre horse ride with a mate and talked to Bill on the phone for kilometre after kilometre.

"By the end of it my mate was crying," Tim says sadly.

On another occasion Tim remembers telling Bill sometimes you just need to let things work themselves out.

"He didn't say much to that - he had no reply to it really because he didn't have the answers," Tim says.

"Obviously he didn't get the answers he needed."

The last time Tim saw his son alive, things had been volatile.

Earlier in the day, Bill was chirpy - "we rang my daughter Alice for her birthday and he had a chat with her," Tim says.

Tim and his partner Lorna Wiliams had offered to look after baby Montanna for Bill and his girlfriend Kayla Portors, whose mother had been rushed to hospital in Melbourne.

Somewhere in the space between, something "snapped" in Bill.

"He came back to our place at 5pm really agitated and wanted to take Montanna - we thought it's just Bill being cranky and going off his head a bit," Tim recalls.

"We convinced him to leave Montanna with us and he roared off in his ute."

Bill's parting words to Tim and Lorna were: "I'm empty".

A local resident discovered the ute on the edge of the Burrumbuttock-Howlong Road later that Sunday night.

Tim had to identify his son at the scene and start the anguished task of contacting family and friends.

Bill's mates wept when they heard the news.

Bill, the "mate who would be there for you 'til the end", in the end felt he had nowhere to turn.

The funeral service for The Buffalo was held on January 23, 2020 at the Wirraminna Nature Park, Burrumbuttock.

Friends and family were asked to contribute to a Memory Box for Montanna, now 14 months old and the spitting image of her father.

Letters, a recipe for Bill's favourite slice, alcohol in a stubby holder, and precious photos were lovingly placed in the box that day.

"You could not have asked for anything more special for Montanna," partner Kayla Portors says.

"When she is old enough to ask and to know, she will be able to see, touch and feel the love."

Montanna is the "heart and soul" of Bill, Kayla says.

"Everything is her dad - she's a daredevil with no fear who loves climbing up on the couch and leaping off into the bean bag."

Looking into those bright blue eyes every day brings a bittersweet pain.

"Some people have said unkind things, like that Bill was selfish for doing what he did but I don't see it that way," Kayla says.

"I see a dad who loved his daughter with all his heart ... he was just in so much pain.

"It's so important to put it out there and for people to understand that.

"Watching someone you love go through it, rips your heart out."

In lieu of flowers at the funeral, the family asked mourners to make a donation to Survivors of Suicide and Friends, organisers of the annual Albury-Wodonga Winter Solstice event.

Tim says everyone in Bill's circle is struggling.

They lean heavily on each other for support on the tougher days and to share cherished memories of their Brother Buffalo.

Bill's Facebook account is still active - friends post pictures, reminisce and connect over music, memories and important dates like Montanna's first birthday.

"I'm 1 today Daddy!" reads a heartbreaking reminder on March 18.

Another, heartbreaking post on March 14, says: You were supposed to be here today Billy. You live on through your daughter's beautiful eyes. We miss you so very much."

There is a close-knit Snapchat network and For the Buffalo Facebook event where a group planned to walk at the this year's Beechworth to Bright suicide prevention walk, cancelled due to COVID-19 restrictions.

Still they plan to gather later in the year around a campfire wearing the black T-shirts made "in honour of our friend Billy White".

Some days Tim can feel himself buckling under the weight of this grief.

"You think coronavirus is bad - suicide is a plague," he says shaking his head.

On the darkest days, he finds solace in those disarmingly ordinary videos of his son snoring on the couch.

And in the fitting words of those who knew and loved Bill best:

Roam free Buffalo.

Ride high, wild and free.