Today I woke up thinking that it would have been like any other day. I would have carried on my normal routines, with my normal worries, and regular activities. When I woke up today, I had no idea that I was never going to see you again.

Oh, how ignorant I was.

The thought had never even crossed my mind. How could it have been? You were always around, always up to something. 

It’s weird, isn’t it? You hear of these kinds of things happening all the time. You see the details plastered all over the news, and it never affects you. After that, you never think twice about it. That newscast was merely a blimp on your radar, never to be thought of again.

But then one day, you know who they’re talking about. 

That blimp on your radar becomes a full fledged missile heading your way, and there’s no avoiding it. It becomes all you can think about. 

How could this happen? Someone I actually know? Someone I see daily? This can’t be real. Then it begins to sink in. Never again will you see this person anymore. No more memories will be made. Suddenly your last encounter with that person goes from being nothing special in particular to being one of your most important memories. 

This is where I am right now.

My final memory of you will be looking back as a car is driving a way, watching you stand on the corner of the street waiting for someone to pick you up. There I was, completely unaware that this would be the last time I would be able to look you in the eyes. 

The night you disappeared, you called me multiple times but I was too “busy” to answer.  When we spoke later that night, you had wanted to hang out. You told me what you were going to do and I just brushed you off like it was no big deal. 

I should have invited you to hang out with us. Maybe you would have watched the game with us and not have done whatever you were doing. Maybe you would have still been here.

I’ll never see you showing up to my house anymore. I’ll never get to hear about your experiences that week or the random facts you had stored. You were never someone who could be forgotten, and you made sure of that on the regular. I’ll even miss when you started talking TOO much, to the point of bragging. That was always you, but that’s what made you great. 

Now as I sit and think about it, it still remains surreal. We were never best friends, but I can still be proud to say that I could call you my friend and no matter what, losing a friend hurts. For you, I hope there is an afterlife. I hope your early death was not pointless. I need to find solace in the fact that even though your end was a cruel one, you’re in a much better place now. Please, rest in peace.