My best friend from high school died in May. He was my friend before I knew how to be one. We started school together when we were two years old. I have no memories of a time before I knew him. He was the most fearless person I have ever met. Incredibly funny, extremely smart. He and I were always in each other’s daily lives but became close in ninth grade when we became debate partners. We spent several nights a week and most weekends- debate tournament or otherwise- together. I think that all of our peers and most of the adults thought that our relationship was romantic. It was not. Have you ever loved someone too much, relied on them too deeply to risk the relationship for something as normal and complicated as a kiss? It has happened to me twice. The first time was with this man. He and I used to fight, he was the first person I felt safe enough with to offend, the only person whose affection for me I trusted enough to show my grievances. He had just finished his second year of law school when he died. I last spoke to him in March. We were no longer as close as we had been as children. I loved him a lot. He loved me too. He should not have died, there was no reason for his death. He should be at his desk in a law office now, spending the summer auditioning for a full time job. Instead his body is in a box and his spirit and his energy are in heaven or in the universe or nowhere. Things happen that way sometimes. The death was surreal, it hit me harder than I expected.
I thought I was good at grieving. Or, rather, I thought I was used to grief and that it no longer affected me.