I'm not sure how to approach this, but I do know that I'm angry and sad and have broken into tears more times in the last few hours than I have over the course of years. And it's all because after searching for an old friend through Facebook for years in the hopes that he or his sister were on social media, I finally found him. I finally found his page.
And he's dead.
I don't know how, I don't know why, but he's gone. This kid... well, this man, because he was a man when he died--we were pretty close as kids. For a while, he was the only friend I had. My true best friend. The only one I played with, the only one whose house I visited, and the only one who visited my house. He came to all of my birthday parties. His sister was my sister's best friend. We all got along great. He and I would terrorize our sisters, because c'mon, that's what siblings do. He always showed off his latest baseball cards or his Pokemon cards or we played ball in the street. He was the reason I started playing Pokemon in the first place. I got cards just so I could trade with him. I got a GameBoy Color, just so he and I could play together. We told dumb jokes to each other. We laughed and shared our dreams and got picked on.
And now he's gone.
I don't know how long he's been dead. I want to respect his family and not ask, not pry, because we literally haven't spoken in a decade and a half, but... I want to know how long I've lived while he has not. But I need to respect them. I need to respect that his sister probably doesn't even remember me or realize how much his death has impacted me, even after we haven't talked for so long. I need to do that, even when I want to know what happened and why it happened and why I couldn't have stopped it. I keep thinking, I could have been there if I'd searched harder, if I'd found him sooner. I could have stopped this. He might still be here if I'd just...
If I'd only...
If I'd...
But I don't think there was anything I could have done. I'll never know. Maybe that's why I'm so angry. Why my heart and face and chest and entire body hurt so badly right now. Because I'll never know if my presence would have made a difference in his life or not.
My soul hurts.
When we were kids, Shannon was... he was smart. Funny. Always smiling. Taking dares from the other boys at the daycare we were in together, even though they treated him like crap. I never really understood that. Maybe it was just because he was an awesome guy. I always figured he'd become something amazing, you know? He was the type of person who could really change lives. Not just talk about doing it, but actually do something about the world we live in, actually do something to make the lives of those around him better. I figured he'd always become something so profound that the world would just... change for the better because of him.
That goodness has been snuffed out. But... I mean, do I even have a right to feel this way, to be this angry, this hurt, this... lost? Especially after not talking to him or even seeing him for so long? People change... something must have changed. But I don't know what. I almost don't even care. I'm so mad right now... at no one, at everyone, at myself... He might have been dead for five years for all I know. Longer, maybe. And it's just... unfair. I feel like the world should be screaming and mourning and raging all at once over the loss of this man.
I wasn't there, so I didn't see the tears shed, the screaming and mourning and wailing of his family after he died. Their pain and heartache weren't something I witnessed. I didn't witness any of it, and now, everything seems so... so quiet over his absence. No obituary. Nothing. Just... just silence. I keep wondering how anyone could go on after losing someone like him.
Just...
Just love the people you have with you. Reach out to people you cared for or were close to in the past. Because one day, you might stumble across them, but it could be too late. Too late to say everything you wanted to say, too late to tell someone how much they meant to you, what they did to impact your life, how they made you a better person just because you knew them. Too late... too late to even say goodbye.
RIP, Shannon Fox. The world has lost a great light.
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