(10/11) “We made it until her birthday. And that was a big deal. G never said it, but getting there was a big deal. This kid had looked death in the eye at the age of ten. She should have been gone. But she became an adult. And maybe that was our gift. Maybe the whole time, that was our gift. Her birthday wasn’t exactly how we planned. She was too sick to leave the hospital. But I brought a beer to her room. I’m not going to say she drank the whole thing, but we had a ‘cheers.’ And she loved that. The next day she took a really big drop. On Friday I wrote my final update on social media. I said: ‘There’s still zero quit in her, I know it.’ Afterwards one of my best friend’s mom sent me a message. She said: ‘I love you baby boy, but let her go.’ I didn’t take that too well. I was like: ‘What the fuck does that mean?’ But at 8 pm that night I got a call from the doctors, and they said: ‘You should probably come now.’ When I got there G’s eyes were wide open. I leaned over her bed, and said: ‘G, you need to rest. It’s time to stop fighting.’ And she kinda nodded. That night five of my friends came to the hospital to be with me. We sat around G’s bed until 1:30 in the morning, just talking. G wasn’t saying anything. But her eyes were open. So I started to think: ‘Fuck it. She’s going to make it another week.’ Because that’s what G does. She doesn’t quit. I left the room for a minute. Just a minute, to go downstairs and get a little air. But when I came back her room was filled up with doctors and nurses. My friend Elgin grabbed me and said: ‘I’m so sorry.’ And I’m like sorry for what? Sorry for what? Sorry for what? It wasn’t how it was supposed to happen. I was supposed to be there. I was gonna hold her hand. I was gonna tell her ‘I love you. We always said ‘I love you.’ Every night before bed, every drop off, every time we hung up the phone. Always. And I was supposed to say it one last time, but I didn’t. It really fucked me up. Bad, for a long time. But my therapist told me that G would have never died in front of me. She said: ‘That night you gave each other your two greatest acts of love. You told her to stop fighting. And she kept fighting until you left the room.”
