three years to the day since you left us unexpectedly, and i still think about you all the time. we weren't even that close anymore, but the day i found out you died was the worst day of my life. it was the thirteenth of february, but i didn't sleep at all that week, so it was also valentine's day and the day after that. (and tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow. you'd appreciate that reference, i think.)
i don't celebrate valentine's day anymore. i can't. it will always be a blur of tears and a hot oven at my back and the phone ringing off the hook and my friend's hand on my shoulder and the taste of shitty beer and the feeling of surprise, over and over, every moment that i remembered again that you were gone. like plunging into a frozen lake. the shock of it. the pain of it. i'm shivering even now.
i guess if you had to die young, february was the time to do it. but i wish you hadn't. i know you didn't mean to. but i wish you hadn't.
