My dearest Nick. Oh, how I miss you. The past two weeks have been a mixture of crying, sobbing for what almost seems like no reason at all and smiling and laughing at the memory of you. I love you so much, and even after 3 years, I still cannot quite wrap my mind around why you were taken. You lived life so intensely, so lovingly, so freely. You deserved more than your short 16 years.
Truly, you did. And yet, somehow, you lived more in those 16 years than most of us could ever dream of. You spread your heart far and wide, smiling and laughing and making friends everywhere you went. No matter the circumstances. No matter the circumstances, you remained completely, irrevocably you. I can only hope I live nearly as wonderfully and freely throughout the length of time I've been given as you did during your oh so bitter-sweetly short 16 years.
Oh, Nick. I love you so much. Not loved, not past tense. But no, I still do. I absolutely still do. I used to think you were just gone, and the hole in my heart would never be healed. Over the past 3 years though, I've come to realize you are still here. Every day. Every happy moment in my life, every sad moment, the nights I spend crying and the days I spend dancing in the ocean...you are there with me.
We are more than the sum of our parts. Your body may be gone, but your spirit can never be destroyed. Your spirit holds your wonderfully beautiful energy, and that energy can never be destroyed. You remain, after all these years gone from your earthly domain, invincible.
Perhaps the hole in my heart will never be completely healed, but every day my heart is just a little bit warmer knowing you watch over me every day. The nights I walk home lonely and still too afraid, I look up at the stars and breathe in your light. The breeze comforting me is your breath. That light shining down through the city lights comes from your shining eyes and beautiful heart.
Nick, you were birthed from a star. And 3 years ago, you left our earthly world to become a star again. I too, was birthed from a star. One day, I will join you as a beacon of light and hope against that deep velvet fabric. And we can dance together in the universe. And one day, perhaps, billions and billions of years from now, those stars that are us will burn heroically, but our elements, too, will be recycled. Our energy will again become the building blocks another beautiful life.
I love you, Nick. But I miss you so dearly. 3 years feels so unfathomably long. I cannot help but wonder where you'd be today. I still remember quite clearly laughing and joking with you in class. I remember the smiles you would give me in the hallway that would brighten even the darkest of days. And I remember all the loving and sincere help you offered me in basketball, even though it would have been cooler to just hang out with your friends. I remember. I remember.
I was your friend, your loving admirer, your fellow traveler, for 6 years. Now...now you've been gone for half that time. But our journey isn't over. We still, I believe, travel together, and we will always. For I will never forget you. I will hold onto your spirit and your positive energy for the rest of my life. You have guided me through the darkest periods of my life, and I know hold on with conviction to the blessings of strength and light you beam to me every day. I try my best to live my life as freely as you did. I want to spread my heart as far as you did, and I truly hope I am.
I live for you, still. I pray to your light every day. And I am oh so grateful for the 6 physical years I spent with you as a friend. Today, I continue to be grateful for every single day we travel this complex and winding universe together.
The shock of losing you has gone, but I miss you every day. Time does not bring relief, and I remember you in places you have never been. Places your physical body never stepped, but where your soul now flies freely. I do not believe time will heal the hurt, but it has put me at peace. I have reached a sense of peace and happiness with my life I think you would be proud of.
So thank you. Thank you for everything. You taught me so much and continue to teach me all the most important things every day. I love you.
Always. You are finally free, my dear, and one day I will join you in that final freedom, grateful for the time both of us have been given on this beautiful blue dot in the wide universe of stars.
It is 12:00 am, and I am crying because you are gone and because I know you are here and because you didn't get everything your beautiful spirit deserved. But through those tears, above my heavy and hurting heart, I smile because I knew you, because you fly with me, because you guide me, and, most of all, because I loved you and love you still today.
Time does not bring relief; you all have lied
Who told me time would ease me of my pain!
I miss him in the weeping of the rain;
I want him at the shrinking of the tide;
The old snows melt from every mountain-side,
And last year's leaves are smoke in every lane;
But last year's bitter loving must remain
Heaped on my heart, and my old thoughts abide.
There are a hundred places where I fear
To go, --so with his memory they brim.
And entering with relief some quiet place
Where never fell his foot or shone his face
I say, "There is no memory of him here!"
And so stand stricken, so remembering him.
-Edna St. Vincent Millay
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