To F-----

So, what am I suppose to do now? You're gone. It's been what---four, almost five years now? You left one week before my birthday. Remember? Of course you don't. You no longer have a memory. It is gone, along with you. But it's not the first time you left. Remember? It was a long time ago. We had our chat about it in the car ride up to your place in the mountains. I wept rivers that night while you squeezed the steering wheel and took long-drawn puffs from your Peter Stuyvesant brand cigarette. You weren't in front of a firing squad, just me. It was time to confess your sins, but you remained quiet. Stoic? Perhaps, but I don't give you that much credit. You just wanted to be a man about it. I spoke of you and her---how you both had your problems and how the two of you didn't mix well. I imagined it must have been like olive oil and water in a carafe. Remember? I certainly do. I can't forget, especially the sight of you---stretched out in your dining room/kitchen area with the hardwood-panel ceiling. Were you comfortable on that makeshift bed? You looked gnarled, like a branch of driftwood. I went to touch you, try and hug you, but people told me not to. I did not realize you had bleeding sores on your back. I knew our time together was limited, but did you have to go while I was taking the Pullman bus ride up north? I heard you left. You smoked your last five cigarettes, then departed. I could not accompany you on that skybound trip. Perhaps I will someday, but that day, you had to travel alone. I will miss you terribly. I do miss you. I regret all the days and moments over those six years we didn't speak and how we will never have that lost time back again to bond. I love you. I will carry on your legacy. But all that remains of you now are a few faded photographs. Fortunately, I still have the video that I took of you in better times. At least I can hear your voice---cursing and swearing like a drunken sailor and telling me to check out the asses of the girls passing by. Thanks for calling me a "flying cucumber" and especially a "lousy cocksucker," though I always had to correct you and assert that I was actually a very good "pussy-licker." Thanks for making me laugh and for the advice I will never use. I wish we had more time to talk. Just a few more words before you left. At least we had a chance to forgive each other. You are still alive to me, even if you are not.

~Andrew K.