I got the call while at self-checkout at a Target in my hometown. I was buying my grandma’s Christmas present, an oversized blanket for watching movies. Dizzy from the frantic holiday energy, I pressed my phone between my ear and shoulder as I scanned the barcode on the blanket.
“I’m so sorry, Caroline. I wanted you to hear this from me.”
“You’re kidding,” I responded lightly, casually, with a slight laugh, in shock. A second later, “What do you mean? What happened?”
“He was in a skiing accident. I just found out.”
“Okay, um yeah, okay.” I stuttered, “Thank you for calling.”
My peripheral darkened. I thought I might pass out. “I think I gotta go, I’ll call you later.”
I left the blanket at checkout, hyperventilating through the parking lot until I reached my car to scream.
***
He was 19 years old, I think, no more than 20. Our friendship was relatively new, so the details that defined each other’s personal history, and even some of our foundations, were still emerging. We were sophomores in college when he died.
Grief defined my early college years. Aching and scathed, I eventually welcomed the relief of not thinking of him, grateful for time passed. Now, it seems to settle and then resurface each winter. I’m reminded of the emotions I felt at the time of his death, formidable and disorienting, and the images and scenes that shelter in the back of my head. Memories of times together, the same stories replayed.
Yet this past December brought a heavier reminiscence I hadn't felt in years, a new realization that he no longer holds immediate relevance in my life. Our connection and similarities have dissipated, stuck in teenage years. He’s suspended in a surprisingly well-fitted tailored suit in the framed picture his parents gave me. Our arms wrapped around each other, baby faces not breaking eye contact. Acceptance coalesced with guilt, my grief feels familiar while distant and outdated.
***
He and I had quickly integrated into the same early college friend group, brought together by proximity and mutual friends, as these early ones typically do, excited and bound by the rebellion of our newfound independence. We would meet up for meals at the dining commons, or spend afternoons in study lounges, or sneak away to a friend’s bedroom at a party to laugh at our own jokes.
We dated for a bit too, one of my first college romances. My heart fluttering, I’d ride my bike to his dorm room as quickly as I could without breaking a sweat. I took long deep exhales before walking to his door to help save face. He would crack my knuckles and I pretended to not like it. He would hide my favorite necklace when I was about to leave, claiming it was now his favorite necklace. Collateral to see me again.
The first thing I heard when I walked into his funeral was his mother crying. She said “thank you for coming” to a guest under a wail I never heard before. I was carried by a volition not my own, like I’d choose to attend my friend’s funeral. He was dead. He felt pain when he died. His young promising life was cut short, and I stood here alive and bodied. This is so fucking stupid, how is this actually fucking happening, I thought, this doesn’t make sense.
His friends stood in a crowd in the back of the room and overflowed to the patio outside, outnumbering the provided seats. My gaze wandered around the room, catching glimpses of my peers’ faces in their hands, tears streaming down cheeks puffy and red. I studied the faces of those I would never have the chance to know their importance in his life, uncles and aunts and friends who were like family. I learned he played the french horn in high school during the service.
The rest of the year, there were moments where I thought I saw him on campus, his strong jaw and domineering physique, walking through a crowd or grabbing a coffee between classes. I would do a double-take, a split second separating hope from reality. What a tease, but who was there to blame? Benches with his name, in loving memory, were built in a community garden and another on campus. I never sat on them.
Like clockwork, friends and I would naturally migrate to an empty room at a party when our social batteries waned and our minds wandered to him. We’d cry and hold each others’ hands and tell stories or new information we learned about his passing, trying to put the pieces together. During a spring break trip, we kept saying he should be here with us. And then we graduated. And we moved out of our college town. And some of us stayed friends and some of us didn’t.
***
My best friends today never met him, neither did my family. I miss a young man, a kid. I’m afraid that will be his lasting memory for me, the terms of his death rather than who he was to me or continues to be for me. His future is defined by the mystery of how he would have impacted my world, and how I would have impacted his. What if we would have drifted apart too?
There might be a year in the future when I forget to grieve for him or text his parents, when I fail in my responsibility to keep his memory alive. I’m coming to terms with this. To me, my sustained grief has served as retribution for the tragedy of his death, how unfair and irrational it was, and his potential that was so cruelly stymied. I feel guilty for the years I didn’t want to think of him at all.
I’m not seeking a resolution or clarity, necessarily. Rather an acceptance of wavering grief, lasting or perhaps not. There wasn’t enough time, was there? Is there ever?
***
I spent a long weekend at a yoga retreat during my junior year of college. On the last day, the teachers led a closing group meditation, with the chance to give a final offering. I wrote him a short note, telling him I love him, placing it in the center of the circle.
The harmonium’s bellows began to expand and contract, playing a steady, airy hiss. In deep concentration, with my eyes closed, legs crossed and spine straight, I felt him. Unequivocally him, without touch or smell, simply a presence. It was bizarre.
What are you doing here? I asked.
You can let me go.
What are you saying? Absolutely not.
You can let me go.
Stop it. You’re being ridiculous.
You can let me go. You can let me go. You can let me go.
The harmonium faded. My eyes blinked open, vision blurred by the beating sun and tears that pooled in the corner of my eye. It was nice to feel him again, even for a moment.
