I just wanted to write about her. It's hard to talk about it because to everyone else it was a long time ago. 6 years. How is that possible? I feel disconnected because her father is gone too. We talked all of the time and somehow, even if he was in his drunken state, he remembered what it was like to be at the hospital and he told me stories about her as a little girl. Most people don't like hospitals because they don't want to remember their loved one that way. I try to remember though. I don't want to forget. She needed me and I love that I was there for her. I can't imagine how scared she was and to know that there was someone there had to have helped. We got into a fight once because she wanted me to help her end it. I told her mother to leave the room and I yelled at her telling her that we were all there to help her get better and that she couldn't just give up like that. Looking back, I wonder if I should've fought with her. She was tired. I was selfish and I couldn't handle the idea of losing her. Maybe "God" knew that. I wasn't there when she died. I left my cell phone in the car. The last part of her body I touched was her toe. I told her I'd see her in the morning and squeezed it. When I got there in the morning, she was gone...and the family was gone. All I could say was "I'm sorry" over and over again. I cried and the nurse ran to me. I fell to the floor and it felt like something physically ripped from my body. The nurse finally helped me up and told me I should say good-bye. I went into the curtained area. She pulled them around me so no one could see. I remember standing there. She was bald and she had a pretty head. She still had the tubes in her nose. I don't know why. She was gone and white and she wasn't herself. I stood there for about 5 minutes and then finally understood that this was just a body. I felt completely alone. I went to my sister's apt and laid on the cement by the door for what seemed like hours. No one was home. I didn't have anything to say. I think I talked to some people on the phone. Thing is, no one said the right thing. I always felt so guilty because I wasn't there when she actually died. I went home and crawled in with my boyfriend because that was all I wanted to do that night. Last year, a friend of mine told me that maybe that was ok. Maybe "God" knew I couldn't handle it and that my purpose was to make sure the people who mattered the most were there. I remember calling Sarah and telling her not to wait until the weekend. She needed to come "now." She did. She was there. They'd been friends since they were little girls and I would've hated it if she hadn't been there. Carrie and I spent the last weekend she had before she went into the hospital at my apt in Lawrence. We went to a KU basketball game, her favorite. We went to a dinner party. We sat in the parking lot before we went into the restaurant, and for the first time, told me she was scared. Finally, we went in. We all laughed and ate and drank...and at the end of the night, she told me that for a little while she forgot she was sick.

I think about her. I don't mention it much because for some reason, I feel that because she's dead and just not living somewhere else--people just think you're unable to let things go and they question the reasons you have for bringing it up. I wasn't her mom, her dad or her brother. I was her friend. She was a certain kind of friend to me though...I hate that. When people asked how I was, the way I tried to explain what it felt like was to compare my life to a set table. It has legs that hold it up and it has all the plates and glasses and such to make it so pretty. She was a leg and when it was gone, everything just shifted. I still feel that way. I wish I could explain it better...there are just people in my life that could've been taken that wouldn't have shaken me as much. That's awful. I needed her and I still do. I find myself in situations practically every day where I need her advice. I'm not glorifying her because she's gone. I'm not. I've felt this way since I met her. There are just some people you watch. There are people that you really listen to. People that you really learn from and strive to be like. I remember her coming to visit me at whatever apt I lived in and thinking that my day was spent the best way possible because she was there. She made me feel stronger. Have you ever met someone and felt that if they were by your side you could do anything? When we lived together that summer...she pulled me out of an emotional abyss where I thought I'd never be found. This blog is long and it rambles and it is just thought after thought...and it's here because it's May. And March to May is hard. And I hope people have forgotten this blog because I posted it for me. But if someone happens to read it, good. You should know that someone out there loves you like this. That you'll be missed by someone and that however insignificant you feel your life might be...someone might be thinking so much more about you while you're putting rollers in your hair, tying your shoes, giving yourself a home pedicure, making your own salad dressing, putting on your make up, ordering a beer, singing to a song on the radio, watching a movie or giving them advice that they don't want to hear.