Day 9: Somebody you didn't want to let go, but just drifted.
My friend Buddy. This is a no-brainer.
Budz and I met back in eighth grade. He was one of my mom's students - dyslexic. He had this gorgeous singing voice that made me want to shut up everyone else in choir so I could listen. Listening to him sing Brahms' Lullaby gave me chills.
I think I've mentioned before about how I had my core group of friends during high school. Two of them were guys - my friend J down in Texas. The other was Buddy. My parents liked him. He'd come over after school for Mom and I to help him with his homework. After a couple years, he even started spending the night at our house.
When my brother Trav was in a coma in the hospital following a car accident, Buddy told me to page him every day with any updates, no matter what. And to page him if I needed anything. He was at the hospital visiting Trav every day. He'd scrape one of his car keys on the soul of little brother's foot, point at Trav's toes curling, and say "Look, I think they curled even more!" He came out, spent the night, and brought his guitar one of the nights both my parents spent at the hospital, and played and sang for me. We even sang together - "Hotel California" if I remember correctly - as his last ditch effort to get my mind off the fact that my brother was in PICU in a coma and had been for days.
We both fell into the underage party scene during what would have been our junior and senior years of high school. One party comes to mind in particular. I had had way too much to drink, ran for the bathroom, started puking, and passed out with my head in the toilet. Budz came to check on me, saw me there, carried me to a bedroom, and sat there all night holding me just to make sure no one tried to mess with me while I was unconscious.
We lost track of each other around the time I hit 18. He'd pop up at random every six months or so, and it would be like we'd just seen each other the other day. And then, a four year silence.
When I was 23, he called me out of the blue one day, said he needed to talk to me. I lit a cigarette and settled in for a good long chat. What I heard made me feel both extremely upset and extremely flattered at the same time, if you can imagine that dichotomy.
Budz had had some issues with depression. He finally couldn't handle it any more. He began a suicide attempt - I didn't inquire as to the method, but judging from what he said, it was either cuts or pills - and then stopped and called 911. Why?
"I'd done it, I was ready to be done with all this shit. Life sucked. And then, all of a sudden, I saw you there, standing in front of me, telling me if I did this you were gonna be so pissed you'd kick my ass. It was so clear - like you were actually there."
He went on to tell me that he had a "thing" for me, and to inquire if I would want to go out on a date sometime. He's a friend, a good one. I had to tell him the truth, that I was in love with Jeremy, couldn't date anyone else, didn't want to go on a date out of friendship and sympathy's sake and hurt him worse in the long run. He accepted it well, but told me, "you know no matter what, you'll always be my girl, my little sweetheart, right?"
Coming from anyone else, I would have either verbally or physically laid them out for calling me "little sweetheart." But Budz...there was no condescension present. It's just how he talks. I agreed. I'll always love him, though in a big brother way. And I miss him.
He turned up again a few months later, after Jeremy and I had been together for three months, and about two weeks after I'd found out I was pregnant with Matthew. He stopped by the house and visited, and then we went out for coffee the next day. After that....
I've seen him a few times, all when he worked at Subway.
I miss him. He was my friend at a time when I was massively insecure and didn't have very many friends. He was my adopted big brother. We used to tell people we were twins born eleven months apart. He was always there for me, no matter what kind of existential bullshit teenage crap ego drama I was going through.
Buddy, I know you're not reading this. But I still love you. You're my big brother, and you always will be.
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