You taught me how to live.

A few years ago I stumbled into an after-school club my mom urged me to join. She thought I needed the connection with kids my age to keep me sane. Most days were spent hiding in my room too much, I admit. But I had always struggled to understand how to make friends, or better said: how to keep them. There always comes a situation where I misunderstand them. Those friends say something other than what they mean, and I'm no hound sniffing for a rabbit and I miss that cue to be a "good friend". So they conclude, that I must be a bad one, no matter how dear they really are to me. I suppose I don't deal well with those misunderstandings. I don't deal well with most things. It's too easy for me to be overwhelmed and no one ever got that, not even my mom.

But so I wandered into this room, after having heard enough lectures about loneliness and how it kills, though I never really understood what my mom meant by that.

All school clubs look the same from the outside, some kids enthusiastically yapping about some topic and using it as an excuse to meet new people. This one too.

You were quiet, though a little fidgety. You didn't open your mouth every chance you got and still, I felt like there was something loud within you. Your eyes seemed like they were screaming more than I had seen in anyone's. Which strangely drew me to you. It felt connecting like I understood you without speaking a word to you. I never thought someone's own thoughts, though I could not hear them, would comfort me. And so we sat in silence, adding little to the conversation. Nearing the end we greeted each other, both in our own unique ways without being labelled weird with the use of a disgusted expression by the other. Still, old habits die hard, and developing my own is a challenge of its own. So In true small-talk fashion, I asked what your next class is, and you returned the question out of fear of being impolite. "You’ve got this", you said after I mentioned my exam later. Normally, I'd assume this sentence was said out of shallow politeness, but your tone was sincere. Something about you was different. Yet so so familiar.

A simple hello at the next club gathering turned into an exchange of interests, which quickly turned into spending those meetings drawing our favourite characters from TV shows for each other. Passing notes to not be disruptive and giggling to ourselves when one of us whispers a quote only we know. Not all days though, my social battery drains pretty fast and I suppose I freeze up. No one notices when I'm more silent than usual, but you do. On those days you slipped me a note "Hey, you good?". And, often I didn't know how to respond to that. I wasn't in tune with my feelings at all, but you didn't force me to answer. Instead, you patiently awaited a response, and when one didn't come you'd slip me a note saying "You’ve got this". A comfort that I felt was missing far too often, but I hadn't known that until just then. Maybe it was my mom not thinking of saying it when forcing me to socialise, maybe it was the judgement I got from everyone around me, but I felt I needed to hear that. And I think you felt that too. From there on every chance you got, you would say it to me, and I'd say it in return. A comforting reminder of our familiarity.

Time flew by and I learned more and more about you while we spent time at my house sitting in my room. My mom thought we were doing nothing, but to me, we were being alive. Talking for hours on end, taking turns rambling on about our current interest or what student annoyed us that day. You always talked about life in a way no one else did. When you saw beauty your heart controlled your speech and you cited the most touching poetry to me. You cherished it as if it was your last chance to see it. But in turn, when you were affected by the sickening parts of life, your words fell sick too. I felt your heaviness, and I wish you wouldn't have felt it was such a burden. You always felt so deeply, I didn't think of seeing the world in this way before I met you. I learnt to listen to the trees and to appreciate the laughter thanks to you. I learnt what heavy tears mean and I learnt to listen to their meanings. But I wished I had learnt more. You are a strong soul, carrying pain and yet seeing the light in any situation. I trust you with my life. I didn't know I could feel that.

I wish this monologue was held at your wedding, with champagne in hand and a meaningful look in your eyes. I wish this monologue would be held on your birthday, a celebration of all the years to come. Or better in that old room, where we both loved for the first time.

This attempt at a monologue as good as the ones you held is no use for those events. They will never come.

Today, I stand before your grave, my friend. Your tears were too heavy to hold, the light inside you too light to bear. You shone too brightly and you sunk too deep. If I knew the extremes would take you, I would have listened to your poems differently. Your citations of sufferance would have struck me deeper. I thought I knew them from the inside out. I was far, far too naive to understand what you meant behind the words you said. I believed you had it under control. I trusted your resilience was an undefeatable force. But I also believed, our future would come and I would have your hand to hold. Maybe you needed mine to hold, maybe I spoke too little of my admiration for you. Maybe I was not the only one who needed to hear a reminder of our connection and its meaning.

Do I dwell on the past too much? Do I see a heightened importance of little things when there is none?

Have I learnt this from you?

If anything at all, I hope I have. I owe you my ability to breathe air and feel it passing through my lungs. I owe you my life as it is today, in every sense of it. So I hope I carry your warmth with me for all days to come. I will hold all that was too heavy to bear for you. I can't let the time spent by your side be forgotten, I need to live as if you are still with me. And friend, I hope you are with me. I hope you live through me and experience life by my side. I will live for both of us. I will carry our sorrow and still smile at the sun as if it were you. I hope you will feel through me, I cannot let you forget what living feels like.

Because I have something to say to you when we meet again, and I hope for you to feel it too.

I love you.