Rafael:4/9/94-8/13/2011

Last month on this 13 of August i lost someone i loved, Rafael, he was my god brother and he was someone i cared for deeply. On that saturday when i gave him one last hug, i never for one second thought that he would never hug me again. That saturday when his sister called me to tell me that someone i had watched grow-up, someone who i had known my entire life , was gone in the closing of an eye, i was suspended in disbelief. i got to the hospital and still wearing my uniform from the event we had been at, my in beige and black everyone else in black and yellow i was confused, the bees were buzzing, i kept seeing bees. in all my young life i had never lost anyone i talked too on an almost daily basis. I had never lost a grandparent or a relative or anything i was really attached too. When ralfie died i cried till my eyes could produce no more tears. that night when i got home i listened to adele and yann tiersan and let the sorrow take me and i cried hard, i knew i had to go back to the place he died in the morning, but i didn't want to believe. it was soo shocking. i had said goodbye to him naught but 20 min before he died i saw him as he fell onto the ground and i saw when they took him away. but i wish i hadn't. i wish he was still here and that he would make me laugh. i wish that he hadn't died and that my godparents would be happy again. i wish he was here to make his sister go crazy and then make her laugh. i wish he was here to txt me and drive me crazy with his repetitive txts. i wish that he wasn't six feet under and that he wasn't buried. threeweeks ago tues was the viewing and i kid you, dear reader, 1500 people showed up, that we know off. The church (that is St. Thomas the Apostle Church) yes i'm catholic, was up to its neck in Rafael's friends and family. As i sat there behind my godparents and my best friend Brenda (his sister) i cried, all week i had held in my tears for fear of making them- my god parents and Brenda- cry, but tues i let go, no matter how much i tried the tears fell and they wouldnt stop falling. people around me were also crying and im pretty sure that everyone wasn't as distraught as i was, but you could see how Ralf with his charasmatic and pushy way had come to be completly loved in the community. It was touching, moving and so very comforting that everyone could give testimony as to how beautiful ralf had been. As a person. as a friend. and as a family member. I tried to see him there, as he lay in his navy blue and silver coffin, but i coulnd't he didin't look the same. the ralf i knew almost always smiled. Even when he was upset he always found a way to turn it into a joke and smile. and when i saw him lying there in the semblance of sleep i cried the hardest i coudn't believe who i was looking at, why i was there and for whom i was crying. nothing made sense and it still doesn't. Ladies and gentlemen i am a coward for i did not wish to be present at the funeral i went to stand over by a tree as they lowered my sweet godbrother to the earth and i still cried, there under the tree, i wanted to hug my parents and tell them that i loved them, but they were faraway so i hugged myself. i saw the lid of the coffin shine and thats the last time i will ever see him. now only memories bittersweet memories remian. today is his one month anniversary. and today i miss him more than i did yesterday, sometimes i forget whats happened but i will see something that will remind me of him, like a funnny cat picture, i'll get excited and want to show him and then remember that no one will laugh , for ralfie isn't there anymore.