Never been on the business end of this before. Although we’re reservists and I didn’t know him super well, a real, living, breathing person that I talked to last month isn’t here anymore.

He was a little off, something wasn’t quite right, but he laughed and talked about the future in very real terms (how he was gonna fix his car up; possible reclass options). It never crossed my mind that this was coming.

I didn’t know his first name.

Maybe I should have.

Maybe if we all did, maybe if I talked more to him or texted him between drills (I don’t even text my own close friends & family enough) or bought him lunch or did something else, maybe he’d be here. I don’t know.

Now he’s gone, no funeral, faint memories, just a ripple in spacetime slowly running out of energy and subsiding into the aether.

—

Please, please if you read this right now and need something, or if you remember it next month and need something, tell someone. Tell me. I’ll fly across the country and come get you. I don’t care.

Need money? We can fix it.

Nowhere to live? We can fix it.

Addictions? We can stand by your side. You’ll never be alone.

Sad or angry? We can listen.

Afraid? We’ll take point. We’ve been there too.

Just call someone. You’re not forgotten. You matter, if to no one else then to us - to me.