For Apollo, Who Shone Brighter Than the Sun

I have a body wash in my bathroom that isn't made anymore. Imperial Leather Foamburst with sea kelp and birch bark. I came SO close to throwing it out today when I cleaned the bathroom shelf, because it's really not usable anymore - it's totally lost its pressure, and I can barely eke out the tiniest bit. Certainly I can't get enough to wash with it anymore. I couldn't throw it, though, because every now and then I squirt a teensy bit onto my finger, and inhale, and you're there with me. That's one of the things that I remember the best about you. The way you always smelled like the ocean.

I have a redcurrant lipsalve, that I bought back in 2001, and I can't throw that away either. I certainly wouldn't use it - can you imagine the bacteria it must have picked up after fourteen years? - but sometimes I open it and smell it and immediately think, "Ah, Jay." If you were watching, you would be able to see the tension melt out of my body with the first inhalation. You didn't wear redcurrant lipsalve - that I'm aware of, anyway *laughs* - but I wore it, back in the days of Batchwood and birthday parties and the bluest eyes in the world staring at me from across a darkened room.

God, I miss you.

I sometimes called you The SBD. People wondered what that stood for; assumed it was something dirty. I let them, because it was easier than explaining how a therapist of mine had once tried to teach me to meditate on the image of a blue diamond, spinning in my mind, any time I felt out of control - and how the diamond image had always failed, because every time I tried to think of a blue diamond I could only think of your gaze.

The technique worked, even if I could never get the right image. YOU were my spinning blue diamond. You kept me calm. You kept me sane. You kept me alive, during the worst times. You saved my life more times than I can count, and I would have given up everything I had if I could have done the same for you.

I talk to the dead. Sometimes the dead talk back. That's one of my bigger secrets, one that I don't hide, exactly, but I don't discuss openly with many people either. And I find it both comforting and heartbreaking that you have never once been here to talk to. I'm so glad that you moved on quickly - so many don't, you know - and I have faith that wherever you are is exactly where you need to be, doing exactly what you need to do. Yet...I miss you. That's all. I wish you were here.

Though maybe not tonight. I probably wouldn't want to face your reaction to the box of mozzarella sticks, half-bag of curly fries, or four shots of Aftershock over ice that I had for dinner. That kind of shit is best kept to myself, not shared with beautiful boys who I want to have good opinions of me. :)

Hey, I never claimed that lack of vanity was one of my virtues.

In another two months, it'll have been a year, and some days I still can't wrap my head around it. My emotions are complex and often irrational. I don't understand how someone like me, who's been dying for half my life, who's been caught and thrown back by Death SEVEN TIMES so far, is still occupying territory on this side of the veil, and someone like you, who I never even knew to have a cold, could just up and die like that. Six weeks. I checked my Facebook messages for the one I sent you the day after I started dreaming and worrying about you, and it was six weeks - almost to the day - between me knowing something was wrong, and you dying. How can a healthy, active person, a person who's dedicated his entire existence to nourishing physical and mental health in himself and others, a person who's barely been sick a day in his life, go from healthy to dead in six weeks? It doesn't make sense to me. It's not logical. I should be old enough and experienced enough to know by now that the universe doesn't always run on logic - and most of the time, I do. But all my practicality goes out the window where you're concerned.

The alcohol is wearing off - about bloody time, it's nearly 6am - and I can't remember if there was a point to this letter. Maybe it was just to tell you I love you. Always have, always will. I've loved you every day of my life since I was twelve years old, and I'll love you every day of the rest of it.