October 20th

Dear Stones,

Apparently, I’ve gone crazy and threatened everyone in school … at least that’s what the new rumor is.

So here’s what’s going on. It’s day three of suspension and, today, they got my grandma to come and babysit. She’s cool, though. She tried to talk to me about you a little bit. She asked a few questions about how I was doing, told me some stories about how she’s lost a lot of friends, which was totally depressing, and then she left to go and make cookies. She says that she misses you, by the way.

Why does everyone want me to talk about you? You were my best friend and you’re gone now. I’m dealing.

Anyway, the really cool thing is that she’s letting me use the computer. I guess Mom and Dad forgot to tell her that I was grounded from the Internet. I went on FB and saw that people are trying to find out what happened at school. Drea’s page is covered with questions and concerns. Her # of friends just hit 400. From 98 to 400 in a couple of weeks—that has to be some kind of record.

I think the thing that’s bothering me the most is that she’s acting like SHE was your best friend. I mean, really? You two met in Grade 8. You and I have been friends since the first day of Grade 3. I know you would say that it’s not a competition, but it’s bothering me that she’s acting like she’s lost her best friend in the whole world when, really, it’s me.

I did have one friend request, though, and it’s so weird. It’s Jake Landry, that hockey guy who sits next to me in English class. We’ve never spoken to each other, and now he wants to be my FB friend?? What’s up with that? I accepted, so I guess we’ll see. Loren also wrote me a message. She wants to know if we can hang out this weekend, so I told her to come over for a sleepover on Saturday. We see each other at school and stuff, but we haven’t really done anything together since … that night. We’re not really “friends on” or “friends off” … we’re just kind of “friends paused,” I guess.

I also checked your page. It’s still there. It’ll probably be there forever. Your profile pic is the one I took of you two summers ago. We must have spent our entire vacation hanging out on that beach. You’re swinging off that Arbutus tree with the ocean in the background, making that stupid monkey face that always made me laugh. Hundreds of people wrote on your page. It’s all good things. How much they miss you; what a nice person you were; how cool you were; how sorry they are; they hope you’re in a better place, etc. … Your last post was a quote from Dr. Seuss: Today was good. Today was fun. Tomorrow is another one. You wrote that two days before …

I think it’s weird that you’re gone but your FB page is still here. And I guess it’s going to stay like that forever. Is that what is going to happen to all of us? We’ll all be long gone, but fragments of us (emails, blogs, texts, tweets, pictures, FB) will remain online like an immortal cyber-existence. And what if it all crashes? Then what will be left of us?

So that’s been my day. I’d ask how yours has been but you’re not here—you’re not here.

Sticks

 

Can’t believe I’m going to say this, but I’m actually missing school. Being home is giving me too much time to think. And think about you. And thinking about you makes me miss you more.

WHY??

Why the fuck would you do that to yourself?

You’re an idiot.

I really didn’t mean that.

No, actually, I kind of did.