Dear Justin

Can you believe that it's already been seven years already? Well, I'm sure you can. You're the one that's gone, after all.

Seven years.

So much has changed. Yet today will always be the same.

I don't think there will ever be an April 1st that I wake up with this feeling of dread. I'll always realize that I've made it through another year when you were taken away far too early. There wont ever be a morning that I don't ever wake up wishing that I could just tell you one last time how much you mean to me. There will never be a morning that I won't wonder what you would have been doing today.

Seven years and everything has changed.

Sometimes I think that maybe you were the glue that held so many of us together. After you left, so many of us drifted apart. I can't even remember the last time I talked to, let alone saw, so many of those friends. We had plans to be friends forever. But maybe that's just how life works. We all drifted apart. I would like to think that would have never happened with us. All of those plans we made and none of it ever actually worked out. I don't know if that's just growing up or growing apart. But we would never have grown apart, right?

Seven years and nothing is really all that different.

I still deal with the same problems that you would spend so many nights talking me through. I guess I've gotten better at dealing. Or hiding it. That really hasn't changed at all. All those late night phone calls and cigarettes and you would call me out on my bullshit when I needed it most. You always had that uncanny ability to look through the facade I put up every day. I have a couple other people that do that, too, now. I guess I'm still not that good at acting okay. Or maybe there are always going to be people like you that can read me.

I'm going to try to make it through the day without having a complete breakdown, but I don't think I can promise you that. I know that you were all about living life for the moment, being happy, and filling the world with laughter and joy. I should try to do the same. But I can't bring myself to do it. Today will always be the day I struggle to get out of bed and face the world that doesn't know what happened. Today will always be the day that I got the worst phone call of my life. Today will always be the day that we never made it to dinner. Today will always be that changed everything.

Seven years.

I miss you. I love you. I will never forget you. You will always be in my heart, Justin, and that is one thing that will never change. No matter how many years go by.