A/N: I am a loyal Chris Benoit fan, and I decided that it was past due for me to write him a tribute. So this one's for you, Chris. May you rest in peace. This is a song-fic to the song "My Old Friend" by Tim McGraw. This fic is told from Chris Jericho's POV. Please R&R, but no Benoit bashing, please.
My Old Friend
My old friend, I recall.
The times we had, hangin' on my wall.
I wouldn't trade them for gold.
'Cause they laugh and they cry me.
They somehow sanctify me.
They're woven in the stories I have told.
And tell again.
"Chris is dead."
With that one sentence, my whole world crumbled into dust around me. I couldn't breathe. The hotel room spun. I felt like I was falling.
"Chris? Chris who?" I asked, my mind too numb to comprehend what Dean Malenko had just told me.
"Benoit. Benoit is dead." Dean said again, his voice choking up with sobs. "The whole family is dead."
And then it finally sunk in. My best friend, the man who I had known and trusted for years, was gone. My legs gave out and I fell to the floor, still clutching the phone to my ear. My whole body began to shake, and I rasped into the phone, "Dean, I'm going to have to call you back." I hit the end button on the cell phone and threw it across the room. It shattered against the opposite wall, but I was beyond caring. I burst into heavy, uncontrollable sobs and punched the floor until my knuckles were raw and bleeding.
Benoit was gone, and I never even got to say good-bye.
My old friend, I apologize.
For the years that have passed since the last time you and I.
Dusted off those memories.
But the running and the races.
The people and the places.
There's always somewhere else I had to be.
Time gets slim, my old friend.
The last time I had spoken to Benoit had been about two weeks ago. He'd called me telling me that he needed to talk to me about something important, but I had somewhere else that I needed to be so I told him that I would call him back later and we could talk. But I got caught up in what I was doing and forgot to call him. That was the last time I spoke to my best friend.
I lay curled in a ball on the floor of the hotel room, staring off into nothing. After the devastating news given to me by Dean, I found myself wondering what it was that Benoit had wanted to talk to me about. He had sounded slightly desperate, but I had been so preoccupied that I had brushed it off.
Right before I hung up with him, he told me, "I love you, Chris."
I was a little surprised, because Benoit never really displayed any of his emotions, but I replied without hesitation, "I love you too, buddy."
I never should have let him hang up. I could've saved him. I could've saved all of them.
It was my fault that they were dead.
Don't know why, don't know why.
Don't know why, don't know why.
Dean and I couldn't figure out why Benoit would do what the police were saying he did. I didn't believe it at first, but then I thought back to that last phone call and how he sounded and I just honestly don't know. But what I do know that Benoit loved his family and he would never, ever do anything to intentionally hurt them. That still didn't explain what the police were saying, but I didn't care. He was my best friend, and I knew him. I knew that he would never do anything like that.
After I'd made that mistake, the least I could do is keep his memory alive and his reputation intact.
My old friend, this song's for you.
Cause a few simple verses was the least that I could do.
To tell the world that you were here.
Cause the love and the laughter.
Will live on long after.
All of the sadness and the tears.
We'll meet again, my old friend.
Years later, I still miss Benoit. I guess we'll never really know what happened on that fateful day in the Benoit household, but I know that Chris and his family are with Eddie now, and somewhere deep down I know that they're both watching over me, just like they did when they were alive.
Death can take the people that we love most from us, but it can't take our memories of them.
Those stay alive forever.
Goodbye, goodbye.
Goodbye, goodbye.
My old friend, my old friend.
Goodbye, goodbye.
END
RIP Christopher Michael Benoit, 5/21/1967 - 6/24/2007
You will be forever missed.