Droplets of rain splashed against the windshield as I made my way to the memorial service across town. It seems some how appropriate that it should rain today, today of all days. Once or twice I had to stop so that I could wipe the tears away blurry my vision. I knew he'd be unhappy to see me crying, grieving for him. I was determined to do justice to his memory and be dried eyed throughout the service. It was the very least I could do for him, considering his family was insistent that they bear the responsibility of his burial. No wonder he never talked about them except in passing. But he was a very private man, guarded on more subjects then others. I always thought that their would be time to get past those walls he'd built up around him, but that time won't come after all. Being there was the only thing that I could do for my friend.
As I turned onto the road, I thought of my mother. True I had accepted the inevitable a long time before it actually happened, but I grieved for her. But it wasn't like this, no nothing like this. Here I am, flood gates busted wide open and free as my heart aches with his loss. I never before realized the impact he'd made on me every day when we saw the worst in mankind. Or how much I enjoyed what time we did have together. We were never lovers, just friends. Still I can't remember a time he wasn't there for me and expecting nothing in return. No one else can tell me any different, I won't let them.
I was just finishing an interview, a promising lead if I ever heard one and looking foward to the much needed nap, when the captain told me. I stood there not really listening, not hearing anything he had just said. I was numb, it seemed to me that it was happening to someone else and not me. I couldn't believe it, it seemed so unreal to me at the time. But then again, how could I not?
Every day we woke with the knowledge that today's the day, the day my number could be called. At the end of the day we'd celebrate, not because one more bad guy was off the street, but because we'd survived one more day of the game that would continue on tomorrow. We fall to sleep knowing that tomorrow a bullet may find us and the game would go on, only with new players at the table. No matter what we thought about ourselves, we never considered we'd lose any one of us. That was never a clear, true reality. It should have been.
Dear God, it should have been.
I don't really remember much after he had said, "Olivia, you had better sit down." Then the tears were streaming down my face as reality slowly began to sink in. I wanted so desperately to believe that this was nothing more then a cruel joke, but then again any lie would have been better then the truth.