Death And All His Friends
I’m sitting on our bench in the park listening to the Finding Nemo soundtrack. She loved that movie—nobody else could get worked up about a dumb clownfish like she could. And now she’s gone. Just like that.
I don’t understand how someone matters that much in such a short time and then gets ripped out of your life in seconds. Mona had plans. We had plans. Conversations that were supposed to happen, ideas we were going to throw around together, all of it just stops mid-sentence. The world was supposed to change because of those conversations. Now they never happen.
Since yesterday I’ve been carrying this infinite pain, but the weird part is it’s packed full of energy and hope and this fierce sense of living. It’s like she handed me the life force she carried—the thing I always admired about her—and now it’s mine to carry forward. I hear her voice when I make decisions. I feel the way she moved in how I move. I can still taste her sweetness in the memory of her skin. What we had together, no one gets to take that.
I won’t forget you, Mona. Not ever. Berlin is poorer for losing you. The whole world is. You were the sharpest little thinker I knew—a real columnist, someone who actually had something to say. I’m going to take everything you taught me on those nights driving around, everything you stood for, and I’m going to keep living it. I’m going to live it for both of us.
You gave me courage. I miss you already. Wherever you are now, I hope you’re changing things the way you changed my world. Take care of yourself out there, little writer.