The Lost Love

by Desiree Rossi
(Orwigsburg)

Memories from individuals throughout their childhood may differ upon the experiences those people have faced growing up. As most become successful in their own personal ways, others aren't so fortunate, but let's not take for granted the people that have fought through the impossibly to become who they are today. Not all memories are significant in the existence of lives, but other will haunt the human mind for the rest of their long lasting lifetime.
Every person on planet earth has their own life story, some benefit while others do not, and others need to escape from these memories as they become to much to barre at times. “Everyone has their own way of escaping reality. And everyone has their own reasons for why they want to escape."- unknown. My reason may not mean a great deal to most, but to me it’s the most substantial reason I have to escape reality, to try to forget about the worst time in my living, breathing life.
Over the past year, I fell in love with a young man. This gentlemen was the most vividly handsome man, with his gorgeous dark brown eyes, and perfectly glimmering white smile and the way he wore his hair slicked back showing off his astonishing facial structure, he was the boy that girls dreamed about finding. I instantly fell in love, it happened fast not just for me, but for him too.
I met him on my first day at my new school, but he was also my neighbor. We shared some classes together, and after a couple weeks we started dating, he asked me out on November 2nd of 2015 and as you can imagine I instantly said yes. Now he wasn’t only my bestfriend but my boyfriend too. What else could I ask for?
He was a wrestler, and I was a basketball player. He hated not being able to see me after school because both of us had practice, but that didn't stop us from staying up late on facetime telling each other about our days. A couple weeks after the season started he quit his favorite sport to come to my games and to be able to see me, I tried to get him to change his mind but he wouldn't, and in the end of the discussion I fall deeper in love with him.
After the season ended, we devoted all of our time together, we were happy, from all the embarrassing family dinners, to attending his wrestle in tournaments with his family on the weekends, while having my heart drop every time he was slammed on the mat. His younger brothers began to look up to me as an older sister, I felt more and more apart of their family.
Soon after school ended, and our six months was approaching, and we didn't get to see each other too much that week because of the result of me getting my wisdom teeth removed, but it didn’t stop us from non stop talking.
A couple days after our six months, he left for vacation with his family, and friends of their family, boy did I miss him. When he returned home, I barely saw him expect at nights when we would go for long walks around town as the sun was setting. I never bothered to do my hair or makeup around him anymore, I was the most comfortable with him, then I ever was with anyone before. Life was perfect, everything I ever dreamed about came true, until the last day we hung out face to face.
The worst day of my life occurred on June 27th, of 2016, only a couple days before our seven month anniversary. I was over at his house, which is only a couple doors down from my own residence. As he stood up from laying on his bed in his bedroom, he walked around a table to meet me on the other side, before we both left to go hang out with friends. His last words to me were “I love you," as i repeated the same words meaning them more and more after every second that passed. I leaned into kiss him, only a couple seconds flew by when his lips didn't touch mine. I opened my eyes hearing a gunshot and seeing the love of my life fall to the ground.
My heart stopped, the smell from the shotgun was instant. I saw blood pouring out from his head, and ears, I saw the beautiful brown eyes of his that i fell in love with swelling up and becoming a dark purple. My baby was at his weakest, I screamed and ran down the stairs to get his mother who was laying on the couch resting. She jumped off the couch and raced upstairs yelling his name as I followed her barely able to see out of my own eyes that we full of tears that were scrambling down my face.
I raced for the phone to call 911, as his mother was giving him CPR, I saw the blood flowing out of his mouth as he was gagging for air. It felt like forever before the ambulance showed up and escorted his mother and I down the stairs. I tried running back up to him I didn't want to leave him but the police stopped me at the top of the stairway and made me go back downstairs, i kept trying and fighting. I promised him i'd be by his side for the best moments and the worst.
As time went by, each second felt like a lifetime as the paramedics raced him to the hospital. My father came home from work as fast he could, to me sitting, crying and gasping for air through the horrible pain I was feeling in my chest from my heart being ripped out of my body metaphorically, when he showed so did my mother and my grandmother. As they tried to comfort me, all I cared about was going to the hospital and seeing my other half. We rushed to the car and drove faster and faster, I never said a word in the car. I prayed and prayed to the man above, God. I never asked him for much, but that night I begged him to let my soulmate live, to let him be okay, I prayed my heart out. I begged for me to be able to teach him how to walk and talk again, he'd really know how much I loved him and he’d be alright and we’d spend the rest of our lives together.
Pulling up to the hospital, I ran through the doors past the metal detectors, till a security guard asked why we were there, as soon as I told him, he said “you better come quick" we ran down the hallway behind the officer to a room full of strange people i've never seen before, little did i know we were all there for the same young man.
Sooner than later, I found out it was too late, they decided to pull the plug because he was brain dead. I fell to my knees in this strange room, screaming and yelling “no! You can't take him!" his mother came through the door and gave me a hug, i asked to see him but she said i couldn't, that he's gotten worst and she didn't want me to remember him that way. She hugged me and say seven words i'll never forget, “a silly boy made a silly mistake," as she left the room, not even a full minute passed before i heard the beeping through the wall from the life support machines as the doctors began taking him off of them.
Everything I cared about, and loved ended that day, most individuals don't face this in their lifetime but I did. I wish I could forget that day, the day my world fell apart, if I could maybe i’d stop crying and at night, or maybe the bad dreams would disappear. Maybe the love of my life would still be here by my side if this memory wouldn’t exist, I would feel alive again, almost as if I was breathing fresh frozen air on a cold January morning, if he was right by my side, but he's not and never will be again. And I will miss him for the rest of my life, as nobody will ever replace him in my heart. I have one goal and that’s to make him proud of me from up above and i’ll do my best to fulfill that till the day I die.
Forever in my heart, the boy of my dreams, till we meet again, I love you. Rest in peace, 7/29/00- 6/27/16.