My best friend is in Ohio, and I’m stuck here in New Jersey. He’ll only be there for a week, and he’s coming home on Friday, but then I’m going to Pennsylvania for a few days with my Dad to see two bands (Skillet + Hawk Nelson). He doesn’t have internet, and I certainly won’t. He’s my lifeline, the only concrete reason I live for. Sure, I could say that I live for the breathtaking surrealness when you go to a concert, and see the band(s) that you’ve listened to at your darkest moment. Or that I live for fireworks on the 4th of July. I could say I live for Halloween (I appear to be a somewhat immature 14yo in public, don’t judge me) and trick-or-treating. I could also say that I live for the ones who lost this fight and made their premature way back ‘home.’

The point is, those things fade, but Kyle’s been there for me for 2 years, even if it feels like so much longer. We’re both battling depression, self-harm and general mental issues. So we rely on each other a lot, and I don’t know if I can make it. I’m terrified of myself, in some strange way. I know one day he won’t be there for some reason, and I’ll fall into a billion little pieces, and he won’t be there to remind me that I’ll be okay. Or that it’ll go the other way, even though he always seems like if he took two steps, he’d be happy and okay and breathing in life again.

And with him gone for a few days, I’m reminded of that. I have no way to contact him, and he might as well be dead but I know he’s not.