i found you on friendster. your smiling face lighted up the screen, and your warm eyes looked at me.
it's been a year since you left all so suddenly.
i'm sorry i didn't get to see you off. to say goodbye. i'm sorry i wasn't there to be your friend one last time.
i'm sorry it took a year for me to finally grieve, to feel sadness at your absence. perhaps it is because finding your friendster profile came so soon after another recent loss, while death's scent still lingers.
memories of you are washing over me now, as fresh as if they just happened yesterday. the way we'd talk about the books we've read, and the peculiarities of faith and religion. the way you made me promise that i'd be at your birthday, or else you won't show up at mine. the way you insisted that i join our block section outing, and when i said i had no money, you paid for my share just so i could go.
i once said i would do anything for you.
so i'm sorry i wasn't there to say my last goodbyes. i guess i wasn't true to my word in that sense. but then, i'm not sure i could have handled it, seeing you without life, without your smile and your warm eyes. it didn't seem fair that death should claim you then, so young and so vibrantly alive.
but you're gone, and a year has passed. all i have of you now are memories, and they will have to suffice.
goodbye, friend. may you rejoice with the angels in the light of God's eternal joy, in the place that awaits us all.