"I'm just having thoughts of..." - Tori Amos I had a friend. His name was Gabriel Gladstone. He was one of the most remarkable people I have ever met in my entire life; that really I ever had the pleasure of even knowing. I believe he was made of pure magick and star stuff. Gabe told me when we met at a competition for amateur musicians and vocalists that he had played the piano before he was born because he couldn’t remember a time when he didn’t play. He said this with a smile and amusement in his voice of course but something in his hazel eyes told me what he spoke was true. When I heard him play for the first time I was entwined in the melodies that surrounded me like a comforting blanket. You see 10 months before that experience my parents divorced and my best friend Lizzy passed away from leukemia. Many a nights I spent alone crying wondering why all this change was taking place. There was no comfort to be had until Gabe sat down at that piano. He and I became very good friends. We would sit for hours at the piano together tinkering the days away. In the blustery autumns we would go collect fallen leaves and wander about in old graveyards doing tombstone rubbings of markers that stood over those long past that died in their youth. On frigid cold Ohio nights I would stare out the window as Gabe softly played his tunes. In the summer in the warm nights he would find me sleeping on Lizzy’s grave. He’d stay and keep me company and even made me smile. We had developed a friendship that ran deeper then the two of us could understand. It was like we knew each other in a past life and in this one we just picked up where we left off. In a way I was so envious of Gabe. The way he could play any tune with ease and little practice where I sat for hours on end in frustration. He admitted he was jealous that I had so many more talents then he and all he had was “the silly old piano”. We had such a deep mutual respect for one another that we ended up creating this bubble of safety around us anytime we were together. He taught me techniques and helped me practice the pieces I was to perform. He kept me focused but taught me how to delve into the music through that center so it would rush through me. He said, “Rea, you are just a tool the piano uses to speak…and she is your voice…it’s a mutual relationship between the two of you…one without the other results in silence…and the Gods do not like silence…” I remember the events like it was yesterday. I was getting ready for school when the phone rang. I answered it to find Gabe on the other end. There was just something not right in his voice, “You know I would never ask you to do this…skip school today and come over…please?” I thought a moment of my schedule and knew that with three tests lined up for that day there was no way. I told him I would my poetry meeting after school and come over to his house as soon as school let out. He seemed slightly disappointed but told me to have a good day. The whole day I found it odd that Gabe would skip and then turn around and ask me to do the same. He, for the most part, was an outstanding student. The only time he really flaked on his school work was when he had a competition.  When I went to his place he wasn’t there. I then searched the haunts we hung out at. The Ma & Pop coffee shop, the graveyard, music store, and the gazebo at the lake for which he wasn’t to be found at any of those places. Finally frustrated I started to head back to my place because it was getting dark when suddenly a horrible feeling came over me. This feeling was so strong it stopped me dead in my tracks and caused me to gasp. I instantly headed over to Gabes place.  Gabe’s father died when he was eight years old. His mother and he lived in a beautiful loft in an old building. To look at the building you wouldn’t think it was much until you took the rickety old elevator to the top and stepped into Gabes world. His mother was a musician also. She worked a pretty fancy job as an Executives Assistant so she was rarely home. I was around so much that his mother gave me a key so I could hang out whenever I liked. When I got there I let myself in and decided to wait. I called my Grandmother to let her know I was ok and will be home at curfew. I got myself a drink and decided to sit down at the breakfast table and do my homework as I waited for Gabe to come home. About 20 minutes later I heard the sound of a door shut within the loft so I went to investigate when low and behold there was Gabe standing in the hallway with a waded up bath towel in his hand. He seemed pretty surprised to see me and most of all he seemed pretty upset and out of it. I gently asked him what was wrong. He shook his head and spoke in a shaken voice, “There is darkness within us all…and if we let it…it will consume us…there is no such thing as shelter when the raindrops are as sharp as razors…” I had heard him speak like this before, but for some reason his words seemed more meaningful and profound. I tried to respond with a positive reply for which agitated him. It seemed nothing I said could snap him out of this melancholy haze that surrounded him. He suffered so much because he understood life so deeply but forgot that with life…comes living. To make an already long story somewhat short I will not go into the fight we had. However, I will continue with the moment that changed my life forever and left a profound deep scar that I don’t think will ever heal. Gabe stood before me hazel eyes filled with a spark of insanity and desperation I had never seen before. He had long dropped the towel he had waded up to reveal he had a loaded 9MM hidden and he had that gun to his head. I begged and pleaded with him to stop. I even went as far as trying to get the gun from him but to no avail. Finally frustrated I said, “Fine…just FINE…go a head and blow your head off and leave me here ALONE!”He looked me in the eye and said, “We are all alone…” He pulled the trigger oddly with a steady and calm hand. The gun went off. I can remember it being all is slow motion much like they do in the movies. That’s what it felt like was a movie. That’s what I wished it to be was just a movie. Instead there lied my best friend his brains and blood splattered against the wall behind him. His lifeless body was lying there free from the war that raged on in his head. He was free from all the crap this life held him too. Free from the small worries that make this existence what it is. There I stood with his blood splattered on me. I just stood there in total shock. My body went on auto pilot as I fell down beside him pleading with the Gods that perhaps he will live through this. I called 911, and then I called his Mother. There I waited by his lifeless body in a puddle of crimson. An investigation was held where upon they found his journal. He had been writing about this for months. They even found his suicide note. How could they miss it? It was displayed on his desk for all to see. He even left me a special note. I was 14 when it happened. I am 27 now. I sometimes wonder what life would have been like if Gabe wouldn’t have killed himself. He was just 16 years old on the verge of so much. I really do believe he was a star that burned so brightly and so fast that he just went out in a flash taking a piece of every soul he touched. When he died so did the music. So did that glimpse of the divine I seen within him. Now his body has been left to rot with maggots and his soul left to haunt me for the rest of my life. The Gods do not like silence…so I play on. Luv,R~takes a deep breath and slowly lets it out~ I feel better now…I don’t blame myself anymore. I hated you for the longest time for being so selfish…but I understand why you did it. I still love you- you were my best friend. Even in death…I know you are by my side.