Let me give you a little background before I begin. In January 2010, I moved to a town where I knew no one. It was  a small town, and all I did was work and go to school and take care of my daughter. I had no friends, and no social life. After about two months, one of the guys who was a regular at the restaurant I worked at invited me to come hang out with him. At first, I didn't like the guy, at all. I thought he was the rudest person I've ever met. After hanging out for 20 minutes, I knew this person would be a very big part of my life, although I didn't know how. His name was Nate. He quickly became the best friend that I have ever known. He knew and sensed things about me that no one else knew or even thought about. We were together every day, for most of the day for almost 2 years. One night, April 30th, 2011, I was leaving his house around 1:00 am to head home, because I had to work the next day.  He had asked me a few times if I wanted to spend the night as I had done on several occasions. We never had sex or anything like that, because I told him I couldn't be with him because I had already dated his brother. I told him I couldn't stay because of work, but that I would be over after work the next day and we would hang out. After I got home, we stayed up texting each other until about 3:00 am. The last text I got from him said "good night sweetheart, i'll see you tomorrow. i love you" After work the next day, I went home and took a nap with my daughter, Athaliah. After being asleep for no more than 30 minutes, my phone started ringing off the hook. I kept trying to ignore it, and finally answered. It was my friend Joanie. She said, "Hey have you heard about what happened?" I was confused and asked her what she was talking about. She said, "It's about Nate, I don't know if I should tell you." So I hung up the phone and called Danny, who is another good friend of mine and Nate's. He answered the phone and I could tell he had been crying, but was trying to sound okay. I asked him where Nate was. He burst out in tears and told me that he had found Nate dead in his bed a couple hours before. I hung up the phone, and got up from where I was sitting. I couldn't feel anything. My body was totally numb, and all I could think was, "I'm still asleep, this has to be a dream." The next thing I knew, I collapsed in the kitchen floor, crying harder than I've ever cried in my life. I was in the most pain I've ever felt. My step mom came into the kitchen to see what happened, saw me and called my dad. My sister rushed to my side and asked what happened. All I could say was "He's gone." I don't know how my sister knew, but she knew exactly who I was talking about, and told my step mom to tell my dad he needed to get there, now. My dad got home, and immediately took me out to Nate's house, where all of our friends were. When I saw Danny, I knew that it wasn't a dream, that I was awake, and that this was really happening, my best friend was gone.

**Fast forward 8 1/2 months**

Today, I still struggle with his loss. Not a day goes my that I don't think about him, and miss him. I still don't want to get out of bed most mornings, and most of the things that I used to love doing, I just don't want to do anymore. It's like he was my energy, he was my happiness, and without him, I'm drowning. I feel like it's not worth trying anymore, because if a good man like him can be taken with no notice, for no reason, then what do I have to work for? It's not worth it. I don't know how to make myself okay again. I don't know if I can ever fully recover from this. He was everything to me. We had a really strange relationship, we were best friends who were in love with each other, but we knew that we just couldn't be together. So it killed me when I lost him, and I still feel like I did that day. I still love him with everything I am, and I don't know how to make me okay again. I don't know if it's even possible. Hoping that someone who reads this will have some sort of suggestion on how to let go of the hurt, and just be okay with living without him.