Did All The Dreamers Die?

Death is never an easy thing to deal with. It is one of the only things that is certain in our lives, yet it’s one of the worst things to cope with. I could think myself insane right now, but there is nothing to clear my head. So I sit next to this mausoleum of some guy who died in 1984, dressed in my funeral attire, trying to build up the courage to face the reason I came here. Trying to build up the courage to watch J.D., my oldest friend, be buried.
I’ve been to a lot of funerals in my 26-year existence, more than I can count, but this death has hit me harder than any other. Harder than my grandmothers death when I was 15 or the group of kids who got in an accident and died two weeks before our graduation. Joseph Douglas and I grew up together. Our fathers had been best friends since they were in high school and our mothers were good friends too. As kids we were inseparable and despite how different we were as teenagers, we were still best friends.
Part of the reason this is all bothering me so much is because of the last time I saw J.D. We got into a small argument, but it was normal for us so I thought nothing of it. Of course I didn’t know that would be the last time I would see him.  We were on different life paths and he was always nagging me to have more fun where I was nagging him to become more serious. J.D. was some spoiled rich kid who walked all over his parents. My mom and dad would have been rich had they stayed married, but they divorced when I was 12. On their own they were well off but not well off enough to buy me a Mercedes Benz for my 16th birthday like J.D.’s parents did for him. I learned at a young age what it was like to work for the things I wanted in life but J.D. just milked his parents for money. I mean, it wasn’t his fault. I probably would’ve turned out differently if my parents handed everything to me too. I doubt I would’ve had a drug habit to support like J.D. but as different as we were, we were just alike.
That’s why J.D. and I got into a fight the last time I saw him, because of his drug habits. I went to his house after work that day, still in my suit and tie. Work didn’t go so well and I just wanted to relax and have a beer with J.D. When I got there he was hanging out on the couch, behind a sea of beer cans, ordering his mom around. I grabbed a beer and sat on the couch, while J.D. tried to convince me to smoke a joint with him. When I refused he started babbling a bunch of bullshit about how I’m a tight ass and need to live a little. I told him that my idea of living wasn’t doing drugs on my parent’s couch all day before standing to walk out. He stood and grabbed my arm as he started telling me all this hippie bullshit about how we were brothers and the world was ours so we should treat it with respect. Whenever he was high, on any drug, he always spouted shit about love and the earth, which most the time had no relevance to the conversation. I pulled my arm away and headed for the door even though he was still talking. As I walked out of the room I heard him shout, “Alex, you used to be a dreamer man. What the fuck happened? Did all the dreamers die?”

The weather today really is perfect for J.D.’s funeral. There isn’t a cloud in the sky and if it weren’t for the light breeze, it would be too hot out. I can hear birds chirping and the air smells like fresh cut grass. He would’ve loved it, the weather. I’m sure if he were lying on his deathbed he would tell his mom, “Postpone the funeral 'til the weathers perfect.” because he liked to make the most out of a bad situation. But his sudden death didn’t give him the chance to tell his mom anything. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not just talking good about him because he’s gone, the kid was still the biggest asshole I know. It’s just that he had some really good qualities too. That’s what I can’t stop thinking of most, him asking, “Did all the dreamers die?” When he said it, I could give a fuck less, but now… now I can’t stop thinking about it.
For the most part, J.D. was a pile. He couldn’t hold a job because he was a severe pothead. His mom gave him a weekly allowance to buy marijuana until he was like 23 years old. That was around the time he started doing coke and drinking more. He was one of the smartest guys I knew, no joke. He could retain information just as good as a computer, which was shocking considering his daily drug consumption, yet he dropped out of college after 2 years.  I can’t understand why any girl would ever date J.D. because he treated women like shit, especially his mom, but somehow he had more girlfriends in his short lifetime then all my friends combined. I hated that about him. I couldn’t get one single girl to treat well, yet he had a million to treat like shit. Funny thing is, the only serious girlfriend I ever had, cheated on me with J.D. I found out by reading a text she sent him that said, “Last night was a big mistake. I really care about Alex so please don’t tell him.” Of course J.D. told me and when he seen that I was pissed, he hugged me and said, “Look dude, I can’t drink gin. It makes me want to make out; you’ve seen it before. I’m sorry dude.” And I couldn’t be mad at him because it was true. Gin made the guy love any girl instantly and he didn’t handle alcohol well to begin with. Plus, I couldn’t be mad at someone I played with when I was in diapers over a girl I’d known for seven months.

From where I’m sitting, I can see that J.D.’s parents and a few others are still by his grave as everyone else clears out. My parents drove by and asked if I was at least going to the reception. I said yes, even though I’d rather be alone than in a room full of people mourning the death of my best friend. I start walking towards J.D.’s mom. Despite that he was never very nice to his mom, he truly loved her and often told her so. She asked me to be a pallbearer in the funeral, but I told her I couldn’t. I haven’t cried yet since I heard about his death so I’m expecting a pretty big melt down. Had I agreed to be a pallbearer it probably would’ve been then, but as I get closer and closer to his mother, I start to think that seeing her face is what will trigger my break down. 
Without saying a word, his mother puts her arms around me, so tight that it’s hard to breathe. She’s always been like a second mother to me and I can’t imagine what it would be like to lose my mother, let alone a child of my own. As she pulls away, she grabs my hand and holds it in hers. I’m trying my hardest to be strong for her sake, so I hold back the tears.
“I know I probably wasn’t the best mom to Joseph, but I tried you know?” She says, still crying.
“You were a great mother Cindy. It takes a good mother to deal with someone like J.D.” I say in hopes of consoling her.
She giggles a little, “Yeah. Yeah, you’re right.” She pauses to wipe the tears on her face. “I always knew that the drugs wouldn’t be what killed him. Might sound weird, but it was kind of like a mothers intuition. I just knew he was going to die young, but it wouldn’t be the drugs to take him, so I let him do what he wanted.”
I put my arms around her because I know what she is saying is true.
I want to ask her just what happened, how exactly did he die, because I don’t really know. But I couldn’t bear to hear the details. Four days ago, I got a call from my mom while I was at work and she said that J.D. was killed in a car accident. A guy in a big rig fell asleep at the wheel and drove right into J.D.’s car. I don’t know whether he died from head trauma or whether he was alive when the ambulance arrived. I don’t any of the details. The second I got off the phone with my mom, I left work and haven’t been back since.  I haven’t done much of anything besides mope since I received the news.

J.D. might have treated girls as sexual objects or screwed around too much at every job he ever had. He might have even done too many drugs or taken jokes way too far, but he lived his life to the fullest, which is more than I can say for most of the people I know. I don’t think I ever even seen him sad. Not once in his whole life. In arguments he would be laughing while I was yelling. When we were seven, we built a tree house in this huge tree behind my old house. Our moms were a little worried about how high up the tree house was, but we built it high on purpose. Not even a week after we finished building it, J.D. Fell out of it and broke his arm. I rushed down to see his bone sticking out, but he was smiling. He used to talk about that incident all the time. He said it was his first real adrenaline rush, his first real high. Thinking back on it, that explains a lot of J.D.’s life. Everything was a thrill to him, from chasing girls to snowboarding, seeing how long he could steal money from whichever job he was at before getting fired, to how fast he could drink a pint of whiskey without puking. He lived his life exactly how he wanted to live it.

His parents and everyone else have left and now it’s just me sitting next to his grave. I start thinking about the day my parents told me they were getting a divorce. I went up to the tree house and wouldn’t talk to anyone except J.D. He came up to the tree house with our sleeping bags and we spent two whole days up there, just talking and laughing. I remember him telling me that my parent’s divorce could be a good thing because now I would have two homes, two birthday parties, two pets and two different vacations. Leave it to J.D. to make the most out of a bad situation with material possessions. His points were valid and the only way I could be okay with my parents break up.
I start to laugh and cry at the same time as I’m sitting next to J.D.’s grave. It’s then that I realize what he meant about dreamers. Every single dream J.D. ever had, he went after. I stopped dreaming when we were kids but he was always pushing me, and all his friends, to do what we wanted with our lives. I wanted to be a doctor, it was my dream, but I gave up and got stuck in a boring 9-5 instead. It is now that I realize why J.D.’s death has hit me so hard; because without him my life is nothing. All the best times in my life, he was there for and most of the time he was the reason they were the best. Whether it was because he caused a scene, like at our graduation ceremony when he streaked across the stage and was escorted out by a police officer or because he just knew how to make people smile, even in the worst of times; he always made situations better than they would’ve been without his crazy antics. I realize now that I should have listened to all his ideas, even when they were a little obscure and not just passed them off as crazy talk, and that I shouldn’t of given up on my dreams. If he were here now, he’d probably tell me that it’s too late for regrets. What’s done is done and I can only make the most of what lies ahead. So, maybe I’ll go back to med school or just quit my job to travel for a while. J.D. would say I should.
So to answer his question... No J.D. All the dreamers have not died.