You're a Star.

You were incredible.

I would tell you how incredible you were, and you only smile that smile and tell me to shut up. You were always so modest. But you were, you were amazing. Once you had that ball, you were like liquid, no one could catch you. You were our hero. The one we chanted for, the one that the stadium screamed for.

Afterwards, you would shrug away the praise and smile that smile. I was so jealous when you showed others that smile. That was my smile, the one you gave to me after I told you I loved you. I don’t think you know how much you were, not just to me, but to all of us.

I would walk home after your games, and I would go to my dark room and wait for you to come to me. It would take hours, I could see the cars pulling into your driveway and I could hear the crap music blaring through your speakers. Once, just once, I went to my window and I looked down onto the party. You were sitting, lazily, on a sofa while some girl wound herself around you. I had to admit, as much as I hated her, she was beautiful. She was all legs and blonde hair. She was the kind of girl you deserved. You deserved a beautiful lover, not a skinny, dark haired kid who did nothing but draw and dream.

But I was the only one who knew you for what you were.

Looking back I wonder if that’s even true. You had secrets, that’s just who were. You had secrets. I wonder now, what they were, and if any of those secrets were secrets that I might’ve one day, heard. If I had asked, would you have told me?

“I saw you with her.” I said later that night.

“With who?” you had asked.

“That girl.” I whispered. You were lying in my bed, your head propped up by your arms and your eyes were gently closing, each time taking a little longer to open.

“She’s not important.” You said. You seemed shocked, scared almost. “She’s just there.”

“Do you love her?” I asked.

You sat up at that. Your legs crossing under you and your eyes wide with what I hoped was the truth.

“What? No.”

I had watched you kiss her as she sat in her little sports car. I had seen you whisper something in her ear and I had seen her smile. That fucking whore. Smiling at you. Like you were her world.

But who was I to judge? You were my world.
“Promise me?” I asked, letting my marker fall out of my hand and smearing a black mark across my latest creation.

“It’s complicated.” You had said. You hadn’t looked at me when you said that and I felt a dull anger, a sharp fear in my stomach.

“What do you mean?” was all I could say. So sure that this was it. So sure that you were going to end this, your conscience getting the better of you, just like I had always feared it would.

“She’s not anything. She’s just there…” you looked into the room as if it held secrets and some of the secrets had answers.

“So you can hide behind?” I whispered spitefully. “When will you understand, if they don’t love you for whom you are, then they aren’t worth it.”

“They’re my friends!” I could see your face, barely. You looked hurt and surprised. I had never spoken to you like this before.

I stood and crossed to my window. This was the window that you climbed through to get to me. I loved this window. But oh, how I wished that you could use a door.

Your strong arms came across my shoulders and your voice in my ear sent a shiver down my spine.

“I don’t love her.”

“Promise?” I whispered back.

“I don’t love her. I don’t love anyone as much as I love you.”

That was the first time you had said those words to me although I had said them many, many times.

Your kiss, when it came…it made me believe. And I forgot everything. I forgot that girl in her little skirt and I forgot the worries that made you hide you and me. I forgot it all, and I kissed you.

That is all I have of you now. And they aren’t even you. You weren’t that. You were mine. And that wasn’t you.

That girl, she is crying. We’re in Trig and she is crying. Looking out the window, doing her best to ignore your empty seat and I know that we all know that she is crying. She loved you. And that knowledge scares me. I want you and your memory all to me. All to me. But she has memories of you that I don’t have. And I want to steal them from her. I would kill her and steal her brain if it meant that in the end, no one remembered you but me.

Your funeral was packed. It made me angry. I don’t think that you would have liked it like that. But it was. It was full of flowers and cards and candles. The silence wasn’t quiet at all. I sat in the back and I hid my face in my hands. You had gone so long hiding who you were, hiding me, I didn’t want anyone to see me. I didn’t want them to see me, and I didn’t want them to ask questions. It wasn’t any of their business, you and me.

I’ll keep your secrets.

Tonight, I sit on the roof. We sat here. We looked up at the stars and tonight, I’m sure that there is a star up there that wasn’t there before.

Because Andrew, you’ve always been my star, and now we can all see it.

Maybe one day would have understood that the only one who mattered was the one that accepted you all along. You hid and you lied and you kissed that girl like she was all you wanted. I told you so many times that you were mine, no matter what you were, in the end you were mine. I thought you believed me. I understood, being what we are, what I am, it’s hard. No one really understands. They call it wrong.

How can love be wrong?

We weren’t wrong. I was wrong for thinking that you would leave me. You always came, I didn’t have enough faith.

You’re a star.

You always were in my eyes, but tonight, when they all look up, they’ll see it too.

I love you.