A letter to Brenna

I've been thinking a lot about you. The impact you had on me, what your last moments were like, what your last year was like, all the drama, all the suffering, what did it all mean?

I remember when I first met you. I was a boy, far from a man, far from my own person, a child playing at adulthood. You were a rave girl deity who knew everyone in the electronica scene, you'd go out to Limelight and whatever other clubs were hip at the time and was still in hs with us! Here I was pushing to extend my curfew to 10, 11, meanwhile you were partying it up harder than most twenty-somethings. Your brother Leo was a reflection of you, in many ways, the coolness, the self-assured swag, it was that assertion that drew me and held me captivated.

I remember the first time I went to a club, you got me and Leo into Pyramid for Konkrete Jungle. I was 17 and green, amazed that you knew the bouncer, the promoter, the bartender, the dj and several regulars in attendance. On one of those occasions  I asked you to hold my glasses for me while I jumped in the cipher to do some breakin'. When I came back and asked for them back, you gave me a blank stare and began looking through the pile of jackets next to you. It wasn't til we reached the bottom of the pile and pulled out two pieces, that were my glasses, that I began to cry, right then and there in the middle of Pyramid. (Any one that's had to wear glasses, with very poor sight, and poor would understand my sentiment, it meant I wouldn't be able to see properly for at least 4 days, would have a headache for the duration and my folks would tear out my hide, quite possibly.) Bren, you were indifferent. That's just what you were like, sometimes just not giving a fuck, but it makes me smile thinking back on it (and cringe at the crying part).

If you had an exalted status then, you became mortal one night as I was laying in the living room of your parents home in SI, watching HBO, trying to drift off to bed. Leo had long gone to sleep, but you came down in your boy shorts and tank top and we just talked, you confided in me that night and I felt honored that you did. After that, I'd see you from time to time, somehow Leo was always cutting my hair in your apt, or we were visiting your loft to see this rabbit or your new dog, that poor rabbit .... haha. (You weren't the best with pets, I think we all know that.) Hell, remember that time I ran into you at that Adidas SoHo party? I met Harold Hunter because of you, not a big deal to you but to me, I was a little starstruck, for sure.

When Leo gave me the news that you were diagnosed with stage 4 cancer, I was in disbelief. His tears, his sobs were real enough, though, and I knew by the way he described it in his car that he too knew that it meant a likely end. That was about a year ago ... we were only a year apart and yet you were already standing on the precipice of death, how do you accept that? Did you? What does that feel like, knowing you might die... I can't fathom that. My father has skirted perilously, my friend Asif was taken suddenly at the tender age of 25 and still, I can't begin to imagine what that's like.

I wish I was 20 minutes earlier. I arrived to the hospital ten minutes too late, I saw you for the last time, laying pristinely on your bed, surrounded by a small group of your loved ones. Sometimes I wonder why you didn't let me see you that time I was with Leo and Jess outside the hospital. Sometimes I wonder what might've been had you pulled through. Other times, I think about Mikela and what life will be like for her, without her caring mother doting on her. Who's gonna give me a second opinion on haircuts or outfits or get me into swanky clubs, who's gonna shun me one day and seek me out the next, who's gonna keep Leo's ego in check, haha. I wish I was 20 minutes earlier... but I gave you a kiss on the brow and let you rest.

Bren, you were no saint, but that's what I liked most about you.