It was a sunny day. I remember it well. I was in first hour Calculus when the principal told us to go home. I called Roman the second I walked into my front door. He didn’t answer. I wasn’t really that worried about it. After all, Roman was a really busy kid. It wasn’t often that he picked up his phone.

That night, I decided to head on over to Roman’s house. There were so many cars in the driveway that people had started to park on the street. Suddenly feeling quite nervous, I knocked on the door. Roman’s stepmother opened it. Her eyes were puffy and bloodshot and her face was wet with tears.

“What’s wrong, Mrs. Colar?” I asked, my voice trembling. She burst into dry sobs.

“You…you didn’t hear?” she asked, her voice pinched. I shook my head. “C-come in,” she muttered, dragging me within the threshold. I held my breath as I saw dozens of people gathered in the living room, every single one of them crying. Only then did it click that I saw Roman’s dad, stepmother, and little sister, but not him. I felt tears begin to well up as I came to a sick realization.

“Where is he?” I managed to squeak. Roman’s father looked up at me and shook his head.

“Didn’t they tell you?” he choked. I shook my head, my vision blurring with tears. Roman’s stepmother put an arm around me. I shook her off.

“Where’s Roman?” I demanded again.

“He’s gone, Race. He’s not coming back,” I heard her say. At that moment, I lost it. The tears began to flow freely. I turned on my heels and stormed straight out of the house.

It wasn’t until the next day that I learned the specifics of Roman’s death. Honestly, the fact that he took his own life was far more painful than him simply dying. It was like our friendship meant nothing to him. At the funeral, I remained stony-faced and dull-eyed, unable to cry anymore. Still, life for me went on, and I had to return to school.

The halls, though filled with students, seemed empty to me. I had no friends here anymore, now that Roman was gone. I felt alienated. Roman and I had been friends since the day I moved here. I hadn’t ever seen the need for more people in my life. Because of my friendship with the most popular kid in school, I was tolerated by others, nothing more. Now that no one could possibly risk Roman’s disapproval, they paid no attention to me at all. They seemed to stare straight through me. Soon enough, they even forgot about Roman.

I began to spend my lunches outside of school. At first, I would go out to the pier for that precious hour and look out over the water, wishing that Roman was there to hang out with me. It didn’t help my deep feeling of rejection and, eventually, emptiness. In all actuality, it made me feel worse. Instead, I began to go home. I would sit in my room and stare at the wall for most of the time. I felt numb, as though no emotion could touch me anymore. It was unnerving.

One day, after fifteen minutes of nothingness, I walked into my bathroom and stared at my reflection. There was such emptiness in my reflection that I wanted to scream. Sighing deeply, I flung open my medicine cabinet and wildly started throwing things to the ground. Still, I felt nothing, until I my hand reached my razor blade. Without thinking, I took it and pressed the triple blade against my wrist. Moving slowly, I dragged the razor across the skin. Pain laced through my wrist as blood welled. I smiled, happy to know that I was still capable of feeling. Smiling an odd smile, I went back into my room and fished around my drawer for a Swiss Army knife that my dad had given me for my birthday. Once I found it, I stuffed it into my pocket and drove out to the pier. I stepped out onto the pier and looked around, making sure no one was around. No one was. No one ever came around this early in the day. Sitting down at the edge, I held the knife in my injured hand and flipped it open, casually feeling its weight. I was tired of the emptiness. The pain removed me from it. With one motion, I slit my other wrist. I laughed as the blood began to flow, relishing in the pain. I threw the knife down on the wooden slats of the pier and jumped into the salt water below, still laughing as the salt stung my open wounds. School would have to live without me for a day.

The next few days at lunch, I would go out to the pier, my Swiss Army knife my only companion. Each day, I felt a little bit of feeling in a sea of loneliness, not enough to be happy, but enough to know that I was still alive. I wore sweatshirts everyday, even though it was reaching the end of the school year, when it really began to get hot, and no one questioned me.

One day, I was sitting at the pier when someone walked up. I turned and hurried to hide my wrists. The person standing before me was young, my age or maybe a little bit younger. She was several inches shorter than me, with sleek black hair and tanned skin. She was thin, and her eyes were bright blue. I had never seen this girl before. Still, I felt ashamed that she walked in on me, and I felt myself blush before her.

“Hi,” I muttered.

“Hi there,” she returned, her voice pleasant-sounding.

“Who are you?” I asked bluntly. A month or so without much human contact had changed me, I realized. I wouldn’t have been so frank before Roman died. I looked at the girl’s face and breathed a sigh of relief. She hadn’t seemed put off by my comment.

“My name’s Viv,” she told me. “Who are you?”

“Race.” She nodded slightly, and then looked off to sea. “What are you doing here?” I questioned, taking care to keep my hands in my pockets.

“I used to live here. I moved out of state a few years ago. I just graduated and now I’m here, visiting a friend of mine.”

“Well, whoever you’re visiting is still in school.”

“Isn’t that where you should be?” I was taken aback by her question. I scoffed.

“It’s lunch time. Besides, they can do without me for the day.” She didn’t answer. “What are you doing at the pier if you’re here to see a friend?”

“Oh, it’s nothing. I’m just reliving some old memories before I go and visit him.” She closed her vivid blue eyes and breathed in deeply. She was trembling slightly.

“Who’s this friend of yours, anyway?” I asked. She didn’t respond. Without thinking, I reached out to touch her. Her eyes snapped open immediately and flit to my wrist. I withdrew, hating my stupidity.

“Why do you do that to yourself?” she asked me. I stared at her in awe. I admired her bravery, but I didn’t answer. The answer was too painful. I caught her gaze and she nodded.

“Well, I suppose I’ll be seeing you, Race,” she muttered as she turned away from me and walked away from the pier.

“Where are you going?” I asked.

“The graveyard,” she replied.

“But I thought you were here to see a friend,” I reasoned.

“That’s exactly where I’m going. My friend, Roman is buried there.” My voice caught in my throat, and I felt myself unable to move. Tears rose to my eyes at the mention of Roman’s name. I blinked them away as Viv walked solemnly away. Surprised, I blinked again. My usual emptiness was gone, replaced by the pain of Roman’s death upon me again. Trembling, I reached into my pocket for my knife. For what seemed like an eternity, I stared at it, before finally pitching it into the ocean.