February 22, 2018. One day that I will never forget and never stop reliving in the mind.
I woke up like any other day, made breakfast and got ready for class. After class, a friend and I went to Target to grab some groceries and browse around. It was on the way home that my day started getting weird. As I was driving to drop my friend back off at her apartment, I received a text from my mom. All it said was "All good?". I remember thinking why is my mom asking if everything was all good. I responded saying "yeah, why?". She then went on to tell me how Ryan and Lauren were home from school and a police officer came knocking on our door. The officer asked if my mom was home and they told him no saying that she was still at work. At first, I didn't think anything of it, thinking that maybe something was going on in the neighborhood. It wasn't until my mom said that she texted Kyle the same "all good?" message and he had yet to answer.
When I got back from dropping my friend off, I went into my room and began googling what it means when a police officer shows up to your doorstep and asks for someone specific. Everything that I saw was about the person being in trouble with the law. I was still feeling uneasy but I convinced myself that Kyle was probably just arrested or something silly like that happened at school.
That night was the night of my date party for my sorority, so I had some of my friends come over to get ready and go together. I was supposed to be a "sober sister" that night, but I found myself drinking more than I normally do, probably because of the nervous and uncertainty I still had with the whole police officer situation. I told my mom to keep me updated, but it had been a couple hours since I heard anything and that was making me even more nervous. I remember telling all my friends that were over about the weird text I had gotten from my mom and how a police officer showed up at our front door asking for her. They all went on to ensure me that it was probably nothing serious and that he was probably just looking for some information about something that may have happened in the neighborhood.
We were all having a good time, laughing, dancing, taking pictures and we were just getting ready to go to the venue. But, my phone started ringing and it was my dad. I yelled to everyone saying that my dad was calling and I was hesitant to answer it, but they told me to answer. The first thing that my dad asked me was "are you home". I told him I was and that my friends were over. Thats when he told me that he was outside my apartment building and to come down and let him in. Thats when I knew something was terribly wrong. My stomach dropped as I went to go let my dad in. We stood in the hallway of my apartment as my dad struggled to tell me that my brother had died. He said that the school had found him in his room at noon that day. I didn't know what to say. I mean what do you say when someone just tells you that your brother had died.
I ran back upstairs to collect some of my things before driving home. As I walked back into my apartment, all my friends looked over to see what was going on and I just broke down sobbing. I remember crying and yelling why, wondering why my brother who was always so lively and goofy would do something like this. At this point I couldn't stop crying, so my friends gathered up some of my things for me. Then, I left the party to go drive home with my dad and my uncle who had driven up to get me.
The whole car ride home was quiet. I was still in shock and just couldn't believe what had happened. I remember asking my dad if he knew anything further, but he didn't. When we finally arrived home, I was nervous to go inside because there were a lot of cars in our driveway. As I walked in, everyone just came up to me to hug me and we all cried. It was amazing to see all my aunts, uncles and cousins there to be with us. One of which had driven an hour away.
That night, and every other night within those first couple of weeks, I had the hardest time falling asleep. Lauren and I slept with each other every night I was home during those two weeks. It was hard to fall asleep every night, but we needed each other to feel a little safer.
I remember waking up the next day and praying that it was all a dream, but I knew it wasn't. I remember walking downstairs and within ten minutes our neighbors were knocking on our back door with eggs, toast, coffee, and hash browns for us. It honestly made me cry because of how nice it was that they had done that before they went to work for the day. It is really crazy to see how fast the word spreads and soon enough it seemed like the whole town had visited our house within the span of three days.
The next couple of days it was like they lived with us and it was probably the most supportive and comforting thing that they could have done. As more and more people kept coming in and out of my house to bring their support and condolences, it was nice to have my cousins there to distract me from everything for a little. I really appreciated when everyone was coming over because it showed that so many people cared about our family. I'll never forget how willing everyone was to help us out and be there for us.
February 22, 2018. The day that changed my life forever. The day that I will never ever forget.
Fly Kyle Fly.
