Dear Billy,

It’s been six months already. I still have trouble believing it. 

I miss you. And it’s really hard some days. 

I just want to call you to hang out and talk and cheer me up like you always did, without fail. But I can’t, no matter how much I want to. And that makes me sad.

I see Gina all the time at Kwik Trip in Mankato. She’s really sweet; I’m glad she doesn’t hate me anymore! But then again, her first impression of me was when I was 16 and obnoxious. I probably wouldn’t have liked me either, honestly.

But you did. No matter where we lived or how long it had been since we saw each other, we could meet up and it would be like we just saw each other the day before. 

I could literally talk to you about anything. That’s one of the things I love about you, Billy. You never judged me; you were honest with me, and if I did something wrong or something to upset you, you’d tell me. 

Do you remember the funeral that you, Jas, Zach and I had for the mouse that got caught in the trap? Nobody would put it in the water (even after you said to just, “Dip it in like an ice cream cone from Dairy Queen”), so you threw it in. 

It was so funny. “I did it, y’all didn’t, don’t take credit!”

Or all the times we had “parties” with Jas, Taylor, Heidi, Patty, Will, Zach, Bryan, Ashley. . . Such as the one where you and Alex broke the shed door, the light got broken, and you, Jas and Julie drank all of my mom’s Mountain Dew? She was so mad! 

You and Zach were determined to climb off the roof just to avoid her. It didn’t exactly help that she came home to a living room full of sleeping teenagers, though.

Or the time when you, Jas, Patty, Zach and I went to the beach in Elysian even though it was storming like crazy? We ran around on the beach in the pouring rain.

I fell (of course), you laughed from the picnic bench, and you and Jasmine never let me live that one down. But then the tornado sirens went off, so you, Zach and Patty took your car and Jasmine and I took mine to Wayside (the rest stop in Elysian) to wait out the storm.

We were stuck in there for what seemed like forever, even though it was only about two hours. We played truth or dare, and Jasmine and I dried our hair and clothes with the hand dryers while you and Patty flushed toilet paper from the roll down the toilet to see if it would keep going. It did.

Then when the weather cleared up, we all drove to my mom’s house, saw two rainbows on the way, and watched movies and passed out in the early morning hours, like we did on so many different nights. 

I can’t even count all the times I met up with you at the beach in Elysian after you got off work at Culver’s. We would just sit on the trunk of your car with your duck blanket, listening to your iPod Touch, talking and staring out onto the perfectly calm lake, enjoying the warm summer nights. Sometimes other people would join us; a couple times we went swimming, and once we found a frog that you were determined to catch. 

One of the funniest memories, though, was at my party when you and Casey decided to see who could smoke a Marlboro Red the fastest. It made you sick, so you ran across the shed, tripped on a tire, and sprained your ankle (although you thought it was broken). 

The next day, you drove home with your left foot (which I still think is hilarious), and when you got home you called me and asked me to meet you at the emergency room in Waseca. 

I drove and met you there, and we waited for over an hour for them to tell you your ankle was sprained and give you a pair of crutches. Then we went to Mankato, and you let me use your crutches in Wal-Mart because you hated them.

When we got back to your house and I was about to leave for Jasmine’s, I asked you for some freezies, so you tried to throw them in my sunroof. You missed (horribly, might I add), and I ended up running one of them over. You goon!

I just want you to know that I think about you every day. Every day I miss you, so you better be having fun up there! 

Keep watching over all of us who love and miss you. And don’t worry, I’ll be partying on the “end of the world” and wishing you were there with me. 

You would love the people I hang out with now. I wish you would’ve had the chance to meet them.

I love you, Billy. I always will. And I’m so looking forward to the day I get to see you again.

With Love,

Jessica