Epilogue
Friends Forever
The more anger towards the past you carry in your heart, the less capable you are of loving in the present....
The story of What Happened When He Died is based off a true story.
I had found a folder of things I kept from my friend’s passing and decided I should get some of the past off my chest. This was the best way for me to do it.
Tyler Bihler was born December 13, 1995 and left us on August 24, 2005. Our entire town used to know his story. Now, almost eight years later, I am the only one who is still visually pained by his parting.
If you were to ask someone in my class about Tyler, they could give you a name and the fact of his passing... if you were lucky.
Many, I’m certain, can’t even remember where his tombstone is.
I still visit it.
The first few years after his passing, you would be able to see flowers and little trinkets on Tyler’s stone. Now, the only flowers there are dead weeds and the trinkets from me.
To everyone else, he’s now just a name.
Growing up, the name calling and bullying were much worse than in What Happened When He Died as I was the only asian student. Plus I had curly hair, glasses, braces, and a life threatening peanut allergy among other undiscovered issues at the time.
Just as in the story, Tyler came to be my only friend.
Tyler was well-loved by everyone who met him. No matter what happened that day, he always made sure his smile was genuine. Tyler had a gift for making people smile even in the worst times. He didn’t care if you had a physical or mental disability, he would simply adjust whatever he was doing so you could join in as well.
Tyler was diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor in late August of 2004. The location of the tumor prevented surgery and a biopsy from being done.
Tyler passed away at nine years old, on Wednesday, August 24, 2005 at 6:33 pm.
During that year, our city held multiple fundraisers and charities to help pay for the medical bills. Thousands of dollars were raised and spent to keep him alive in hopes someone would think of a way to cure him.
The “Sprint Bracelets” were really created. My grandmother and I loved to make jewelry and we found these little heart charms with Tyler engraved across them in bold letters. We took the charms and made what became known as the Tyler Bracelets.
Last year I took my bracelet Tyler had given me as a gift and attached my Tyler charm to it to make a pendant. The one on the right is an original Tyler bracelet and the one on the left is the pendent. Accompanied by two extra Tyler charms.
His passing influenced his older brother in his career choice. Last I heard, which was sometime this past December, Tyler’s older brother was in college for brain medical science.
Tyler also has two younger brothers, currently in the local middle and elementary schools.
His cousins are in my classes, two girls, represented by the two mares in the story. Just as I have to everyone else of our class, I’ve watched them grow into very pretty yet vain young adults. I’ve watched them all become meaner and harsher than the other students our age.
And just as Easel did in What Happened When He Died, I cut myself off from everything. Without Tyler, I was alone again. And although I didn’t know it then, I did love Tyler.
After his passing I became cold and emotionless. I was terrified to love anyone else because I was afraid I would be left alone again so suddenly and unexpectedly.
The others were not so affected as they had other friends to lean on other than him. My classmates leaned on each other and left me to lean on no one. For eight years I loved no one and in the past few years I began playing with hearts and breaking them.
At the beginning of last year (2012), the victim I chose to break his heart, played mine back. Except they weren’t playing. They really did love me. I became confused as I hadn’t felt or received love since Tyler’s passing and I left him.
He remained my friend and my definition of “friend” was drastically changed. I began to open up to select people, showing emotion, and stopped playing hearts.
Tyler still holds a large part of my heart and my memory and I still have regrets of things I wish I’d said, but I can proudly say that I can hold him in my memory and still live my life. I still adore soccer, due to the fact that we were on the same team for those three years. I have his favorite song, My Heart Will Go On by Celine Dion, memorized and can still hear him putting all his soul and every ounce of emotion into singing it. I still have to deal with the memories of him and the pain of knowing he’ll never smile again, but I know everything will be better, I learned my lesson:
Don’t wait until it’s too late to tell someone how much you love them, how much you care. Because when they’re gone, no matter how loud you shout and cry, they won’t hear you anymore.