More Pete

Man, if you'd have told me a year ago that I'd be this devastated about the loss of a 47-year-old white dude from Philly, I would have laughed in your face. The crying spells have stopped, but I'm in a perpetual state of depression, which I can't quite afford right now. I pretty much have to drag myself out of bed, but I'm surprisingly thankful for the obligations that require me to get up and be productive. I need to be job hunting and putting on a good impression. Not grieving and wearing all black. My supervisor suggested that I speak to someone about my grief at my job. I tried to break through this on my own, but I'm failing at that, so I just decided that I'll go speak with my counselor at school after all. Lord knows I'd love an appointment today, but I settled for 2 days from now instead.

Its not so much the sudden loss anymore, its more of the "what ifs," and "if onlys." I mentioned earlier that Reisha was the one that told me to quit being stupid and not let Pete's race be a thing. Now whenever I see a dark haired white male, my immediate thought is that he should be Pete. I went out to eat yesterday and I saw a black female taking pictures with a tall white guy and they were a couple. And my thought was immediately, that should be me and Pete. Some of our last text convos were me saying that I couldn't wait for us to just chill in a coffeehouse to talk about life and get inside one another's heads. His response was "sounds like a plan." Now here I am, in the coffeehouse that I couldn't wait to show him, with all of the art I knew he'd enjoy. And I'm alone.

At the balloon release, I was pretty devastated. Don't get me wrong, plenty of tears from others, but yeah, clearly I was distraught. Yesterday a friend called me and announced that he'd been fired from his job for sexual harassment, which he'd never done. But suddenly innocent jokes he'd made became a source of judging him and firing him as it became a his word against hers type of situation. It all took me back to Pete again.

One day I vented to Pete about not agreeing with some management things that happened at the gig. A few minutes after my vent, I made him promise not to repeat anything. He responded by saying that my words were safe with him, and asked that I not repeat anything he said as well, which I obliged. Which would be why my coworkers may have been surprised at my grieving him. We seriously kept our friendship a secret. On the day he kissed me after I drove him home, rather than leave from work, I had him meet me across the street at a gas station, so that none of the prying eyes would see us. So yeah, they got Work Pete, I got Pete.

But nevertheless, here stood my lesson. I stood around crying my eyes out. I told another woman I'm close with about myself and Pete, but my sudden fear is that my extreme show of sadness would indicate more in our relationship. I showed my hand. He and I never had sex. But we were close friends. So close. And now, here in my grieving, I've said far too much. At the end of the day, I need a job. My rent is kicking my ass at $1k a month, and as much as I want to just jump in a hole, my son depends on me to be a functional adult to keep our shit together. So watching my friend complain about his misconstrued words, I guess I took another lesson from Pete. Work is work and home is home. Inappropriate jokes are for your friends, not your colleagues. Pete knew. And he just showed me.