I'll Always Say 'I Love You'

July 19, 2010.

A day just as any other day, filled with summer promotion planning and execution at the radio station. It's late afternoon and I get a call from Mark. Very odd, he never calls me during the middle of the day.

Me: (annoyed): "Listen I'm really busy so this better be important."
Mark: "Hey. I don't want you to freak out, but I just got this weird call from Luke. He said he thinks  Moret killed himself."

A pregnant pause fills the air.

Me: (in disbelief): "Mark? Mark Moret?"
Mark: "I'm not sure...I'll call you if I hear anything...just be by your phone."

I hang up, unable to move forward. Moret is one of the strongest, most stable people I know. I tell myself that it's a rumor and try to dive back into the Lady Gaga promotion I was work on.

Mark calls me back almost a half hour later, confirming the rumor. Moret is dead. I hang up the phone and stare blankly at my computer. Moret, the big brother I never had, is gone. The tears come crashing down my face like tidal waves, and I race to the backdoor before anyone can see me. I weep silently and tell my boss I'm leaving for the rest of the day. Moret is gone.

One of the few pictures I have with Moret, and tragically taken almost exactly a year before he died.

I always called him Moret because I was dating Mark, but he would always correct me and tell me that he was Mark first. Which he was. He was like our big brother.

Moret was prior-e, which means straight out of high school he enlisted, did his four years, and then went to college on the GI Bill. When Mark was a senior in high school visiting colleges, he stayed with Moret, who was a freshman at the time.

Moret lived across the hall from Mark our junior year and we spent many nights between the two places grilling out. Man, could both those boys cook!

Throughout our junior year, once I finally turned 21, the three of us would hit the bars together. Moret always called it "date night." On one particular date night, I had one too many. Mark had left the bar hours before, leaving me alone with Moret. We spent the remainder of the night in intermittent conversation about how much he loved Mark and which girl he should go home with. I remember slamming my 32 ounce mug and leaving the bar.

Apparently, I sobbed the whole bus ride back to the house, who knows why. I remember having a tough time with the stairs. I'm later told Moret held me upright by the belt-loops of my skirt. We reach the second floor and Moret pounds on Mark's door.

Moret: "Mark! I have your girlfriend!"
(no response)
Moret: "Mark! If you don't come get your girlfriend in the next five seconds, she's sleeping at my place!"

The door immediately swings wide open, and Mark scoops me inside. Moret was a known womanizer, so much so that we called him Quagmire (after the Family Guy character).

The next day was Dining Out, a formal banquet for AFROTC. I tried to keep from throwing up most of the day, but Moret was in fine form, as always.

Moret and his "date" Scotty.

Moret graduated and commissioned later that year and went on to live in Colorado Springs as a Second Lieutenant. The following year, Mark and I graduated college and found out we would be living in Anchorage, Alaska. Our first stop on the drive from Omaha to Anchorage was Colorado Springs to see Moret.

When we finally reach Colorado and rang his doorbell, Moret flung open the door and gave each of us the biggest hug we've ever gotten. The look of joy on his face was almost overwhelming. He cooked us a huge dinner and then took us on a motorcycle tour of Colorado Springs. We stopped on top of a large hill, overlooking the entire city. The lights were breathtaking in the cool spring air. Moret tells us it's one of his favorite spots. We end the night at his house with glasses of wine by the bonfire.

As Mark and I get ready to settle in on the couch, Moret stops us and tells us to go into his room. That's right, he was the kind of guy that would give you his bed. We pack up and say our goodbyes the next morning, not knowing this is the last time we'll ever see him.

That phone call in July 2010 crushed me. I loved Moret, but I feel like I never told him. Almost every day since I've felt this gnawing, empty feeling that he died alone and feeling unloved.

The memorial I made for Moret at the Out of the Darkness Suicide Prevention Walk in Anchorage.

Ever since Moret passed, I vowed to make sure those nearest and dearest to me would always know that I loved them. So I text, and I chat, and I call because if you're important to me, I want you to know. Because tomorrow is never promised and I never want to be left with this feeling of regret ever again.