SchmAlex

My best friend's ex-boyfriend died yesterday. They had what you might call a complicated relationship, but I know they loved each other. The situation itself is quite complicated. I'm so sad for her.

Briana and I have known each other since we were in the first grade. We were in the first grade and the second grade together, then I moved away. When I was in highschool, my family moved back to the area and we spent our junior and senior years together. In highschool, I kind of protected her. After highschool we lost touch for a few years. I had gotten married and she was doing what normal eighteen year olds do. When I was twenty, after just getting out of the military, I went home to live with my mom to figure my life out. I had just found myspace and was searching through old highschool friends and I found Briana. We chatted on myspace and got together for coffee and then we were together almost every day after that.

Her life was different than mine. Where I had had a difficult time working for everything I had, she had it easy. Or at least it seemed easy to me. Her boyfriend, Alex, was older than her and had struck it rich during the .com bang. She lived in a giant beautiful house in Walnut Creek, Ca. She drove a brand new BMW HM3, new boobs, a new smile and hair extentions. Plus a huge walk in closet full of name brand clothes. While she went to school, I worked my pitiful part-time job at Build a Bear Workshop and watched my brothers kids for not enough money to cover my bills. I thought she had it made. For our twenty-first birthdays ((three days a part)) he sent the two of us and two other friends to spend a long weekend in Las Vegas. We stayed at the Bellagio in amazing rooms that overlooked the pools. We spent four days partying it up. It was a blast!

I really did think she had it all, but we all know the grass is always greener. In the year I spent hanging out at their house, I saw Alex a total of maybe five times. He was always gone on business and came and went at all hours of the night. I remember they used to meet for lunch and that would be the only time she would see him during the week. Ever her protector, I would try and smooth things out when him and I were waiting on her or if we had a minute alone. After a while, things went bad between them and one night Briana knocked on her friend's door and her friend answered naked after having just got "out of the shower" and Alex was sitting in the dark. After that, We started refferring to him as SchmAlex because we didn't like him anymore. It was crazy. They each moved on and so did I. Mine and Briana's lives went in two different directions after that. Bri started working in a bar in the city and I moved to NC, got married and had a baby.

Its crazy to think he's gone now. He died in a car accident which, unfortunately, is not that surprising. One time I sat in the back of that HM3 and watched him do 160 through rush hour traffic. Sometimes death is a tragedy and sometimes it is not. Alex had lived a full life. He got to do WAY more than most people I know twice his age. He had money, love and friendship. Most people leave with only having had two of those three.

Bye, SchmAlex. You'll be thought about often.