Haunted
It's strange how a person I met once has completely and totally affected me.
This is what we call human emotion.
Every time I was filing, invoicing, or entering something on the computer at work, I thought of him. Each time, without fail, I started to cry. Because I don't know what else to do, I have to write about the night I met him. I have to write about the night when Jim saved my sister and me from boredom just by being there. It was almost exactly 6 months ago: December 17th, 2007, my company's Christmas party.
Encouraged by my mother, who insisted I needed to unwind, I elected to go to my office's Christmas party despite having a final the next day. Instead of choosing to bring my boyfriend as a date, I chose my fun-loving, then 23-year-old sister, Dyana, because I knew that she would dance. I was almost reluctant to go, and we decided that we would only stay for an hour or two since it would probably be boring. That was before we met Jim, of course.
Entering the building, co-workers from different branches of the company came up to us and complimented us. In this crowd was Jimmy, the son of one of my co-workers, who seemed desperate to find people his age. He came up to us during the cocktail hour, and behind his back, Dyana, a fellow intern and friend named Danielle, and I whispered about how he resembled Heath Ledger. He was kind, good looking, and successful; Jimmy was involved in the restaurant business and was doing extraordinarily well for a man his age. The cocktail hour ended, and we all walked into the main party room where Jimmy took a seat next to Dyana and me. Jimmy was smooth. Everyone got drinks while the music started to play, and the three of us engaged in more small talk. He's one of the only people I've ever met who has actually seen one of my favorite movies, 29th Street.
The night progressed and my sister and I realized we didn't want to leave early at all. Jimmy was saving the night, and he didn't even know it. We didn't even know it.
He was the only guy at the party who had the courage to dance with the both of us. She didn't want to tell him that she had a boyfriend because he was such a cool guy, for she feared he would lose interest in being her friend if he knew otherwise. Towards the end of the night, Jimmy asked me, "So what's the deal with your sister?" I replied in a voice that was supposed to sound naive: "What do you mean?" "Does she have a boyfriend?" "Yes...they just started dating." It didn't stop Jimmy, though. The two of them spoke for half an hour by themselves near the bar. Dyana told me later that he caught on to me playing stupid and that they laughed about it.
I had no idea that they exchanged numbers. I had no idea that he text messaged her frequently, asking to get together. "Come to my restaurant; I'm the manager now." "Let's hang out." Dyana said she never took him up on it and that she kept the messaging to a minimum because she didn't want to jeopardize her relationship with her new boyfriend. Over dinner last night, she showed me that she had him in her contacts. "Look. See, I have him in as Jimmy."
This information came hours after Tina pulled me aside at work at noon yesterday. She said that she had to tell me something confidential, and I thought, "Oh my God, they're firing me." But then she continued. She said that since my sister is a police officer, Tina wanted me to ask her if she knew anything about an accident of some sort. When I looked confused, Tina said, "Jimmy died." I covered my mouth, as I assumed she was talking about my co-worker. "Not Jim Sr. Jimmy Jr. Jim's son." I gasped, and my eyes instantly welled with tears. "Oh my God, why couldn't they just be firing me," I thought. As my eyes filled, Tina's did, too, and I walked back to my desk quickly. I passed my friend V in the hallway, and he sensed something was wrong. I felt bad about brushing him off when he asked why I was crying, but I needed to make a call. I called my sister. No answer. I text messaged her. She called. As soon as I started talking, my voice broke. "Someone died. Jimmy...from the Christmas party. He died." "Oh my God," she replied. I begged her to find out what she could. Nothing. She knew nothing.
Finding out bits and pieces from her police friends in Tuckahoe and my friend Jill, we know more. We wish we didn’t. Dyana said aloud the same words that I selfishly thought when my old high school friend Shereine Jacobs, who moved away after freshman year, died a few months ago: “Thank God we didn’t know him better.” No. NO. I’ll say the same thing I said about Shereine because it holds true for him, too: No one was better off not knowing Jimmy. We would have been lucky to have known him better. She would have been lucky to have dated him. I was lucky to have danced with him. I am lucky to even know his name.
I thought writing this would have acted as a catharsis, but it’s done nothing but make me feel worse. I’ve been crying since I started writing this an hour and a half ago. The thought of going to the wake on Thursday afternoon does nothing to boost my spirits.
Rest in peace, Jimmy.