Friend Steven

I remember when I first met my good friend Steven. It was a fresh sunny day at the City Terrace Park. Children were laughing and playing on slides, swings and sticking their feet into the sand. Parents filled the basketball gym rooting on their children to win the opposing team. Those yelling out their kids name to get the ball into the basket echoed through the park. It was me and my cousin, Jessica, sitting on the empty soccer field. We waited patiently on the dirt floor for Steven to arrive so we could leave to my friend Jackie's house.

"Finally you came!" my cousin shouted. I turned around and found a tall dark skinned boy with a beautiful white glowing smile. His eyes looked golden brown in the sun light. "Yeah," he laughed, "my mom wouldn't let me leave. So I had to sneak out through the back." Jessica shook her head, "what did you do this time foo?" "Nothing! I'm an angel" he replied with an evil smile. He looked up to the sky with his hands glued together looking like he was praying. Jessica gave him a playful push "sure you are. Oh, this is my little cousin Sam." I smiled at him and he smiled back and said "I'm Steven." I was expecting him to greet me with a friendly hand shake but instead he gave me a hug. "So, you're going to kick it with us today little one?" he asked. I nodded "Cool. When you're with me you're never going to have a boring moment, trust," he replied, "I know how to have fun." He winked and all three of us headed to Jackie's house. Steven was right; there was never a boring moment with him that day. He filled my day with laughter and happiness. I didn't know that was going to be last day I would see him.

February 13, 2010, a week later that I had met him; I had gone straight to my cousin's house afterschool. We had made plans earlier with Steven to hang out at the park again. I waited and waited for Jessica to arrive home. She had been an hour late and finally she slowly came through door. I rushed to her excited for today plans but then noticed how depressed she looked. Her eyes were red, puffy, and filled with tears. "What's wrong?" I asked. She shook her head no at me and dragged her body to her room. I followed her to her bedroom concerned. "You okay?" I asked. She sat down on her bed not bothering to take her school bag off and looked at me with such grief in her face that it made want to cry too. I hugged her and she sobbed in my arms. "Steven died today." She whimpered. I didn't know what to do or say. All I know was that I felt like a little piece of me died. I cried with her.

Even though I only met him a week before his death, he seemed like a really nice guy. He was always laughing and smiling. He was never ill-mannered and very respectful. That whole day that I had spent with him gave me the