I walked to the stand.  Heart screaming at me to run, but my mind told me I couldn’t.  Feet blindly moved forward, not listening to either just walking on their own accord.  the priest smiling at me waving me up to the podium.  Shyly, I approached, throat dry, paper wrinkled and trembling in my shaking hands.  I looked down at all the familiar faces, Mike’s family all there dressed in the ceremonious black.  His mother’s face was red and her eyes were puffy.  I swallowed and began what I had dreaded to do; flattening the paper and reading my scribbled words.
“You know when you have everything…and it feels like a dream.  That’s what it was like…to meet Mike…he was my dream.  I met him two summers ago…instantly clicking…it might have just been summer heat…but I knew…we were still perfect”
The tears I tried so hard to choke down were rising up, hot and steady from my throat.
“I loved everything about him…the warmth of his hands…the sparkle in his eyes…his corny puns…his crooked smile…his need to be kind to everyone and everything…his messy brown hair…but, funny thing is…I never told him any of that…I had always thought we would be ‘us’ forever.”
This was where the hardest part came and I didn’t know if I would make it.  I took a deep breath, closed my eyes and continued.
“Then I got the call…it was like a wrecking ball hit me…I tried to deny it…run away…I didn’t talk to him for weeks…”
The tears were streaming down my face, hot and stinging
“Next time I saw him his beautiful hair…was gone…he wore thin paper-like sheets…but his sparkle was still there…he smiled that crooked smile…I loved…saying he was going to be fine…that I was going to be fine”
I looked up at the crowd; everyone was either silently crying or waiting for my next words.  The room was filled with a suffocating sorrow.  My throat was dry, I was almost done.
“In the end he wouldn’t see me…he left me with a note saying three things…1. Be strong…2. Never stop smiling…3…wake up”

Someone was shaking me; I woke up to the tears of Mike’s mother.  I looked around me for a second remembering I was in the hospital waiting room.  I began to panic, thinking the worst had happened.  I started shaking and grabbed my head, tears bubbling just beneath my eyes.
“He’s alright” I didn’t hear her at first, “what?”
“Mike went through the operation successfully, he’s alright”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing, more tears streamed down my face.  I put my hand over my mouth and began laughing.  “Thank G-d” I hugged her, both of us looking like two blubbering idiots as we sobbed and laughed in each other arms.
I felt the crumpled up paper in my sweater pocket, I looked at it and smiled tossing the eulogy into the trash.  I didn’t need it anymore because I could now tell him directly what was written on that page. 
When it was okay to see him, I went up.  Trembling, the feeling of anticipation tingled through my body.  I opened the sliding door to his room and there he was.  Breathing.  Living.
I ran to him, crying once again.  He was awake, talking to his mother.  But when he saw me he gave me that crooked smile I thought I would never see again.
“Hey beautiful, I told you I would be fine.”
I laughed sat down next to him and embraced his living body.  He embraced me back and I felt his doubt of not making it, his relief that he did, and his warmth and affection towards me.  We stayed like that for a long time.  Finally I released him, looking up into those dazzling eyes and told him what I never had before.
“You’re a dream you know, my dream come true.”