How Avril Saved My Life

“I will see you tomorrow, okay? I’m sorry to hang up but I love you. Please be safe and I’ll see you at the meeting, ok? Goodnight Exene. I really love you.”

It was about 3 or 4am on August 1st in Brooklyn when I ended the call with you. That particular call was 45 minutes long–which was short for us. We had a meeting in about eight hours and I was exhausted, I know you were too. It wasn’t uncommon for us to talk for hours a day, half at work, half decompressing from what we experienced at work. It was a remote job, but it felt like we came into a virtual office every day, chatting during our breaks, and even eating lunch together in between meetings. I felt closer to you than I had in a long time even though we had never lived further during our almost decade-long friendship. Me in New York, you in Madrid. I was so thankful to have you back in my daily life.

I promised I would get my passport so I could book a flight to see you, although you seemed unconvinced. That night we cried together over work, our exes, and getting sober. It wasn’t uncommon for us. You kept saying you were weak. I shared my insecurities in an attempt to show you that if you’re weak, I’m weak too. I wished you could see you how I saw you. I wish you knew that even people with no prior mental issues would probably develop them if they held your position at work, or maybe you did know. You had to have daily meetings with people who would (here’s some dark humor that we love so much) make anybody want to end their existence. But I reassured you that even bad bitches cry, and I loved you. 

For the last weeks, the emotional pain you were in and the information and decisions you had to be aware of started physically manifesting. Stressful meetings turned into sleepless nights, attempts at easing our team’s fears of uncertainty turned into rheumatoid arthritis flare-ups. I didn’t know how to change anything but to show up for you and tell you it's okay to cry and feel this way. 

I didn’t know it would be the last time I talked to you. I try not to get into my head about it, but I have some regrets. I am thankful that I told you I loved you often. I don’t doubt you knew. It was a video call, our last one. And I could see that you were in bed, typing on your laptop. The blankets covering you. It seemed obvious that you would go to sleep afterwards. What I wonder most, is if you knew when we were talking, or even saying goodbye, that it would be the last time. I wonder if it was a decision you made laughing because you realized nothing matters and you were taking your power… or were you succumbing to an attack your brain was having on you? I know it would often tell you that everything will forever hurt, and there was no reason to keep going.

At the end of the day, the things I wonder don’t change anything and it doesn’t make anything better. I could never blame you for feeling the things I felt myself…

I met you as a teenager in California. I was living in LA, and you were living in the Bay Area. We had switched homes temporarily. Over the years, I knew you to be someone who was a part of my personal social circle (being queer in the Bay Area will do that), and someone in my work circle (this circle overlapped with the queer circle, but they definitely were two seperate groups). 

From my teen years to now, we were effortlessly in each other’s orbits. When we both lived in LA, a group chat between you, me, and a few of our other work friends developed into a beloved monthly oyster and seafood outing. You and I would bond over struggling with cystic acne, but wanting the garlic noodles anyway. Three times out of four we would split them because there was more to life than being beautiful (although we were beautiful with or without our breakouts.)  The Oyster Gang would reminisce positively about these outings for years to come, wishing we could all come together easily again. 

Then there was the time we ran into each other at a friend’s wedding celebration that took place at a bar in Oakland. They had a photobooth where we took my favorite photostrip of us ever (it is now my lockscreen). You and [redacted] made out in that same photobooth and you were so giddy when you told me. You were so happy that night, and to my knowledge sober. It was so good to see you laughing freely. There were many heavy things we have experienced together but this memory is a beautiful light and fun one. I cherish it and I’m so thankful I have a memento to remember. 

Ebbing and flowing into each other’s lives would never stop even though eventually, we made our homes far, far away from California… I went 3000 miles, you took the cake with almost 6,000. I don’t know what that says about us, or how we felt, but I’m pretty certain we wanted to get the fuck away from anything familiar. I related with you on that. 

As we somewhat moved on from the Tongva Land (Los Angeles) chapter of our lives, it seemed like you had so much drive both inside and out of the industry we met in. I was always impressed with your endeavors. Remember, we were even working on a writing project together for a magazine once upon a time? I loved the range our friendship had. 

Exene and myself the night our friends got married.

We had periods where we didn’t contact each other–but never because of a fight or falling out. Recently, I was going through my voicemails and discovered an old one from you. You were telling me about a new job and if I wanted to get involved. As much as you went through, you always wanted to make it better for somebody else. It was something I admired so much about you. You would come to me with different opportunities which always made me feel good because as sex workers, finding non-sex work jobs that took us seriously could be difficult. Plus, the companies you worked with were always trying to make a difference.

This particular voicemail was from 2016. I can’t help notice that your voice was a bit higher and sounded more youthful, maybe a little less tired too. I had to double check the date because it sounded so similar to a voicemail you left me in May 2022 where you asked if I would want to work with you again. I jumped at the chance to be part of something bigger than myself as I was looking for my next venture in life. 

I hadn’t seen you since 2019 when I lived in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. You were visiting from Europe, maybe Berlin? I had a vintage looking green couch that was great to film on and you happened to need a video filmed for a project! I set up my lights, and even did your makeup. (I have some hilarious selfies of me eating green grapes that match the couch and you in a latex outfit in the background sitting on it. They still make me laugh. I gasped when I realized your mother probably had your phone after you passed, and if she did, she might’ve seen those photos of us. Horrifying.) We were both very on and off with filming, but always down to help each other with whatever. At the time I was building my makeup portfolio. Surprisingly, we never worked together while filming to make content featuring both of us as performers. So even this time, I just filmed you being cute in a full body outfit. Sort of tame, but you were giving high art in some latex!

It would be years before I saw you in person again. Covid happened too and I know that was terrible for you. We reconnected after losing touch for a number of reasons– none of them either of our faults. It was always easy to open back up to each other again. 

So I was thankful. Thankful to have a new job, thankful to get to talk to you every day, and meet new like minded people. I was also in the first real relationship I had been in after my abusive relationship in 2019, and losing a fake soulmate of mine in November 2021. Everything was looking up. You were telling me people at work were more talkative and excited than before, and that I was doing a great job in your eyes. That’s really all I cared about. We were on top of the world for a few weeks. Showing up to accomplish a mission turned into showing up to try to alleviate what I could from the suffering I saw all around me.

I don’t know when it all unraveled and describing it sometimes I can’t help but laugh my ass off–and I know you would laugh with me. Other people might find it concerning but somewhere along the way, you and I both realized no matter how serious or funny we regarded things, it would remain the same. We could laugh at our pain, and it would still hurt. We could be serious about it, it would still hurt - maybe more. I laugh when I think about how I found out you passed while I was having an active mouse problem in my apartment building so I couldn’t even lay in bed and be depressed correctly. I laugh when I think about our entire team getting let go from work three weeks after we lost you… because if mourning you wasn’t enough, we needed financial issues too. 

I laugh when I think about how my relationship fell apart, my roommates seemed to stop talking to me, and my parents stopped contacting all in the same week or two. I laughed at how my life had been in constant crisis for years and I feared being the person where “it’s always something.” So I didn't reach out as I normally would’ve, and I kept to myself and tried to talk to professionals to make sure I was okay. The people who asked knew I was fighting harder than I had ever fought. 

I laughed, but I cried probably more than I have. For a month, I could only connect to people who had gone through similar trauma that I did. Six months earlier, they were all strangers and now they are some of my best friends. I’m so thankful you brought them into my life because even in the depths of my darkness, moving forward seemed possible with them. I spent nights consecutively on their couches, crying in between laughing, cuddling with their cats. 

I hate to be dramatic, but who knows where I would be if I didn’t have a community that valued supporting one another, validating one another, and making sure we’re all okay. You made people feel so important, heard, and irreplaceable. The way we listen to each other and try to understand one another is unlike anything else I have in my life. We made Avril Heals as a way to bring our daily escapism fantasies to a reality. We wanted to honor you by sharing the joy and healing you gave us with others.