My Best Friend Died Today, December 2021

My best friend died this week. There are no words.

My friend’s death was horrific.  She and her brother were walking across a parking lot when they were hit by a speeding, out of control car. Tom died immediately; Kay was alive when she arrived at Christ Hospital’s Trauma Center.  According to the ER doc, she opened her eyes and uttered the words, “Help me. Please help me.” Her last words.  She died on the operating table of massive internal bleeding.

There are no words.  How does one comprehend your friend of more than 60 years innocently waking to the DMV to have her drivers license renewed and then having her body smashed into by a 1.5 ton mass of steel and iron.

I try not to envision her body laying on the cracked and dirty pavement of that parking lot.  I try not to envision it but it somehow it keeps wanting to play in my head anyway.  Was she conscious?  Did she know what hit her?  Was she in pain?  

Please God, she was not aware and did not feel the pain.

I have known and been best friends with Kay since sophomore year in High School.  Kay and I met and bonded over a speech I gave in Religion class, “A Meditation on the Crucifix” (you have to remember, this was 1962).  I couldn’t tell you why she liked that particular speech, but she stopped me after class to talk and we kept talking for the next 62 years.

Our teenage years were spent with our good friends, Betty, Pat “Duke,” Peggy, and another Pat or PR.  We called ourselves the “Unsinkables” and spent most Saturday nights going to sox-hops at one of the local high schools and ending up at a Pancake House in Evergreen Park drinking coffee, eating cinnamon roles and laughing so loud the manager would ask us to keep it down.  

In college we rode the el together to Loyola University which we attended as commuter students.  We’d study together, complain about our classes.  We’d join Sue, Carol Ann, Mary, Kathy, the 2 Bob’s, Lee, Jon and others at the Red Garter on Saturday nights where we would sing along with a banjo band and drink beer.  We both got jobs as waitresses to pay tuition, Kay at the Merchandise Mart and me at Stouffer’s.  

I married and joined VISTA and she went to work, eventually getting a Masters Degree from Jane Addams School of Social Work.  She dedicated her life to helping others.  I had three children, went through a divorce and remarried.  Kay was my steady rock through it all. 

The last many years we would meet at Fox’s Pizzeria on Western Avenue 3 or 4 times a month.  I felt guilty because it was close to my home but a drive for her, but Kay never minded.  We’d get there around six and often leave close to 10.  What did we talk about?  Everything.  Everything that is except politics.  She was conservative I am an unabashed liberal.  We loved and respected one another enough to leave politics off the table, especially these past five years.  But nothing else was prohibited.  She believed in Psychics, I didn’t.  Until she changed my mind.  I loved to travel and Kay would patiently listen to all my stories.  She took a handwriting analysis class so at least once a month I’d have her read my writing.  We’d share our hopes, our fears, our happinesses and sorrows.  We’d complain about perceived hurts and comfort one another when needed.

In short, we loved and respected each other.  I now understand how much I needed Kay – – – I like to believe she needed me too.  We kept one another going through all of life’s ups and downs.  She was there for me when my mother died, when my father died and when I lost two of my brothers.  Kay lost her father early but her mother lived to be over 100.  I hope I was as much support for her as she was for me.  Even during Covid, we would visit at our “driveway parties’ always six feet apart and wearing masks.

The circumstances of Kay’s death was shocking – so it was widely reported in the news.  Nearly all the news-reports described Kay and her brother as “elderly.”  “Two elderly siblings were hit by a car Wednesday afternoon and killed.”  

I’ve always taken offense at the use of elderly to describe those of a certain age.  To most, the term “elderly” implies a person is decrepit or has some kind of impairment.  Kay was neither.   She was a vibrant, inquisitive active woman enjoying her life, her family and her multitude of friends.  She could tell you the history of just about any country and summarize books she read years ago.  

Kay was not expendable.  Kay was loved and valued.  

Kay Coyne was my very best friend.  Her passing will leave a gapping whole in my heart and a void in my life that cannot be filled.  It’s only been a few days but I already worry  . . .  What will I do when I want to call Kay to meet for one of our long talks?  I don’t want to think about that; its too painful.  I want Kay here to help me through this pain.  But I know that won’t happen.

Then I remember something I heard long ago.  Maybe Kay said it, I don’t know.  “True friends are always together in spirit.”  

I don’t want you only in spirit, Kay.  I want you here sitting across from me at Fox’s. You with a gin and tonic, tall – me with my Miller Lite. – – together helping each other through life.