Death seems to come out of nowhere at times

And yet, death is everywhere

It is and one day will be everyone, and everything we know, everything we love, everything we care about

One day, it will be us

Today, death is Ian.

Death is Ian, with the goofy long hair and sleepy face and **** smile

Is it wrong to think of someone just-dead as ****?

Death is everywhere, every moment, but today, tonight, death is especially heavy.

Death is questions.
Is dying from kidney failure painful?
What happens now?

Death is an empty chair and desk in several classrooms on Monday, eyes drawn toward it but not lingering.

Death is a locker full of belongings never to be opened by its owner again.

Will they empty his locker?

Use it as a memorial?

Death is knowing that the name ‘Ian’ is on the mind of so many people in Carteret tonight.

Death is never graduating from high school. Never going to college. Having kids.

Death is the negative. The permanent.

Death is personal but impersonal, impartial and omniscient.

Death is not knowing which one is better.

Death is knowing that life will go on.

Life will go on with the loss of life.

Death is personal, singular tonight, for us, but it is unifying.

More than a pep rally, more than school spirit.

Death unifies hundreds of different people tonight in a way that is unexpected, uninvited, yet irrevocable.

Death is everyone and everything. Every age, every gender, every religion, sexuality, status, history, personality.

Tonight, death is Ian Jacob.