Some people leave quietly,
like the last light slipping beneath the horizon.
You didn’t.
You left stories
tucked into airports,
echoes of laughter
across provinces,
footprints in countries
most of us only dream of.
You carried more than illness.
You carried curiosity.
Adventure.
Kindness.
The stubborn belief
that life was still worth living,
even when it asked far too much of you.
Eight and a half years
isn’t just a battle.
It’s birthdays fought for.
Sunrises refused to surrender.
Moments collected
because tomorrow was never promised.
Love found you anyway.
It found you
when Ana walked into your life.
It found you in family,
in friendships,
in every conversation
that turned strangers into people
who never forgot your name.
There was supposed to be a wedding.
Instead,
there were goodbyes.
Life can be unbearably unfair like that.
But love doesn’t end
because a heartbeat does.
It lingers
in the stories your family tells,
in the places you’ve been,
in every person
who laughs because they remember something you once said.
You may have lost your fight with cancer,
but cancer never stole
the man you were.
Not your courage.
Not your heart.
Not the life you packed
into every single day you were given.
So today,
I don’t remember a disease.
I remember a cousin.
A man who loved,
who wandered,
who dreamed,
and who left this world
far too soon—
but not without leaving
pieces of himself
in all of us.
Rest easy, Darcy.
The sky is a little bigger now,
because somewhere beyond it,
you’re finally traveling
without pain.
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