Today an author who is writing a book about "reunions" with lost loved ones asked me to share the story of my friend Roy.
We Were Like Twin Souls, Accepting Each Other Down to the Core

I would bring back my best friend Roy Moyer. He died of AIDS 21 years ago, at the age of 29. We met at freshman orientation at Florida State University in Tallahassee, in 1976. I looked across the room and saw this tall, handsome Nordic blond guy. I said to myself: ‘There is my life’s best friend.” We became like brother and sister, closer even: like twin souls.
For years, we did everything together. We giggled and laughed and disco danced through the seventies. We were housemates our senior year; we fixed hundreds of awesome dinners together; we shopped and traveled together, and we shared our inner most feelings and experiences. In fact sharing something with Roy was often the best part of a new event in my life and hearing something wonderful that Roy experienced made me as happy as it made him.

Roy was warm and funny, goofy and silly in a Dudley Doo Right kind of way. He was kind and loving and generous and had a deep full laugh that was contagious. We accepted each other down to the core. Someone loving you that much made you feel loved absolutely. Roy taught me that people showed their love in different ways even saying Patti when I fix your broken necklace I am showing I love you when I reach something from a high shelf for you I am showing that I love you and I know when you have my favorite big BLT fixed for me at lunch you are loving me when you let me sing off key through a long car ride you’re showing that you love me.
We were tender and affectionate with one another always hugging each other and cuddling on the couch, but not in a sexual way. I was not attracted to him, which worked well as he was gay. Instead, we completed each other.

After college, he moved to Atlanta and became a social worker. I went to Auburn University to pursue a Master’s degree, and then returned to Tallahassee to begin a Ph.D. program. Roy and I where as close as ever. We talked for hours on our weekly phone calls and visited each other every few months.
I lived in a small town where I couldn't’t go shopping without running into someone I knew. Roy and I were so close that when my friends in Tallahassee would see me they would always ask, “How are you?” “How is Roy?”

I had a four-bedroom house with a big fenced-in yard that my dog would play in. I took martial arts classes, and I had a group of friends that were like a second family. I had a steady boyfriend. I’d eat grape nuts for breakfast and joke with my roommate about our crazy dream from the night before. I’d start my day singing in the shower and then get in my car singing along with the songs on my radio and go to work.

I had my own consulting company and taught communication at Florida State; my class in nonverbal communication had 150 students enrolled each semester. I was living a happily-ever-after existence, and Roy always a part of me and me always a part of him was so very happy too.

When we were both 29 Roy and I were walking in Atlanta’s Piedmont Park his big 6’2 frame towering above my petite two inches. It was a beautiful spring day as we circled the lake and I was blissfully breathing the fragrant flowered air. As we rounded a curve, Roy stopped, brushed back his blond hair, turned toward me and said, “Patti, I’m dying.”

I heard a loud gut-wrenching scream crying “No!” echo across the lake. It took me a moment to realize the scream was mine.

In that moment, everything in my life began to change. I knew with certainty I had to move to Atlanta to be with Roy. I didn’t ask him if he wanted me to come, I just decided. People thought I was crazy. But it was really selfish – I just had to be with him.

Within a few days, my boyfriend had broken up with me - he was afraid of being infected from my innocent friendship with Roy - and I began getting rid of my belongings. I sold almost everything in the house down to the bare walls. I took the cash and left my house, my friends, and my speaking business. I took a job as at temp receptionist in Atlanta to make ends meet, exchanging a $500-a-day speaking life for a $6.50-an-hour wage. Instead of being treated with respect and admiration, I was treated like a servant.

I took a small apartment and fitfully slept on a borrowed mattress on the floor of my closet. I was alone in a city filled with strangers. I would visit Roy every day he was in the hospital and sit on the edge of his bed, holding his hand. And though Roy and I would laugh as we always did, our jokes were about the glove-wearing hospital staff that tried to avoid touching him, his new free hospital gown wardrobe with built in”ties in back” air-conditioning and about his new easy diet plan, we called “Wendy’s drive through” a drip from a stand above his bed when he could no longer eat.

Over the year I watched him decline, he went from a being a strapping six foot 2 inch man to an emaciated 90-pounds that I could carry in my arms. I would return home each night, take a shower and weep uncontrollably. My sleep was filled with concentration camp filled nightmares. I saw Roy lose his ability to first walk, then to eat, then to remember, to speak and finally his ability to breathe.

Roy died in July before his 30th birthday. I could not believe that the world would keep spinning without that sweet boy. I could not believe that I didn’t die too. I was so surprised that I could actually go on breathing without him. His family insisted I have his ashes. He told me before he died he wanted me to have them so he could come to my wedding.

The reunion I envision would start out with just for the two of us. We would walk around his beloved Piedmont Park in Atlanta. As we walked, we’d catch up on each other’s news. We’d laugh about him never getting older than 29 and the fact that I, at 50, was still a tiny blond.

We would cry over having missed so many dinners and trips with each other. I’d tell him about the speaking practice I rebuilt after he died. I’d express regret that I haven’t yet married, so don’t yet have a son I can name Roy. I’d tell him how sorry I am that his sickness prevented him from marrying the man he loved, who later also died of AIDS.

Then we’d go for dinner at one of his favorite restaurants. He loved fine foods. We’d meet up with friends after dinner and go dancing together until the wee hours.

And I’d thank him for being the best friend in the world to me, for making my life so much richer through the gift of his unconditional love.
--Patti Wood, 50, Atlanta, GA, motivational speaker and consultant on nonverbal