Leo Died.

Ronan. A bedtime story for you. An unconventional story. The best kind of bedtime story. Because you never got the chance to grow up and hear this one. So I will tell it to you now. Enjoy, little one.

My childhood, Ronan. So whimsical. So unstable. So honest. A childhood full of love and chaos — but not the good kind. The kind that ends in divorce because parents fight too much. The kind that makes a little girl grow thick skin before she even understands why she needs it. I am thankful for that skin. I have always been thankful for it.

It was a childhood where rules didn’t really apply — but dreams did. Dreams were mine. Nobody else’s to shrink. Nobody else’s to define. They were shattered often. Into a million tiny pieces. And I learned to gather them, one by one. Alone.

A small town. A very small town. Wrapped in trees so tall they felt like walls. Everyone looked the same. Believed the same. Sat in the same pews every Sunday. Difference didn’t disappear there. It just learned how to make people uncomfortable.

Until one day.

One day, a man appeared as if he had stepped out of another world and landed in our kitchen.

Tall. So impossibly tall. Your daddy tall. Six-seven at least. To a little girl like me, he looked mythic. Curly, shoulder-length black hair. Skin dark brown and rich, like polished wood catching light. The kind of dark brown my town didn’t know how to hold with ease. The whitest smile. The biggest smile. And the most sparkling chocolate eyes.

Well… almost.

My first encounter with sparkly eyes.

His name was Roger. But we called him Leo. Leo the Lion.

And he was magic.

Not magic in a fantasy way. Magic in the way some people just carry warmth with them. When Leo walked into our house, the air softened. My mom’s shoulders dropped. My dad’s laugh came quicker. Something inside our home felt steadier when he was there.

My parents loved him openly. Fiercely. Without hesitation.

They never introduced him cautiously. Never explained him. Never softened him to make anyone else comfortable. He wasn’t a guest. He wasn’t “Dad’s friend.” He was Leo. Ours. My mom cooked for him like she cooked for us. My dad listened to him in a way that felt sacred. They defended him without ever having to say they were defending him. It was quiet loyalty. It was love without performance.

He belonged to us. And we belonged to him.

But the town noticed.

There were glances in grocery store aisles. Conversations that lowered when we walked by. Smiles that didn’t quite reach people’s eyes. I didn’t have the word racism then. I just knew some people stared at Leo longer than they stared at anyone else. I knew our small town wasn’t used to a tall, dark brown man standing confidently in the middle of its pale sameness.

Leo never shrank.

Neither did my parents.

They chose him anyway. Chose love anyway. Chose integrity over comfort. And I watched that. I watched them refuse to make him smaller so the town could feel bigger.

He would show up at our house out of nowhere and stay for weeks. Go on trips with us. Sit at our kitchen table like he had always been meant to sit there. He laughed loud. Hugged tight. He made you feel seen. Completely seen. When he picked me up, I felt weightless. Protected.

To ten-year-old me, he wasn’t different. He was luminous.

He did not apologize for existing. That kind of freedom was radical in a place built on sameness.

One night he drove in from a few hours away. I remember him standing in the kitchen light, glowing in that way he did. He lifted his shirt to show my parents a wound on the side of his stomach that wasn’t healing.

He made light of it. Joked. He didn’t want to worry anyone. He was always protecting other people from his pain.

Time moved the way time does. My parents divorced. I saw less of Leo. He was my dad’s best friend, and I didn’t see my dad as much.

Then the phone call.

“Leo is sick,” my dad said. “Leo has a disease called AIDS.”

“AIDS?” I remember saying. “Like Magic Johnson?”

I knew what that meant. I knew it was a death sentence.

My dad said he would take care of him. Organic juices. Vitamins. Meditation. Anything he could think of. My dad loved him that much. He loved him like a brother. Maybe more fiercely than that. The world wasn’t kind to men like Leo in those years. Insurance was uncertain. Fear was loud. Ignorance louder.

But inside my dad’s care, there was dignity. There was devotion.

My dad watched him die.

It was my first real encounter with death. Not someone elderly. Not someone whose time felt complete. A vibrant, dark brown man who once filled our kitchen with laughter.

After he died, I learned more about his life. About the courage it took for him to live as fully as he did in a world that didn’t always make room for him. But in our home, he was never a lesson. Never a symbol. He was just Leo. And what is more beautiful than being loved simply as yourself?

It took me years to grieve him properly. I still miss him. But I miss him in a beautiful way. When I think of him, I hear his laugh. I see his smile. I remember what freedom looks like.

He was my first teacher outside my parents. He showed me that love does not need permission. That difference is not danger — it is light. That standing beside someone the world misunderstands is a sacred act.

And I think about him now, Ro.

I imagine him somewhere beyond this world, tall and glowing. I imagine you running toward him. I imagine those sparkling eyes meeting your sparkling eyes. I hope he is teaching you about courage. I hope he is keeping you safe.

Sometimes I feel like I have been turned back into that ten-year-old girl. Lost in a deep, dark forest. Standing at 1064 Harmony Drive. Wanting someone’s hand to hold.

But the only hand I want is yours.

And you are gone.

And I am here.

And life is not fair.

The end. For now. But not forever.

I love you, my never-spicy, extra-naughty monkey boy. I hope you are playing with Leo. I hope he is glowing the way he always did. I promise to make you both proud.

I love you. I miss you. So much.

xoxo