See you in a better place Tujays

““When do you think people die? When they are shot through the heart by the bullet of a pistol? No. When they are ravaged by an incurable disease? No. When they drink a soup made from a poisonous mushroom!? No! It’s when… they are forgotten.”— Dr Hiriluk One Piece

When I said I wanted to write more this year some days back, I didn’t mean it to be this kind of article Julius Olufidipo fondly known as Tujays. It’s weird how the death of someone you’ve never met in person before can affect you. As someone said today, “friendship transcends boundaries.” I guess we can’t be too sure about our reactions to certain things. After all, Tujays was the awesome cool nerd guy next door.

I woke up this morning like any other morning. I do not have any morning routine except the daily devotion at home, which sometimes I don’t participate in due to late nights from work. This particular morning I woke up to having light, which is generally a good omen. I walked out of my room to my older cousin’s to greet and pester her as I do. With my phone in hand, I quickly attended to pending messages from individuals before I decided to check group messages. I went to Geekhub and found out the group was locked. My first thought was that most likely two opposing comic fans' debate had escalated and the group needed some cool time.

While scrolling up I saw Osama’s message “Tujays is dead” and I’m like, it’s probably a prank or something. Going through the messages till the end of the group chat confirmed that it was all real. Tears came rolling (they came visiting as I type too) and I went into the bathroom in my cousin's room. I cried while pondering on how fleeting life can be because if anyone deserved death, it wasn’t Tujays. The dude was the typical hardworking Nigerian youth who was pushing hard against the weapons this country had fashioned against him. He didn’t pick the easy way out but wanted to make an honest living doing what he loved best. What did he get in return? Killed by the poor healthcare sector. Things were just turning out well for him as he recently got admitted into Michigan Technological University.

I never got to meet him but I’ve known him online for about 5 years now thanks to WhatsApp. Tujays was this cool MCU fan with weird takes. I didn’t have an interaction with him on a personal level but the few times in the group were great. How you would deny being a ladies' man, how you believed No Way Home should have won best pictures at the Oscars, how you said all men have twerked once etc. You were so hyped for Dr Strange and The Multiverse of Madness, your most anticipated movie of the year and you left us 9 days away from it. Is it how you’ve roasted me for all my Ls from females over the years? Is it your unbiased review of Batman that was beautiful, just as how fanbases should be, no hate, just some cultured love? Bro legit made a fucking comic book, something we only could dream of. You can check out Obajimi on the https://www.raptures.io/ app.

I’m sorry Tujays for being a hypocrite. I’ve always believed in saying and doing things for people when they are alive and not when they are gone. Maybe that’s why this line, “Love me now, when I’m gone, love me none” by Frank Ocean gets to me a lot. Yet here I am, guilty of a habit I dislike. Valar morghulis but we will all miss you. Trust me, we will all go see Multiverse of Madness and I trust MCU not to disappoint us for you. Rest on Tujays.

This article was originally published here.