- Ladies and gentlemen, we're sending over 30% of our kids
to the Ivy Leagues, baby.
- [Student] He does everything to get us to college.
- It's not a normal school.
- All that I care about is winning.
- [Interviewer] Do you have any texts
from a loved one that passed away?
- I do.
- Yeah.
- Yes, my best friend. His name is Angel.
He passed away in 2019.
- What was your favorite memory with him?
- Oh, there's a lot.
So the first time we went to a concert,
and it was like our first time, like, you know,
trying to buy alcohol.
That's where, like I realized like, okay you know,
yeah, this guy's gonna be my partner
where we're gonna get into a lot of trouble.
He text me saying a doctor told him that he had leukemia.
That's where he sent me like his last text.
I know this is random but if anything happens to me,
like if I die, I just want you to know
that you've always been my best friend.
And if anything happens to me, do me a favor
and watch out for Allison and Treasa for me.
We never had all this bromance,
like, oh, I love you bro, this and that.
I did realize like, oh shoot, like, this is happening.
And then I said, don't say that yet.
Say that in the next 50 years.
And that was it. That was my last message to him.
But I do have one video.
He was passed out. I was drawing something on his neck.
- You gotta use your words, you can't do this to me.
- A little touch up there.
Do you wanna sit up? Do you wanna sit up?
- Yeah. To be honest, I am tearless,
I've cried so many times. I don't think I can cry anymore.
- Her name is Blue Roxy Scott, she's my best friend,
and she passed away in 2020 from cystic fibrosis.
For her whole life,
I've known that she wasn't going to live very long,
so the text messages are just me talking to her
like I would talk to her any other day.
So, on September 18th I said, hey, do you have any idea
how I make skinny jeans cool?
And she goes, hmm, maybe a cute belt
with a big shirt tucked in the front.
And I go, wow, that was some good advice.
I didn't expect that.
And she just said, LOL.
And then I text her, hi, I love you, you're a rockstar.
You got this.
And she never responded.
I feel connected to her all the time,
but especially like watching sunset
always makes me feel connected to her,
anytime I'm at the beach or just re-watching videos.
- Just kidding Meghan, I love you.
You brought me pie last night.
- Wait, what?
- Yeah. She brought us pie.
- That was just at the beginning, her saying like
that she loves me.
She wasn't very like, open about those sort of things.
So to like have her voice on video saying that she loves me
is like super special.
So today I'm talking about my friend, Angie.
We met at the top of 2019 and right away we vibed.
My favorite memory with Angie
was actually at my 20th birthday party.
At the end of the party she went up to me
and she was just like, thank you so, so, so much
for inviting me. Like, I'm so glad I came.
She really needed that and everything,
and I was really glad to like
bring some like light and life into her.
So yeah, the last couple ones,
the first she wished me happy birthday,
she was like, enjoy yourself fully.
And I was like, thanks Ang! Miss you, come through tonight.
And she was like, I can get outta work at eight,
you think I can still slide?
And I was like, hell yeah.
Like you'll probably just miss the food, but that's all.
And then she was like, sounds good.
And that was the last message I had from her.
So it wasn't until my second day of my last semester
at Santa Ana that our mutual friend Candace goes up to me
and she goes "Did you hear about Angie?"
She was like, "Angie passed away".
And it was really hard
because she told me February 12th, 2020,
and Angie had passed away January 12th, 2020.
So like, I didn't get to go to her funeral.
I didn't get any type of closure,
but I had a lot of film rolls from my birthday party.
And so I was like, I need to develop all of them.
I need to develop for them now.
This is Angie. This is my favorite picture of her.
I took the picture and I just like
think of the last thing she said to me,
and I think of like, just how happy she was.
And it's just really nice to be a light like that
in other people's lives.
- My dad was a very intense kind of like big personality,
vivacious type of person.
He dealt with a lot of anger issues.
A lot of that stemmed from, had the childhood
that he had to endure growing up.
He would try to reach out to me a lot
and I didn't really wanna talk to him,
but the last time he reached out, I was like,
I'm gonna assert myself
and I'm not gonna text back until I want to.
And that was a few days before he passed.
He said, I know you're probably busy
but just wanted to say hi and I love you.
And then he said, why you no say love you dad?
With like a crying emoji.
And I said, I love you too,
sometimes when I get messages before meetings
or read them right when I wake up, I forget to respond.
And then in the morning he said
love you and have a less stressful day punkins,
which was a nickname he called me with some emojis,
and said love you too, I'm hoping it's less stress.
And then he said, my buddy had me covered for three days,
beer emoji, thumbs up, laughing emoji,
and I'd send a pot leaf, but I don't have that emoji.
And I said, LOL sadly.
And then that was it. Just like benign.
But it's weird that the last thing I ever said to him
was the word sadly.
- [Interviewer] Yeah?
- Yeah, just weird.
My dad passed away in a motorcycle accident
and he was drunk.
He just always happened to be that guy
that would get away with whatever,
and just be fun and it's fine.
And it's like, it's fine until it's not fine.
- I have a text from my brother who passed away.
I've known him since I was like four.
We always called each other like,
that he's my brother, but he's not biological.
He went missing.
His mom called me and said that they couldn't find him,
they didn't know where he was,
he wasn't answering his phone.
I had to drive around LA looking for him.
I eventually found him in Santa Monica,
and then he was like expressing that he, you know,
he was thinking about committing suicide.
So I took him home and I was checking up on him
as much as I could,
and then the next day he went missing again.
We found him, he had walked a little bit,
but he wasn't really talking to me anymore.
So I was like, okay, like,
we need to take you to the hospital
and figure out what's going on.
I got a text from him and he was just like,
hey James, are you here?
I was just like, yeah, I'm here, we're all here for you,
what's going on?
20 minutes later, I got a call from one of his friends
saying that he jumped off the building and he killed himself
and his phone was on him,
and I never got a response to the text I sent him.
I don't know. Sometimes I forget like that he is not here.
Like, I'll have a dream and then it'll feel real,
and then the next day I'll like go to text him
and then I'll be like, wait, I can't.
- So I met Vincent Nava in my Freshman year.
As a person, he was just so outgoing.
He never cool guy-ed anybody.
Like, he was the same person to everybody.
Favorite memory of him is probably
the last day I had with him,
because I think I cherished it the most,
'cause I didn't get to see him after that.
We went to my friend's house,
we were all getting together, just friends.
There was actually a couple pictures from the days before,
from another party, and I sent them to him.
And he was like, my family, I love you,
and I was like, I love you more.
He was like, where you at?
And I was like, (beep) my bad boo.
I was like, literally with my whole family came through,
I'm at my crib.
I'm gonna get ready right now and head over, pull up.
And then he was like, for sure on my way sexy.
And then I just gave him the heart eyes.
That was just like literally the last day I gotta see him.
And the next day he drove to LA and then he swerved
and then he hit a back of a 18 wheeler
and he was in a coma for a couple days
and he just never made it out.
I just cherished those last moments that I had with him,
and I always have him on my chain all the time,
and I wear him every single day.
I don't ever take this off right here.
- So I'm talking about my dad today.
He passed away last year, last March.
He had terminal cancer.
He and I were probably a lot similar than I like to admit.
He was a professor, he taught art.
But the last text exchange that we have,
I was on my way to go visit one of my best friends.
He texted me right before I got on the plane.
Love you! Have a great trip.
Learn from the world with others dear to you, your pop.
And then I said landed!
When he got sick, it changed how he looked,
and so I don't really have very many pictures of him
during that season, just because he looked really sick.
And so I have some pictures of us when I was little.
That's me when I was little,
and that's my dad.
I recorded his voice a lot, so I have a lot of his voice.
- [Pop] Ellis, this is pop.
I'm just calling to see if you got there okay.
- That's it.
I think that's the thing I miss most
is having someone to come home to,
just a little voicemail to check in and see how I'm doing.
- [Interviewer] Is there anything
that you would want to say to her?
- I would just say that I miss her. I miss you so much.
- One thing that comes to mind is say, let's have a beer.
I'd like to have, yeah,
I'd like to have one more beer with him.
- I just miss you. And I hope that you feel better.
I hope that you don't have that stress of your body anymore.
- I'm glad that I got to show you that I loved you
and that you knew that.
- I miss you and I love you very much,
and I hope that you're doing well wherever you are,
and I hope you're happy.
- Dealing with somebody that passed away close to you
is a rock of emotions,
and it doesn't hit everybody the same.
And you know, sometimes I'm just driving in my car
and I'll be crying.
And like, it would just hit me
'cause I realize that I really can't see
my best friend again.
There's no right or wrong way to do it,
just feel the emotions and go through it,
and I would definitely talk to people about it.
- Focus on the community you have around you,
because so many people love you.
And I think it's just about the little ways
that you preserve them and you keep them in your memory.
I think you just have to continue to live for them
and there's gonna be really bad days,
and you're gonna miss them so much,
but then there's gonna be really good days,
and you're just gonna know that they're smiling at you.