A night like no other

I’d say this story starts the night of November 6th, 2018. Me and a friend were at a kings game that night, that night at the game it just so happened to be country night. Me and my friend Ben were regulars, going every Wednesday for as long as I can remember. During the game we were talking about if we were gonna go to borderline the following night since we both had work. Then a song to one of our favorite dances came on and we decided that, that was a sign we should go. So fast forward to November 7th, 2018. I finish my shift at work later than usual and rush home to shower and change, meet up with my friends that live in simi and head over to borderline. By the time I get there, those friends in simi have decided that they did not want to go that night, me frustrated since I had already made plans to go told myself that I would hang out for a while then just drive myself. Then convinced to have a beer and stay for a while, I decided it probably was not a great idea to drive myself there so I decided to stay at my friends house and make the 1 minute drive back to my house later. Skip to 11:30, I will never forget this moment, I am walking back to my car to go home. My phone starts to ring, it’s my dad. An important part to this story, my dad is a police officer with the Simi Valley Police Department. The phone call starts with him frantically asking where I am knowing full well that there was a 99% chance that I was at Borderline. I told him that I was just getting in my car. Where he asks, I’m just at Blake’s house I respond. I hear the instant relief in his voice with a response that I will never forget, “there is a shooting at borderline, I am on my way there. I will call you when I leave.” My heart immediately sank to the floor. I got out of my car and ran straight back inside to Blake’s house. Where we called everyone we could think of. My first call was to Ben who I was with the night prior he was already outside. My second call was to my friend Justin, no answer. So I moved on and called a few others. Then tried Justin again. No answer. So immediately sent a text to see if he responded. No answer. Me and Blake had our eyes glued to news to see if we could find out anything. I end up leaving Blake’s house at 1:30 that morning to go home. At home, I broke down. No longer able to hold back any sort of emotion. I watched the news until 5:00 that morning. Just long enough to assure that my dad was ok, he called me around then to let me know that he was done and on his way back home. Absolutely mentally drained I tried my best to get sleep since I had to leave for work the same morning at 7:00. I probably got 30 minutes of sleep if that. At work (I worked at a sandwich shop in Newbury Park at the time) me and Blake opened and got ready for the day. That’s when my sister came to break the news that my friend Justin had passed away that morning in surgery. Unable to hold back anything, I had to go home. There is something completely different when losing someone for a reason such as this. It’s a loss that feels Incomplete in a sense. Death itself, as horrible as it is, there’s something about losing a loved one or friend to an act of unnecessary violence that leaves you empty. It is hard to try and find some sort of closure or way to move on. There is something that will always stick with you, something that will always make it hard to move on. To this day I still struggle with the fact they Justin m, and 11 other souls were taken from us that night. Im the ensuing days my depression had hit an all time low, almost as if I had regressed from all the progress I had made from over almost a years span. I am telling you now that I would have never made it through without the support of my close friends or the borderline community as a whole. The way we were able to bad together, and show love and care was outstanding. To people we had known for years, to people we met a few months ago, to people we met that day, to the older generation , to the younger generation, to the regulars and the newbies. It was the highest sense of Union I have experienced in my entire 22 years on this earth. To wrap this up, I have never been more thankful for a family that is not blood like the borderline family. When the cards were stacked against us we bonded together and rose against. I love each and every one of you and hope that in times of need we will be and forever will be there for each other.

Jonathan A.