Aggeo Simões and Luís Sander have been friends for 35 years. They met at the age of 7, at school in Belo Horizonte, and they have shared a lot during this time- passion for drawing, magazines, comics and music, a common girlfriend in the teenage times, many trips, some fights, same university class and a partnership in a small advertising agency.

Aggeo was the last person Luis called before dying, in a car accident, in the middle of the night in 2010. “I felt terrible for not hearing the phone call”, he says. “For a long time I wondered that if I had answered maybe Luis could be alive”. Until today Aggeo doesn’t forgive his friend for not using the belt that night…

Luís went away but Aggeo is still with him in a way. In his blog Manual do Pai Solteiro, from the best seller with the same name, there is a letter Aggeo published to his friend, illustrated with a self-portrait made by Luis. The drawing was colored by Ava, Aggeo’s daughter

Writing helped me with my grieving, such as other things Aggeo tells below. Then we reproduce the letter published on his blog originally. Both of them confirm the sentence we, from the project love repeating: “The ones we love are always alive inside us”
With the word, Aggeo:

“One of Luis sons is my symbolic “Godson”, in the sense he has never been baptized * we are both atheists). He has graduated in the end of 2010 and he called me to replace his dad…It was very touching. In the first year after the accident I tried to stay near my family, especially Ava, his family and the friends in common. I told Ava that I had met Luis when I was her age… laughed with friends remembering old stories… Sharing memories gives the idea that the person is still alive, because we realize that the person is still in people’s minds. Until today I catch myself talking to Luis when I see some situation that I know that he would say something funny or when I think about something that only he would be able to understand.”
From a single dad to another: Luís Sander (originally published on Manual do Pai Solteiro blog).

“My dear friend Luis,

In my 17s I was so naive, I gave you so much support when you wanted to get your girlfriend pregnant h so you could live together, also at 17. After Lucas was born we saw that things would not be like that Culture Club song, Love is love. But even that was not so hard, right? You and Lu worled hard but raised two beautiful and talented boys. You were the first guy ,my age, who was a father. This made me admire you more than before. I’ll never forget the day the three of us, lying eating popcorn and watching TV, in that apartment downtown which had a beautiful view of the Santa Tereza bridge, in despair because Lu’s water had just broken and we went to the hospital so fast… as if the Terminator were behind us. A first for everything. So much emotion.

I get inspired by some of your plays with Lucas to cheer up my little girl. And how you used all your talent to make him laugh and admire you. Before all this shared custody talk, you became a single parent and had an intense relationship with your children, always gaving everything to them, the coolest toys ever. Education. Good mood. Music. A lot of music.
If we miss you, friend, imagine them. But be ok because what you would give them would bey more of the same you have always given. They already have all of you. Face, intelligence and talent. You did a much better job than the absolute majority of parents. And will continue to do it because of what you have left in children memories, that I hope to be as good as yours. Elephant memory.

Boy, when Ava was born you were the first person I remembered, because after the birth of Lucas I had never slept in a maternity hospital. I want to be a nice father as you have always been. And a great ex-husband also. A task that is sometimes difficult, but it is essential.
Hug, my dear friend, ThePolice will not play together anymore. “