This was the last project you would ever work on, but it was going to be the project that would catapult you into the next stage of your career. It was supposed to be a beginning, not an end. A few days after you died, Aziz sent me a long email sending his condolences. In it, he talked about what the show would mean for you:
I’m not sure how much he told you about the project we were working on together but he was the first person I wanted on board. He was fantastic. It was great seeing how much he’d grown as a writer and storyteller. He was a leader. He was hilarious. He challenged me in the best ways when everyone else was ready to move on. He was only there three days a week and we all hated those two days when he wasn’t around. My little brother wrote on the show and loved him and Harris was like a mentor. He was so sweet to him and all the other younger writers.
The other week we cast him to play a part on the show and he was elated. I remember when we made the phone call that let him know he’d got the part, hearing the excitement in his voice now just makes my heart break. He was so excited and so were we. He was so thrilled to move to New York. He got a ridiculous haircut that he thought looked good. He was planning on losing weight and cutting back on his insane diet.
It was going to be huge for him.
I was so thrilled that more people were going to see his genius. It was going to be a raw, unfiltered version of his comedy that we just didn’t have a chance to see yet. He was at the top of his game in so many ways. Knowing he was on the cusp of something so fantastic just adds another cruel layer of sadness to this whole thing.
I loved him dearly. We all did. And I’m so sorry he’s gone. But the few years I had with him are better than 10,000 years with most of the boring people out there. I’m glad we all had him while we did. I’ll make sure to keep him in my heart forever and everything I do will be in his honor with the goal of trying to make him laugh somewhere, wherever he is.
He loved you dearly, Harris.
Everyone did.
Wherever you are, I hope you know that now.
22 Eight Months, Six Days
In ways, I always felt like your mother. It’s not that our mother didn’t do a good enough job or that we were latchkey kids or something like that—quite the opposite, in fact. I was just so proud of you in this way that—now that I’m a mother—can only be described as maternal. I loved you unconditionally from the start and always jumped at the opportunity to tell anyone who would listen just how special you were.
Today, Mike and I leave Iris with Mom and Dad and go to a play. Coincidentally, we sit next to two middle-aged women who are talking about Oddball Comedy Festival, which came through town last weekend. They’re raving specifically about Aziz Ansari’s set; how phenomenal, adorable, and hilarious he was. Aziz was kind enough to get Mike and me tickets to the show, but the baby wasn’t feeling well. Or maybe I wasn’t feeling well. Or maybe I just didn’t want to sit there and see Aziz being funny and alive when you can’t be either of those things.
In the old days, I would have boldly interrupted their conversation with “Oh, my brother is a writer and executive producer on Parks and Rec.” I loved to brag about you and did it often. Not much to brag about now!
I mean, I could butt in and say: “You know, Aziz Ansari is a truly good person in real life. He sent us a churro cake in the mail. It was creamy and delicious. And he wrote the most beautiful tribute about my brother after he died of a heroin overdose. It made us all laugh after forty-eight hours of feeling like Mel Gibson in the torture scene from Braveheart. Aziz was a pallbearer at his funeral. My brother was a one of three writers on his new Netflix series that’s being advertised every fucking place I look. Social media is a land mine—is that your experience of it? My brother was going to play Aziz’s best friend in the show. It was going to be his big break into the acting world. He was moving to New York. He’d booked an Airbnb.”
But you died, and none of that stuff happened. So I say nothing.
Watching Master of None is like sticking needles into a voodoo doll of myself, but I’m some sort of masochist and need to feel the pain. The goodness, originality, and authenticity of the show is mind-blowing. And you had so much to do with that. I hear your voice so clearly in it. Like that scene from the “Nashville” episode in which Aziz and his date are at a BBQ restaurant in Nashville, and Aziz is trying to negotiate what they’ll split until he finds out she’s a vegetarian. This is genuinely heartbreaking to him because it means no “splitsies.” Splitting things was of paramount importance to you. One dish was never enough. You always had to try everything on the menu.
I think of our family vacation to Maui a few years ago. It was on this trip that you bought that blue Maui cap you always wore. Mom caught this scene on the flip camera you bought her for her
