Siloe Irumva had just graduated from Lewiston High School earlier this month. He was going to the University of Maine in the fall to study business and accounting.

Instead, he is being mourned by shocked friends and family.

“Me and Siloe did pretty much everything together,” said Ange Adoni, Irumva’s brother. “I played basketball with him all the time. At one point we slept in the same bed until I was 9. He was everything to me, and I just miss him so much.”

Irumva died Friday after falling into the Androscoggin River while fishing with friends near the Gulf Island Dam at about 7:30 p.m., the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife said in a statement. His body was recovered by divers the next day.

On Monday, Irumva’s shocked family and friends said the teen was caring, funny and honest, and a member of the Lewiston community who will be sorely missed.

They also struggled to come to grips with the tragedy that had taken their friend, brother and son so quickly.

A FISHING TRIP GONE BAD

Irumva and his friends were fishing Friday in a usual spot along Switzerland Road in Lewiston near the Gulf Island Dam. According the state officials, he slipped on a rock while trying to detangle a fishing lure from a tree branch and fell into the water. The river’s current swept him downstream and under water.

Irumva had taken up fishing after graduation, according to Akylle Murchinson, one of Irumva’s friends and manager at FunZ Trampoline Park in Lewiston, where Irumva worked. The pair and other friends began going to the spot dear the dam.

On Friday, Murchinson said, he let Irumva leave work a little early to go fishing. Murchinson wanted to go himself, but had work obligations.

“I regret not going,” said Murchinson. “I feel like if I were there, everyone would have made it home safe.”

Majid Ahmed, one of Irumvas’ closest friends, was going to join him there. Ahmed had been to the spot a few times, but had never fished. That day, Irumva was going to teach him how.

Instead, as Ahmed neared the fishing area, he heard people shouting.

“Everyone was screaming (Siloe’s) name, and I didn’t know what was happening,” Ahmed said Monday. “I then saw a body in the water, and it looked like the body was right under the water but all I saw was a shoulder and it looked like someone was swimming.

“My other friends were screaming that he was drowning and they were both crying. I started running after him yelling his name and then his body goes under the water.”

Ahmed quickly called 911. Emergency responders came quickly, but not before Ahmed lost sight of his friend in the water.

He then called Murchinson, who thought it was all a joke at first. Then Murchinson decided to call Irumva’s brother.

“That was one of the worst phones calls I’ve ever had to make,” said Murchinson. “I panicked and said, ‘I just got a call from Majid saying your brother just drowned in the water,’ and I heard his voice drop.”

A FAMILY BROKEN

Irumva and Adoni had a strong sibling bond, doing everything as they grew up together. From shooting hoops to playing outdoors, the two were inseparable.

So when Adoni got the call from Murchinson, he too thought it was a joke. It was made real to him when Murchinson kept saying the same sentence over and over again in a scared tone.

Adoni then had to tell his father.

“When I told my dad, he was on the phone with someone, and he took the phone and threw it across the room,” said Adoni. “He didn’t believe what was going on and kept asking where he was. We jumped in the car and quickly went to where Ahmed told us to go.”

When the family got to the scene, they could see emergency responders searching the Androscoggin River for their loved one. They wouldn’t find his body until the next day.

Adoni said the first night without his brother he couldn’t sleep, knowing that his life would be different without him.

OUTPOURING OF SUPPORT

Almost immediately, Ahmed felt like he needed to do something to remember his friend.

Then, the idea came to him: a memorial for Siloe.

“I know he would’ve done the same for me if he were in my shoes,” he said. “I thought it was the least we could do for him.”

Together, a group of people who were at the scene made posters, hung up balloons and put a candle to form a memorial on Longley Bridge over the Androscoggin, just downstream from the dam.

When the memorial was touted on social media, residents from the Twin Cities also came to share their condolences.

“All of a sudden, we saw people coming and leaving flowers, signing their names,” said Ahmed. “We saw people who just graduated, members of the Lewiston High School basketball team, all here for Siloe.”

Adoni said he and his family went to the memorial as well, and were stunned to see so many people coming out for Irumva. In addition, a GoFundMe set up in Irumva’s memory has raised more than $7,000.

“I didn’t know he had this much of a connection to the community, people that cared about him,” said Adoni. “But this felt like the right thing to do. It felt like Siloe was looking down and smiling on us.”