It was something about the way he carried himself. His humor. His will.

You could see it in his eyes! High hopes, even when the cancer gave Kyle bouts of amnesia.

"I just can't remember people's names. Especially offended are girls!" Kyle told us last year. "They figure I should remember their names because they're all special."

Kyle delivered the line with his signature deadpan expression.

I first met Kyle one year ago today.

When Kyle was first diagnosed, his fraternity Theta Chi went all out to help Kyle fight that fight to live, to get the experimental treatment his insurance wouldn't pay for. They sold bracelets: "Their goal is to raise $100,000," Kyle told us.

KOMO viewers pitched in. I gave Kyle a check for $3,500 courtesy of our People Helper viewers. The University of Washington students gave up their lattes, and gave that cash for Kyle's treatment.

When Robin Imholte handed Kyle cash raised by the 'skip a latte' fundraiser, his response was classic Kyle. "Only wads of cash? That's all you could come up with, wads of cash?" I laughed. So did Robin. You couldn't help it when you were around Kyle. He was a very funny young man.

His mom Sheryl has a story that shows how humor was in Kyle's blood.

"Once a bully picked on him on the playground in elementary school and he put his fingers around his eyes and said, 'You wouldn't hit a kid with glasses would ya?' and the bully started laughing and left," says Sheryl. "That was the nature of his life. He dealt with all of his troubles with humor."

In the end, his fraternity, the community, our viewers and Web readers, came through with the $100,000.

Not just from here.

"We got people from Louisiana, from New York, California, and Arizona. They didn't know Kyle and never would," says C.J. Bowles, Kyle's friend and President of Theta Chi.

When I heard Kyle had taken a turn for the worse in the fall, I visited him in the hospital. My hope, that he was doing a lot better! It was wishful thinking.

Someone in my newsroom asked me just last week, "How's Kyle?" I told her, "I'm afraid to ask, afraid to know, afraid what Kyle's mom might tell me."

Then, Tuesday night, I got an e-mail from Kyle's mom Sheryl. I didn't want to open it. I wanted good news, not bad. I wanted my next story about Kyle to be a hopeful one.

Not this one.

"Hello John, just wanted you to know that our Kyle passed away last night," Sheryl wrote. "Thank you for entering Kyles' life. However briefly, you made an impression."

Kyle wanted the job I have. He told me so. What he couldn't know is how difficult this job is some days. Especially today.

Our thoughts and prayers are with the Charvat family and with the love of Kyle's life, his girlfriend Megan.

The memorial service will be held Jan. 28 at Overlake Christian Church in Redmond. The service starts at 2 o'clock. While Kyle's mom will write the eulogy, I have been asked to read the carefully crafted words.

It will be my honor.

"He was always my hero," says Sheryl Charvat. "And especially at the end".

Kyle Charvat was 22 years old.