my best friend died in november. i dreamed it would happen earlier that month, but didn't think anything of it.
my first best friend, that is. there's been ones after her, there were even ones during; i've never been the kind of person that can have too many best friends. i have a lot of best friends now. i love my friends. and i say first because i'd called people that before her, a few girls in elementary, but most of those relationships ended terribly and were horribly onesided. wasn't the case with emma. we'd known each other since kindergarten through girlscouts, but she started being my girl in the sixth grade. she was my girl for six years after that, but things fell apart right after our senior year. i won't get into the why. i barely remember the why. fucking teenager shit, man.
point is, we stopped fucking talking. i didn't even know why, for years. couldn't remember how we got to point b from point a. i ran into her mom at the store. she told me, or implied, she'd gone down a kind of dark path. got involved with some fucking loser who'd come to her funeral high. who would remove her from his profile picture not even 2 months after she passed and jump at the chance of listing himself as single on facebook.
always did hate her boyfriends
i found out december first, because a friend told our other friend about her obituary in the paper. that friend came to me and asked me if i was okay. i didn't know what she meant. she had to call me and tell me.
i never thought i'd be so far removed from her that i wouldn't know if something happened.
her step dad said to me, i wanted to make sure someone got ahold of you. her sister said, i'm so glad you came. her mom said, i knew you would. (and i knew you'd bring as many as you could.) i'm glad she knew.
after the funeral, i started looking for memorabilia. i found a bracelet she made for me in high school. i don't really remember why she made it for me, i think it was just a gift... but i'm not sure. i never wore it. i've never really been a jewlery guy. i hope it never hurt her feelings. i haven't taken it off since i found it. the silver on the charm has been rubbed pink from how often i hold it. it's all i really have left of her.
i lost the charm tonight, for about 20 minutes. it kind of felt like the world was ending all over again. then when i found it, i cried even harder, clutched the fucking thing like it was her hand, and just laid there? it was a really weird, sobering moment. i haven't been able to keep this bracelet off my wrist since i found it. i keep telling myself she's still with me if it's on me. i know it doesn't work like that. and, yet? and yet. that's it, i guess.
our friendship wasn't perfect. it really wasn't. we fought all the time. we dated for a week, only to break up because it didn't feel right. i was just scared, i think. i wasn't like other boys she'd been with and i didn't think i was good enough. she went along with the breakup only to tell me a year later that she hadn't wanted to, but i was with someone else by then. we got past it but it definitely changed things, i think.
when we stopped talking, i was mad. i was mad for the first year. then it was just a semi-annual crashout, looking at the ceiling and thinking about her while i looked at the ceiling. i'd listen to seven by taylor swift and just hope she didn't hate me.
now, she's gone. now, i have nothing but questions. i'm haunted by the fact that her mom said she called her the day she died and asked her to come home. i'm haunted. i'll never know what she was going through but i'll always know it was bad. i'll always know i wasn't there, and maybe it wasn't my decision to leave, maybe it was very much her who made that call, maybe i wouldn't have been able to change a thing, but it doesn't change how i feel. she was my girl for better or for worse and now she's gone
the grief i'm feeling is like this compounded mourning of our friendship, and i've been sitting at that grave for years, but now there's a real grave and i don't even know where it is because her mom stopped texting me back. i might reach out again soon, but i don't know. i'm afraid i just serve as a reminder. i don't know.
i don't know at all. i miss my friend. that's really it
Will happen, happening, happened Will happen, happening, happened And there we are again and again 'Cause you and I will always be back then You and I will always be back then You and I will always be back then You and I will always be back then And so, you and I will always be best friends
