Rach, this one goes out to you.

Rachel I want to start by telling you that I am writing this for you not because I think you want a letter, but because I think you need one so that we can cry over it together every day until you graduate in 13 precious days. You were the first friend that I made living in my Allyn Hall dorm room back when I thought all that I needed was to get into one of the sororities that I was obsessing over at the time and just get through my first semester of college away from home. I will never forget the moment you stepped into my room decked out in a tighter than belief crop top and an equally flashy leopard print skirt ready for a night out withe people you barely knew. I remembered thinking how pretty you were and that I was the awkward girl who was in a leopard print peplum top that did not look nearly as good as you and I immediately wanted to change. You sat down next to me and asked me to take a picture with you and to this day I still have no idea how it happened but from that point on we were just best friends.

You made every year of college the best for me just by being you. Your assertiveness has never met a better match than my go with the flow attitude and I don't think I would have had a place to live or ever gotten a job without your persistent need to map my life out and always make sure I was doing just as well as you were (except in school... you've always managed to somehow do a little bit better in every class we have taken together). I knew you would be my best friend for the rest of my life when one fateful night when it was raining and we were running to the frat houses per usual and an Egyptian man rolled down his car window and told us to "hop in" his Audi and you grabbed my hand without a second thought and said this is our chance and jumped in like there was no chance of us being kidnapped.

I'm sure our freshman year no one knew our names at any of the parties we stumbled into, but we never failed to show up Thursday-Saturday even if that meant it was just the two of us red-nosing the night away. When you took me home to meet your family for spring break that year I instantly felt at home with them and even though you did not let me check any of my bags at the airport or let me get away with not eating your aunts special chicken, laying on the beach with you burning to a crisp was exactly where I was meant to me.

After Freshman year I never lived a second without you; we moved into another dorm together and then straight into the house we share now. You are my favorite person to wake up from a nap to and watch sit at the end of my bed while you try to convince me to be athletic with you (never going to happen) or to hop in Dulce and get our favorite food together ( always going to happen). Through every wild night out, every break up/ makeup/ second chances that we have given the men in our lives, I knew I could always count on you for the most logical and best advice out there (even the time I cried on your floor and you didn't know what to do so you just let me do it and bought me our favorite chips after). I know I will never find anyone that loves free drinks and shamelessly flirting for them as much as we both do and I don't ever want to.

You are my rae rae, my go to best friend to have the best time with, and someone that I know I will love for the rest of my life, College may be ending for you but our relationship never will. You truly are one of the most intelligent, vibrant people I have ever met and no matter what job you take (when does the federal hiring freeze end?), where you live (Cleveland- I know this is a pipe dream) or where life takes us; I will always be here for you. When life gives us lemons; your lemons meaning the 3 girls you have and mine being the 5 boys that I'll never know how to handle and us having to meet up at your camper on Geneva to trade children with each other or me continuing to pretend to like football and going to your future husbands NFL games, I will never hesitate to drop everything and anything for you because that's how much you'll always mean to me.

Love Forever,

Me

P.S. If Pappy thinks he's actually moving you out after graduation I'm telling June.

PPS I wouldn't want to share a matching tattoo or boy named Chris with anyone else.