To my childhood best friend,

I remember the day in my room -- we must've been 8 years old -- when I asked you to be my best friend. It was so silly. It was like a wedding proposal or something, but I loved knowing, without a doubt, that that was what we were.

I think you said something like, "Well, aren't I that already?"

Which was fair, considering we had been a duo since, well, I can't even recall. Whenever I look back in my memories, you are there. That favorite photo of us screaming when my grandpa startled us in my room, walking in and interrupting our Barbie time with an unexpected flash of his throw-away camera. The video you took when I turned 13, and we stayed up to watch the time change and to see if I felt any different.

All the pool parties, barbecues, carpools, hair braiding, secrets and sleepovers. The games we would play in your basement for hours. The first time you got a cellphone and I was so jealous. The sixth grade dance and taking pictures on your porch.

But now I have to go on Facebook and click "see friendship" to validate that any of this ever existed.

What happened to us?

Everyone says middle school is the worst. Looking back on it, yes, there are quite a few duck-face, brace-faced photos I need to delete from my profiles before I start job-hunting. Sure, it was awkward and it was comical. But it wasn't the hell that I had been forewarned of, until I remember that I lost you.

Seventh grade was cool. We were old, and "mature." I came to your house rocking a jean vest and sunglasses on the first day and I remember your mom's reaction (which I wholeheartedly deserved). We walked together and I talked about how great it was going to be, how many friends we would make.

I think you took that last part of advice a little too strongly.

Because a year later, you stopped walking to school with me. You didn't give me a balloon on my birthday and I cried, wondering what I did wrong. You only talked to me when we hung out in groups and I called you begging to know what happened and you, as if on repeat, kept saying "I don't know."

My dad will still look down the block sometimes and ask me whatever happened to us. And it pains me because we just look at each other with the same confused, sad face. I still haven't solved the mystery.

Every now and then you pop up on my Facebook feed. I don't recognize you.

The moments we were supposed to share — high school graduation, college orientation, spring break — are being done with new friends, new attitudes and new hair colors.

You might see this. You might not. You might think I'm crazy and show your sorority sisters or whomever you hang out with nowadays, and laugh.

But if you do, I just want you to know I'll always care about you. It's a weird feeling I have. Because I felt betrayed and abandoned for so long, but I know what we had was good and after all, you were my best friend. You were my childhood. And I can never thank you enough for all the memories we made.

From,
Your BFF