I got away from this tiny town and that’s okay, but what wasn’t okay was that I got away from you. I may not have gone far, but it was far enough to drive a wedge between us.
The day before I left you came to say goodbye. It was an incredibly hard day for me. I was leaving you, I was leaving home, and I was going to be all alone. I cried after you left, I don’t know if I ever told you that, but as you pulled out of my driveway I cried my eyes out. For you, for this town, for everything I knew, and for everything I was about to experience. We had joked about putting you in my suitcase to take with me, but here’s the thing… I was only half joking.
We promised to call and text, write and send packages, we even talked about visiting each other. Then the excuses came: not just from you and not just from me, but from both of us. We should have known then that it wouldn’t last. The text messages were few and far between. The calls were rare and disheartening, there wasn’t too much going on that the other could relate to. We never wrote and the package I started to make you sat in my tiny dorm closet unfinished for months until we no longer had a friendship.
In a way, I was jealous of you. You got to stay here and be around all our old friends, you got to go to the local things, you even got to go to our favorite hangouts…without me. You may have thought I was experiencing new things without you but I was having FOMO because your life kept going without me. Although mine kept going, I still thought about you almost every day. I didn’t want to give up on you because I loved our friendship and we had been through so much together, but it seemed as if I was grasping at straws for something that had already been given up on.
Like most things, we came to our breaking point. We had that stupid fight that was mostly my insecurities masked as other things. We both said things I don’t think we meant; I know I didn’t mean the things I said. I told you I needed a break like we were Ross and Rachel from Friends. The problem was I never apologized for saying something so idiotic. I never tried to reach out the next day, but I was angry and I was stressed and I didn’t want to hurt anymore. I’m good at pushing people away, I just never thought you would be another one of my victims.
When I reached back out to you months later, you were not having it and I should have known better. I should have tried harder to see you. I should have done so much more to save the friendship we still had. I should have stayed and worked it out like an adult. Instead we berated each other, we were nasty and cruel and again said things we probably shouldn’t have. We both concluded that we had just drifted apart and it was one of the worst nights of my life because I knew I had just lost my best friend forever.
At first I was numb to it. I deleted your number and unfriended you on most social media. Every time I saw how happy you were without me it broke my heart. It was selfish, but I didn’t want you to know how much I missed you and how hurt I was over our broken friendship. I couldn’t let you see me hurting when it seemed like you weren’t even phased.
I regret that and I want to tell you I’m sorry. I’m sorry for not putting up a fight and for letting a dumb argument get in the middle of our friendship. You see, somehow we forgot it was supposed to be us against the world and we moved on with our lives… without the other. I still hope your name will pop up on my phone. I go to send you funny memes or videos that make me cry or pictures that make me think of you and remember that I can’t because I let little things get to me. I want to call you every time something crazy or wonderful happens in my life. As I go to dial your number, my mouth dries up because even if I had the guts to call you, I know I wouldn’t have a thing to say because I wouldn’t know what to say.
So here are the things I can say to you. Thank you for loving me when I didn’t love myself. Thank you for reassuring me when everyone else told me I was wrong. Thank you for helping me find the courage to leave this tiny town. Thank you for helping me find my voice when I thought I was talking and nobody was listening. There will always be a special place in my heart for you because of these things. I wish you nothing, but happiness in life and your endeavors because at one point that’s all we brought each other. I hope you are well and I hope you are smiling. Please keep dancing and singing and laughing because those were always my favorite things about you. But most of all please know I miss you and I love you B.
