Hey, you guys.

I remember how, back in middle school, we always rode the same bus and always hung out at the same house after school. Your parents referred to me as their other daughter. Sleepovers were regular; days without talking were infrequent. We carried each other's triumphs and sorrows like our own. Our teachers referred to the three of us as “the three musketeers”. (Am I romanticizing a bit? Age and time do that to you.)

However, something shifted our senior year. You know the story -- it's the same in books and movies. We had already begun to gradually grow distant; time pulled us apart and together like the tide and the shoreline. Alliances shifted and lines were erased before drawn again. Perhaps I had entered a late rebellious phase. Perhaps time had committed too much damage and introduced too many changes. Perhaps, frankly, we simply were no longer the compatible best friends we once were. Whatever label you want to stick to this event, whatever you wish to call it, the result is the same: it changed too many things, if not everything.

I don’t want to say that I hated either one of you, although I might have had … strong feelings for a while (they were more out of bitterness and frustration more than anything else). Although, if we are to be honest, neither party behaved as well as they could have. Two warring camps that would have put Shakespeare or the 2016 election to shame.

Regardless. We warily circled around each other. We handled the shift, the impact, the best we could. We moved on, and you two and your friendship became stronger. Last May, we graduated and, the dust having long since fallen, now here we stand.

The past week or so, we apologized to each other. We made our amends. We cleared the air. We buried the hatchet and calmed the waters. Whatever other analogies you can think of. This hesitant budding of starting over, of peace and forgiveness, is not going to be the same -- not at all. But then again, do we want us to be exactly as we were?

If our friendship was the same, we would still think that Crocs were the best shoes and that Hot Topic was the best store to have ever graced mankind. We would still wear bell-bottom pants. We would still own Gir bookbags and wear rubber bracelets like our lives depended on it. We would still be stuck in the late 2000s.

You two did not have to forgive me, but you both did. That means the world to me. It's amazing what resolution and closure do, isn't it? I feel more at peace with myself and my past actions. Thank you.