Where were you when the world walked out?

I heard my name and I knew the voice but couldn't place it. I turned around and looked for a familiar face but it took a minute to register when I finally saw her. The shock threw me off; she was twenty pounds heavier, had an eyebrow piercing, and wore a hemp necklace. She caught up with me and grinned, her smile the only thing that seemed the same. I half-smiled back and managed a "My God, how have you been?" but my mind was reeling.

Here was someone I once considered family. My sister. The same little girl I laid next to in a sleeping bag at summer camp and talked about our pets and what actors we would marry. Who went with me to see Fall Out Boy at little shitty VFW halls and The Muse Cafe. This was the same little girl who would take me to her dad's house with her every other weekend because she didn't trust him enough to be there alone.

This was the same girl who said we would always be close. Who, in a 7 year friendship, I trusted more than anyone I had ever met. The same girl who I loved even when she started choosing sex and cigarettes over our friendship.

(This would be my first experience of loving more than I was loved.)

So we're standing in the blistering July heat and I'm staring at the sweat on her forehead while she's talking about where she's living these days. She talks about her brother in jail and then asks what bands I came to Warped this year to see.

All this time I'm wondering why she was ever in my life to begin with. And then I realize that I grew because I lost her. Because I suffered my first heartbreak in losing her, not a boyfriend. Because she made me angry and hurt and lonely. And because I had no one when I moved to a new neighborhood, I had to learn to be my own best friend.

I'm still applying that concept.

On that summer day, she said, "We really should get together sometime." I said, "Yeah," and gave her my number. Angry and half in love with her, I turned and walked away, knowing she wouldn't call.

She never did.



You know who you are. You might stumble across this one day. I hope that when you do you are better off than the last time I saw you.