my forever friend
a poem of my pain
My forever friend was
The new girl in 3rd grade
Who played alone.
Not with the boys
Not with the girls.
Her hair unbrushed.
Her teeth unbrushed.
In 5th grade we adopted each other
And made a science project together,
Knit to one another like one soul.
That summer my grandfather died,
And she was there.
We spun each other in the field.
That night we heard a bird
that sang in the dark.
In Middle school
I had no idea
How to act like a girl, but
Somehow she knew.
I couldn’t do my hair, but
Somehow she knew.
The next summer she was grounded.
All summer.
I wasn’t sure why,
Except that her dad was mean.
So I came to her dark house
That smelled of kerosene.
We found what her dad hid
In the far corner of the attic.
Magazines with glossy images I couldn’t process
But also can’t forget.
(It’s Amazing how the wrong things stick.)
For snacks we mixed a lot of Quik
With a little milk.
And Frosted flakes
with peanut butter.
We put the dishes on the counter with the others.
No one did the dishes at her house
but they had a milkshake machine.
Let’s do them, I said.
Ok, she agreed.
It took a long time
but we did
Then stacked them- clean- back on the counter.
In High school
I took Honors.
She picked her split ends in Basic,
One long blonde curl at a time.
I gave up makeup, but not boys.
I decided to rely on Who I Am.
I drove to school with wet hair,
Which froze by the time I arrived.
She worked out and rose before dawn to fix herself just right,
Each curl and eyelash arranged, her outfit perfect.
She was on all the boys lists, but I was not.
I fell for artists. She loved all the jocks.
After school we sat together, perched on her bathroom counter
searching for blackheads.
We traded “the skirt” back and forth.
On weekends, we slept in small beds- hers or mine
Close together.
In the morning, she would nuzzle me awake.
And call me Sheila in her sleepy voice.
Her pet name for me.
We were naked together, more times than I could count.
Unashamed.
Her touch on my skin felt like my own but not like that.
It wasn’t like that.
I loved her like I loved me.
I went to college.
She went to beauty school.
I met a boy I kinda liked.
She was the one to tell me-
You LIKE him, she said.
I smiled. I wasn’t sure, but I couldn’t deny it either.
She met someone too. Not a jock. Not an artist. Her opposite.
I danced with him at their wedding, crying, saying
You better take good care of her.
He promised he would.
Barely a year later
She was in labor.
I was with them.
She hummed and hummed through the pain.
Finally her first baby came.
Tiny. pink. We were 21.
My wedding - we were 23.
She was right- I did like the college boy.
She was my matron, my right hand.
Held my flowers, bustled my dress,
Gave me advice, because I hadn’t done all that yet.
I listened and figured it out.
We took turns having babies.
Her two to my one.
She was there when my first was born.
Less than a year later, she added one.
Then I added one.
Then she added another.
And I added two more.
There were eight humans between us.
When we got together, it was a circus of small bodies.
I wanted them to be friends.
I wanted them to grow up together.
And I wanted to get old alongside her.
We were the same, I thought.
We will take care of each other, I thought.
But I didn’t know.
What they did.
She and my college boy-
My two favorite people.
That time in Florida.
When they traveled together.
And at her beach house. All the kids piled in one room when they…
And then that time at our house.
The red couch burned in my mind until it burned in my yard.
How did I not know? Was I stupid? Was I asleep?
What question could I have even asked then?
What could I ask now?
“Why?” seems right.
Why did you once?
Why didn’t you stop?
Why didn’t anyone tell me?
We were so different -but maybe still too much the same.
But…he couldn’t have been confused.
He had to know the difference. He had to know this would shatter me.
She had to know I’d never recover, not really.
They had to know once was enough to ruin everything.
To ruin us.
To ruin me.
Once would have been enough, but
It happened again.
And then one more time.
I don’t know what hurt more.
Knowing that he did,
Or knowing that she did.
My forever friend, whoever she was, is no longer.
She is gone.
I hear in my head that
I didn’t matter.
I wasn’t enough for either of them.
I trusted the wrong people and
I lost them both.
I can’t argue. I hang my head in defeat.
I plug my ears and pour more wine.
I drink deep, pulling it in, gulping it down, to silence the noise.