Path of Thorns

"On my life I'll try today, there is so much I've felt I should say, but...Even if your heart would listen, doubt I could explain."

It was the kind of friendship that began without warning, exploded with meaning all over my life, and ended immediately, terribly. And we never spoke again. We were friends for such a short time, but our friendship changed very much who I was and how I saw the world. In the end, having hurt her more than I ever knew I could hurt someone, I was left to wonder what on earth it'd all meant. And why we'd even bothered.

I was eighteen, and it was my freshman year of college. I was away from home for the first time in my life, and exposed to ALL SORTS of chaos I'd never known existed, both in myself and the lives and worlds of the people around me. (For those of you who lived in Grace Hall with me...you know without my having to explain, that it was quite the parallel universe in comparison to most college dorms.) All sixty of us were somehow secluded -both emotionally and geographically- from the rest of campus, and somehow managed to become closer more quickly than, in hindsight, even seems natural.

She is an example of such closeness in my life. We were friends immediately. And in no time at all, she was one of a dozen people who I not only lived with, but relied on as every source of support a person has any right to expect.

I was drinking a LOT, I was bulemic, depressed, terrified, and I was lying. To my friends, and especially to myself. Night after night, and day after endless day she listened to me, cared about me, gave to me without question, and picked up my pieces when they fell to the ground around her. Somehow, despite claiming she'd never run across anyone like me, she was able to handle me perfectly, to settle the waves of hysteria that gripped me without cause or warning each and every time. She entertained my delusions and supported my neurosis, somehow without judgment. She loved me, simply, in spite of all of my flaws. Possibly, even, because of them.

As the months of that year passed by, and I began to grow capable of coming to terms with myself as a person rather than myself as a daughter, sister, member of a family, friend... but a person over whom I needed to gain some fucking control... I started to realize that I didn't have to depend upon the closeness we'd established, which at the time was starting to feel more like co-dependence. Extenuating circumstances aside, I took it upon myself to push her as far away as the situation would allow. It is, simply put, far too easy to hurt the people we love. We understand what it is that makes them tick...and when given the opportunity, we possess the ability to take advantage of that. Which is exactly what I did. It was horrible, yes...but at the time it felt more like self-preservation. Or at the very least...I'd convinced myself that's all that it was. And in no time at all, our friendship had dissolved, and so had she.

I couldn't believe how quickly it got away from me. I intended only to push her away from me...mostly because I was afraid of depending on her so very much...and in turn, I alienated her from everyone. My campaign to end our friendship took on a life of its own, and eventually, she couldn't walk into our building without her head down. She never looked at me again. And then it was over. The semester ended, and everyone went home.

I left Cabrini one year later, and only when I arrived at Gannon, and felt the rush of starting college all over again...did I remember how much I had loved our friendship, and how important it all had been to me. It sounds strange...but I was never able to think of her in the constraints of Cabrini's campus. After I left, then, I had to face how very much I missed her.

I tried, a few times, in the last few years to get in touch with her. I joked occasionally with old mutual friends about what I'd say if I saw her again. But alone, it haunted me. There was someone in the world who could claim that I'd destroyed something in them. That I was the cause of their pain. However brief. I'd hurt someone that badly. Sometimes you think about people you used to know, and wonder where they are, how they are. But I couldn't help but thinking that I'd actually be better, somehow, if I knew what she was doing. That she was OK.

Five years later, I finally got the opportunity. I'm cynical where the stupid internet is concerned, but it's how I happened across her again. And it's how we started talking. And I know now...that she's not only OK...but fantastic. And somehow, she's forgiven me.

The past is unfair, because no matter how close to us it may feel, there is no greater distance in this world. I can never repair the damages to either of us that were done that year, but the lessons they taught me remain with me still, as though it all happened only moments ago. When I heard her voice, I felt like she was sitting right next to me again. I could see the way her eyes went away when she smiled, the way she leaned back when she laughed. I remembered the way she told stories, and the look she gave me when she knew I was lying. Five years have passed, and everything has changed for us both. But it's good to know that sometimes, some people...remain somehow, right where you left them.