Divergent Blossoms

I felt rusty. Not rusty like I needed to practice a skill or rusty from sitting around all day - rusty like I was covered in rust. All disgusting and peely. How could I have been so stupid to let Beth treat me like that? She had promised all my secrets were safe with her, that our late night chats would be our special best friend time. But of course she had to go ruin that with her underlying need to cause drama and be the center of attention. 

I couldn’t seem to squish any deeper into my pillow. No matter how far I fell I couldn’t escape my obsessive thoughts. Maybe it was an accident? Maybe we could still be friends? No - Beth had crossed a line. 

My bedroom door creaked open, my nerves praying it wasn’t mom - I couldn’t have a chat with her now. I wanted a friend, a true, fun, amazing friend - but I couldn’t talk to Beth about herself. 

Freddie’s little paws came bouncing into the room, his droopy eyes staring up at me. My bed was so low to the ground, but his short, furry, and quite frankly lazy little legs couldn’t bother to jump up onto the bed so he always insisted on whimpering until I reached down to pull him up. But I couldn’t move. Everything in my body just felt numb, my blanket squeezing all the warmth out of me even though it was supposed to do the opposite. Freddie got impatient and started sniffing under my bed. It sounded as if he was playing with something. Shit not a mouse? 

The thought of there being a second unwanted furry creature under my bed suddenly irked my muscles to move. Freddie’s tail stuck out from under my bed and I pulled on his legs to pull him out. He had a piece of paper in his mouth - thankfully it must’ve been what I heard him playing with - but I had no idea what it was. 

“Hey there Fredster, whatcha got in your mouth there, bud?” I whispered, trying to peel the paper from his mouth. 

His slobber unfortunately wet the edges but from what I could see it was an envelope. I didn’t remember having any letters under my bed? It must’ve been from my memory box. Random stuff was always popping out of there. 

I couldn’t remember what this envelope was until I realized I recognized the handwriting. My name written in swirly script, the penmanship indenting the paper. Jenny. The only person that wrote like that was Meredith - my best friend - or at least used to be my best friend. We hadn’t talked in awhile but I could spot her writing anywhere. I was puzzled. I didn’t remember Meredith ever giving me a card. Maybe it was from a birthday. 

I hesitated for a second, opening the flap of the card while avoiding the wrinkled edge covered in dog spit. I wanted to see what it was but I was a little worried to see what it could’ve been hiding. 

Meredith and I had been friends for, well forever. We met in the 1st grade and lived only a block away so we were instant friends and were always hanging out. We would ride the bus to school and make up silly games as our innocent eyes stared out the bus window. We understood each other. But as time passed we realized we were more different than we were alike. We’re still friends now and I see her in our French Literature class (she’s way more into it than me…) but we don’t have a close bond anymore like we did all those years ago. I still wanted to see her and hang out with some of our friends together, but it wasn’t the same. She preferred to spend time alone and she always took things too seriously. But she was still Meredith. 

I blinked a few times wondering if I should just shove the letter back under my bed. But I instead pulled out the letter unfolding a piece of computer paper with black scribbles across it. I could hear my heartbeat quickening. Why was I nervous? The letter was dated for 3 years ago. Freshman year. Our first year of high school - a wacky few months at best. That’s when we started drifting apart. 

Dear Jenny,

Hey. So it’s me, Meredith. You’re probably wondering, “why is she giving me a handwritten card? Isn’t that pretty old-fashioned?”. Well I guess in a way it is, but it gets the job done. It takes more effort than a text or even email (although who even uses email nowadays?). The extra effort just means I care so please care back. 

I wasn’t sure where she was going with this. She was getting blabbery in the first sentence and when she got wordy you never knew what to expect. But nonetheless I kept reading. 

So, I know we’re both probably going through a lot right now because hello! We just started high school and that’s some crazy stuff right there! But I need to get some things off my chest. About our friendship. See here’s the thing - we’ve been close for awhile. And yeah I know you know that, but we’re definitely a lot more different than we both care to realize sometimes. And we also don’t have vulnerable caring moments together. I mean I don’t know if you even know what I’m trying to articulate here but I feel like we’re barely even friends anymore. Something that you probably know but don’t seem to care about is I have anxiety. And no not your average “I get kinda nervous sometimes” - no I have a real mental illness. And that means I’m in silent pain a lot. I don’t expect anything from you because it’s my illness and I’ll deal with it myself - but instead of being there for me when I need you, it seems like you’re just egging the anxiety on sometimes, making everything about you, adding in scoops of guilt whenever I’m not adhering to your every need. 

Hold up, slow your role Meredith. I didn’t know that’s what she felt. I mean yeah I knew she had some anxiety, but the fact that she felt like I wasn’t there for her stung. She wasn’t necessarily there for me. But then again this was three years ago. I could hardly remember what happened last week given the emotional rollercoaster the last few days had been. I thought I might regret finishing the letter, but I couldn’t stop there. 

So I decided to write you a letter because I would be too scared to talk to you in real life. I mean we’re “best friends” but the fact that I have to write a letter to my best friend instead of sitting down and just talking to her is a red flag, at least in my book it is. Now, I’m not saying I don’t want to be friends anymore - of course not. But I want to fix things between us. I want to be able to sit down with you and enjoy a meal or talk about our day. I know we’re different and we’re only going to drift away more as time goes on - we can’t lie about that. But that doesn’t mean we forget about our friendship forever. We grew up together - we’ll always be friends. But I don’t want to lose that because of stupid anxiety or unneccsary fights or any other drama that could arise in our future inevitablely wacky high school years. So I hope we can chat sometime about this. I’m honestly afraid to give you this - I don’t know how you’ll react. But I don’t want to pretend that things are fine between us. I hope you understand and take this seriously. You’re my Jenny. 

Your Friend, 

Meredith

Oh. Wow. I didn’t know what to think. I knew Meredith always seemed more serious than the average teenage girl, but this was a little further than I expected. The thing that puzzled me the most though was why I couldn’t remember getting this card. Had she given it to me awhile back and didn’t respond? Oh shoot what did she think? That I didn’t care about her? We still talked now it wasn’t like she blew me off. Oh no, oh no. We grew up together - we’ll always be friends. We were best friends. But I guess we’d be kidding ourselves if we said we were still best friends. We were kinda just friends. I went to reach for my phone but then stopped, her words practically playing back in my head as if she had read them aloud to me. It takes more effort than a text...the extra effort just means I care so please care back. Please care back. Ugh I felt queasy. I looked down at Freddie, he’d migrated to the rug, his head nestled between his paws.

“Uh bud, what should I do?” I didn’t realize I’d spoken out loud, until Freddie’s ears perked up, his eyes somehow meeting mine. 

I couldn’t just text her asking about this. Had she even meant to give this to me? Should I even mention it her? I could think of a lot of things to say in response; I could dig back into my brain and regurgitate all my own thoughts and feelings about Freshman year too. But maybe just maybe this time I could make it about her. 

I sat up, my body aching but my thoughts far from Beth’s dramatics. She might’ve been a cool high school friend, but she was no Meredith. 

I practically slid down the stairs, slipping my shoes on and popping my phone into my back pocket. 

“Mom, I’m running over to Meredith’s! I’ll be back soon!” I shout, not waiting for a response. 

I had to see her, at least we could chat. I didn’t know what I was going to say or do, or if she was even home and available. She probably was, but would she want to talk? She wasn’t always willing to just hang out at the last minute. But it was worth the risk. 

My thoughts kept jumbling as I walked up the street and around the corner until I reached her small brick house. All the cars were in the driveway so that was a good sign. It was barely dinner time on a Friday afternoon and knowing Meredith, she probably wasn’t doing much. She always liked to emphasize how she was moody on Friday because she was tired from the week. Well, that wasn’t the best reassurance but I was hoping today might be different. 

I hopped up the stairs to her front door, my mind racing. I stopped for a second wondering if this was the right thing to do. I could always just text her, I mean it was fine. I could come back tomorrow. Eh I’d come this far, I had to show her I cared. 

The doorbell sang through the cracks of the door and I could hear her dog yelping throughout the house. I stood waiting for a second, wondering if I should ring the bell again. I heard a noise, hopefully she was coming. The door unlocked and opened to Meredith, still in her outfit from the school day, but her hair out and messy, one of her AirPods popped into her ear. She didn’t say anything right away, but her expression wasn’t too bright. 

“Hey! I know I didn’t text you or anything but I was just wondering if we could talk - you know just for a little as friends. I miss hanging out with you”. I stuttered. 

Her glum expression perked up more than I’d seen it perk up in a long time, her hand pulling her AirPod out, pushing her hair behind her ears. 

“Aww, yeah sure, come on in Jenny,” Meredith said, patting me on the shoulder as she closed the door behind me. 

“I know I normally am kind of stand-offish on Fridays but it’s nice to hear that you just want to chill - it’s been awhile since we’ve done that,” She said smiling into the foyer. 

I instantly felt so relieved. I couldn’t stop from smirking and I felt excited. The back of my mind kept saying this would only be a one time thing - but at least it was happening at all. I knew we were growing apart, not something I wanted to acknowledge. But with college applications looming over us I was glad we could spend some time together before we physically were apart. 

Our childhood had been a patch of daisy’s compared to our friendship now. But regardless of what was to come, I would forever be grateful for my Meredith.