Debra

In the days when he felt his final breath was getting closer, he tried to remember how he felt when they first met. He searched through all his memories of his teen years for that first moment and looked for a sign that she would be the bane of his existence. There wasn't any, at least not on that first afternoon, when one of his best friends presented Debra as his girlfriend. All he remembered thinking back then was that if his friend was happy then he was happy. That thought would prove itself wrong a short time later. 

He couldn’t pinpoint the exact moment she turned from a person he barely acknowledged to his worst enemy. Maybe it was after one of her stupid jokes about his appearance, maybe it was one of the thousand times she made an unnecessary observation on something he said. Was it all the times she tried to look cool by making fun of his friends or anything he liked? Or one of the few times a teacher paired them to some school project that ended up with him making everything alone? He wasn’t sure. One day he just felt it in his bones that he hated her and wanted to be as far from her as possible. Life, of course, never really gave him the chance. 

During high school, he had to share his space with her at lunchtime, friends gatherings, and a few classes. The fact that they shared the same lazy behavior towards school and the same group of friends could’ve brought them closer, but it only made him see how much he wanted to put her existence behind him and forget they ever met. Three times he almost did it. 

The first time was when he started college. Life was completely new, for the first time he actually cared about paying attention to classes and a few days in he met Jules, the girl that would end up being his best friend for life. For the first few months, he felt like he was a new person in a new world that was ready to be explored. He and Jules would go to museums, they would watch documentaries, read books and discuss them. They discussed everything with passion and dedicated themselves fiercely to whatever project they had that week. The two of them were inseparable, so it was only natural that she was by his side the day Debra entered one of their classes. 

His first thought had been “This is the worst illusion ever”. Then she came to say hello and he realized her presence there was a really bad reality. Part of his love for college died that day. From then on he was forced to see Debra and deal with all these small terrible things she did.  She was the kind of student that made stupid questions on someone’s work and constantly lied to teachers to not receive the worst grades. People often just considered her silly but he saw right through her. At some point he wondered if he was the only one, so he asked Jules, and being the good friend she was her answer was precise. “Of course I see who she is! A few weeks ago she asked me for help with a paper but kept trying to make me do it for her. Debra is evil!”

Jules' support helped him survive the next years of shared classes with Debra and on their graduation day, he had two reasons to celebrate. Graduating and being free from Debra forever.  

So for the second time in his life, he had a chance to forget all about her existence. He went traveling with Jules, always looking for new adventures and things to learn. They were together when he got his first job and were together when he met Sarah. The first time he looked at her he knew he was in love and nobody was surprised when two years later they were happily married. When Sarah got pregnant they moved to a nice house with a lot of space for their child to play. On moving day he met Eric and quickly became friends with the neighbor. Things seemed so perfect that when Eric told him about his wife, who was currently traveling for work, it never occurred to him who she could be.  So two weeks later, when she returned, he was furious to find out his old enemy not only lived next door, Debra was also married to the nicest guy he ever met.

He tried to explain to Sarah how much he hated Debra but she never fully understood why their neighbor was his nemesis since high school. The blow of having her in his life again was only softened by the birth of his son, Julian. A boy so charming that Jules, who constantly repeated she could barely be responsible for herself, agreed to be his godmother. 

“Maybe you guys could move.”

Jules told him in one of the many weekends she showed up to see her beloved godson. 

“I tried, but Sarah thinks having Debra around is not a reasonable motive for it.”

It took him 5 years to find a motive and convince Sarah to move to another house. On moving day he made a promise to himself, he wouldn’t be caught by surprise again. He wouldn’t forget about Debra’s existence and would always be on alert to her presence. So 20 years later, when Julian presented them to Lilly, his lovely fiancè, he wasn’t really surprised to find out the girl his son was about to marry was Debra’s daughter. This was just the kind of thing that kept happening to him.  She, on the other way, had the indecency to look surprised.

“I can’t believe after all these years knowing each other we’re becoming family!”

He called Jules that night and they spent 40 minutes talking how about life sucked sometimes. 

The third time he forgot about Debra’s existence came many years later. It was the first time he broke his promise but who remembered their nemesis after just losing the love of their life? Hell, he wasn’t sure he remembered anything existed except his love for Sarah and his pain. The way time passed changed after that. He wasn’t sure if it was because he missed her or because he was old, but everything seemed to be happening too fast. Jules tried to convince him to live with her and her wife, so he wouldn’t be alone but his son took him to live in his house. 

“It’s a big house dad and the kids are going to love having you here. They are excited to be living with both you and Grandma Debra in the same house.”

So after spending his life trying to get rid of her here he was. Living his final days and sharing two grandchildren and a house with the woman who had been his enemy his entire life. Always despicable Debra bribed the kids to prank him and often hid his glasses. But as his final days approached he realized that even though she annoyed the hell out of him there was a certain comfort in her presence. His hatred for her was something he had felt for the biggest part of his life. It was older than his love for Sarah and Julian, older than his friendship with Jules. It was a feeling he was used to it and it brought him some weird peace. There was also a certainty in knowing that after he died he would finally be free from her. 

That year was the saddest year of all for Julian and his family. A few months after he lost his father, Lilly’s mother passed and their kids were absolutely inconsolable. Still, he tried to find some beauty in everything. And even though for reasons she never really told him his godmother got really mad at him he managed to keep part of the family together forever when both Lilly’s parents and his were buried in the same cemetery.