A Lost Friend

In high school I had a friend, a best friend, named Brandi. She moved into our school district and we became friends in 4th grade. We were close friends throughout the remainder of elementary school and junior high and then had a fallout in 8th grade (over a boy). Once again, in high school we became close. Brandi was outgoing and enthusiastic about life. At a point in my life when I was still shy and unsure of myself, she was a good influence on my self-confidence. She was also poor. Very poor. Her mother had disappeared when she was young and she was raised by her father. He remarried a woman who was only about 12 years older the Brandi. I really can’t remember if her stepmom was as wicked as Brandi often made her out, but to hear Brandi talk about her, you’d think she was the evil stepmother from Snow White. I think her stepmom just was living a hard life, with little money and lots of kids to take care of. While Brandi’s home life was far from ideal, my parents embraced her as one of their own. She used to joke that when she found “the one” she’d introduce him to my parents, not hers. Brandi had friends, but most of my other friends didn’t really like her.

Brandi could be hard to deal with. A friendship with her was demanding at times but I always gave her the benefit of the doubt because of the life she had led. Her parents weren’t supportive, she had to work hard to pay for all her clothes and things like shampoo, and she had no access to a car and always depended on me for rides. But I felt like I was getting something out of the relationship too so it was fine with me. She cared about me and brought out the best in me.

Brandi and I went away to college, 2 very different colleges. Me to a private, catholic school and her to a public, big party school. The first 2 years of college we remained close. Junior year things started to change. I don’t know if it was the influences of her party school or that her true self was coming out but she was drinking nonstop and experimenting with drugs (certainly pot, shrooms and e and I wouldn’t doubt of she tried numerous others). I was far from an angel myself, but she seemed to lack morals and was very self-centered. She had a boyfriend that I just had a bad feeling about. They fought nonstop and I heard later (through a 3rd party source so I have NO idea if this is true but I wouldn’t doubt it) that her boyfriend hit her regularly. Things got worse as we headed into senior year. She rarely emailed or called and when she did call me – I essentially listened to her drone on and on about her life, never letting me talk about my life. Between fall break and Christmas break, I don’t think she emailed once. We did hang out some over Christmas break, but from there things just hit rock bottom. There was no blow out, we just stopped talking.

On one hand I was upset, I was no longer friends with someone I had been so close with for years. But on the other hand, I have enough friends that I don’t need to have a friend, who requires so much effort with so little return. She did get in touch with me soon after I moved to Seattle. We talked quite curtly over the phone and then emailed a few times. I was the one who finally made it clear that it was over. What bothered me is that she wouldn’t admit to her role in the problems we were having. The last straw was when she told me “I never felt like I could fully trust you.” WTF?!? I, more than any person out there, was the one that stood by her and stood up for her. After the fact, people told me that they always wondered why I was so loyal to her. (I think she was mainly referring the fact that she thought I had a thing for her ex-flame. I did, I don’t deny it. He liked me too in fact. But out of respect for her, nothing ever happened between us, even years after their relationship ended. He and I only discussed it once, to acknowledge what we were feeling and agree that we’d never go there, so if she had the feeling that something was up then she must have seen the connection between us but wasn’t willing to tell us it was okay.) I had been completely loyal to Brandi through all these years of friendships and the fact that she could insinuate that I wasn’t hurt so much that I wanted nothing to do with her ever again.

After crying over this to JQ, who was a bit hurt because Brandi didn’t even try to rekindle their friendship, I learned a lot. JQ had been keeping a secret, Brandi’s secret. Senior year of high school, Brandi had gotten caught shoplifting. She needed a parent to sign some paperwork and her dad would have had her head had he found out. She asked JQ to drive her to a trailer park about 15 miles from where we lived. It was the home of her MOTHER! Yes, the mother she supposedly hadn’t seen since she was 9. The mother that had not been heard from in so long that she was legally declared dead. This happened 4 years before our friendship ended and speaking about trust, Brandi had never trusted me enough to tell me about her mother.

JQ and I both have run into Brandi once since then (separately). I made polite talk because I didn’t want to be rude, while JQ made eye contact and then ran into the bathroom to call me. Our parents have stopped asking what happened after we replied numerous times that we didn’t want to talk about it. Brandi is no longer part of my life. Except…

When I was home for Christmas, I asked JQ a question… do you dream about Brandi? Yeah, she admitted, a lot. Me too! I guess it is a manifestation of unresolved issues. I don’t necessarily want to resolve anything, but I wish the dreams would stop. They freak me out.