TheGioBlog

by me i guess

I want to write this post as a love letter to all of the dear friends I left behind. Well, I did not technically leave them behind, but life had other plans for us, I guess.

All of them will have fictional names in this text, but it is dedicated to everyone who has ever lost a friend, for whatever reason.

My dear Layla, you are, and still will be for the rest of my days, the image that first comes to my mind when someone talks about friendship or long-term friends. I still recall, to this day, the first time I ever glanced at you. Two ponytails, blonde hair, and those purple eyeglasses. I have no idea how we became friends that day, but since then, at six years old, you were my home for many years.

I want to apologize to you, Lay. I feel like I might have been too bossy. I was also so jealous of you. You were the purest-hearted soul mine has ever managed to meet. And for a long time, it was just the two of us and our connection. No one has ever given me that kind of love, and maybe no one ever will. I tried other friendships, but no one ever felt like us. Not even ourselves now.

I remember how you stayed with me through every horrible moment of my adolescence. You never left me. I still remember the letter you wrote for my fifteenth birthday. No one has ever done something like that for me, not even now. We were both fifteen when you changed schools. I was praying everything would go wrong so you would have to stay. I was selfish and immature. I got mad at you for choosing to leave me. And you did.

We stayed friends for a while during your first year at the new school, but that was 2020, and no one knew what life would look like when things went back to normal. I said I wanted to change schools too, just to be with you, just to not be alone. You told me you had other friends now, and that we might not be together all the time. I understood the message. And to this day, that was probably the worst heartbreak of my entire life.

Years went by without me contacting Layla. I would hear about her from our old school friends. They would ask me about us. We just grew apart, I would say. She was different. Living a different life, with new friends. She was happy. And that made me angry. I felt left behind. All I had at the time was an abusive relationship and a doctor’s note excusing me from school due to severe depression.

Nowadays, I talk to Layla from time to time. We plan to meet and talk, but most of the time it never happens. And when it does, it feels different. It is not us anymore. And for that, I think I will grieve for the rest of my life. I love you, and I am forever grateful for those years we shared, Layla.

Mia was also a great friend of mine for a few years. She lived close by, and we even became a trio. Me, Mia, and Layla. It was good while it lasted. Mia also went away. I know she had a very hard life and moved out of the neighborhood. We saw each other twice after she left. We used to message constantly, still present in each other’s lives even from afar.

But Mia changed too. Not completely. To me, she is still the same kid who was afraid of losing her virginity and loved sweets more than anything. But Mia met a man. Older. Much older. She fell in love without really knowing what love was. That man made her believe that love was supposed to look like that. She left everything and everyone behind for him. He promised her the world, and she believed him.

Mia got pregnant at twenty-one. Her child’s father already had five other children and legal cases against him. After her baby was born, Mia realized that he was not her savior. He was leading her down a path we could not follow. I watched Mia lose herself.

I still stayed by her side, as someone who had survived an abusive relationship. But Mia lives like a hostage, and deep down, she knows it. We fought. I did not want to be around her abuser when I visited her. She chose to stand by him. That was my last conversation with Mia.

Mia is lost, and alone in this world with a baby, and there is no way for me to save her. I will always love them both with all my heart.

Thank you, Mia and Layla.

For all of it.