The first time I met you, you were dressed up as a witch, with your tarot cards spread out on the table in the corner of the room. It was a Halloween party at a mutual friend’s house. I gravitated towards you because you were beautiful and shy. I was overwhelmed with the chaos and wanted a safe haven; a place to breathe unencumbered by social graces and swirling drunkenness.
I sat down and introduced myself. You focused on the cards, which left me free to focus on your heart shaped face. You had auburn hair that demanded attention - peeking through from under the straight black wig, pale blue eyes, and those full lips most people pay money to fake. Your delicate fingers (on an artist’s hand, I would later find out) effortlessly shuffled through the tarot cards as you read my fortune.
I confess, I don’t remember the reading at all. I remember staying at the table for hours and laughing with you in our shared introverted misery. I remember us carefully revealing our feelings for various people, events, art, books, movies and so on. Most of all, however, I remember how grateful I was to have met you – you who became my best friend for one of the hardest chapters of my life.
We had already grown apart by the time you passed away. You always told everyone with a twinkle in your eye that I left first. I left you. But you knew it wasn’t you I had to escape. It wasn’t you I needed to find. You were proud of me and my bravery, but you were also bitter and upset that I left and you didn’t. You stayed far longer. Then, when you did move away, you moved even further than I did! In the opposite direction, no less. You wanted me to come visit you, but I had two little ones that I had to bring with me, and not enough money to make the flights. In my remembering, however, I think subconsciously I didn’t want to see the truth of things. I didn’t want confirmation of my fears that you hadn’t really escaped at all, just changed the location of the gilded cage you put yourself in.
It’s been almost two years since you departed from this earth, but I’ve missed you off and on for at least the last five. I was sent pictures of you in the hospital, surrounded by your dogs. I was sent links to the obituary created on your behalf. But they aren’t you. They aren’t the true inner you that I got to know and love and I can’t even look at them and connect them to you. You would have rolled your eyes at some of the chosen images. You would have wanted them to show your art, tell stories about you, share your favorite songs. But alas, funerals are for the living, so they focused on them. Each told a story about how they helped you, or what they will miss about you (helping them); putting themselves front and center. I’m glad I didn’t go to your funeral. I tried to be there virtually, but whoever was put in charge of the “live” camera did a shit job and forgot ten minutes into the event anyway.
But, dear friend, I miss your laugh. I miss the ease with which you could create and share your art. I miss your inability to cook a proper meal and how you chose wine based on how pretty the bottles were. I miss walking into a store and being able to identify which tchotchke, Christmas ornament or pillow was born from your imagination, how your desire to seek out and create beauty would spread across into homes of strangers all over the world.
If I’m being completely truthful, dear friend, there are things I really don’t miss, too. I don’t miss seeing you spiral further down in a haze of pills and booze and self-loathing that was never your burden to carry. I don’t miss the frustration and anger I would feel when you’d text me hurtful things and not remember them later. I don’t miss feeling as though I was somehow to blame for moving away from you, instead of praised for moving for and towards a better me. I remember the shame and guilt I carried for not convincing you to move with me, or staying long enough to get you in a better place.
Do you remember the last few times you saw me? You came for my fortieth birthday. I’m not even sure if you remember any of it. You were drinking before noon, you hardly left my couch. My sister valiantly stayed by your side, trying to stave off the inevitable, but you came tumbling down in the kitchen, almost taking a bystander with you (a very big, burly former football player who didn’t have a chance). You didn’t leave the floor for a solid 18+ hours. We moved you out of the way, and others tried to tend to you so I could focus on my guests, but at that point I just wanted everyone to leave. I wanted to find my friend who was hiding deep inside that crying mess, half in the kitchen, half in the garage, calling the boyfriend that had already been called and forgotten.
The next day, I remember thinking “yep, we’re done.” All of my patience over the past few years had been exhausted. All of the times I tried to help had been thwarted. I felt like a terrible friend. I failed you.
Three months later, you were eloping with the boyfriend and wanted me to come for the wedding. You wanted me there for the prep and all the pomp and circumstance that goes with it. I didn’t attend any of the pre-wedding bullshit. I barely convinced myself to attend the wedding. And you wanted me to be the photographer! You wanted me to be the one documenting this event for you. Take photos of people I had never met and never wanted to meet. You were hurt that I wasn’t “there for you” when you were “there for me” and I was baffled by what you thought “being there for me” really meant?
Less than three years later, you were gone. My last memory of you is a vague one. I can’t remember if I saw you leave the wedding venue with your husband. I was focused on capturing the moments around you, with you, for you but missed seeing the real you. I felt a hollow sense of what used to be, but couldn’t bring it forth. It was the beginning of a new chapter for you, and the end of ours.
Now, I have the tarot cards you gave me. Sometimes when I pull them out I can feel your presence. The real you, not the one everyone else saw. The you that just wanted to sprinkle beauty and laughter everywhere. The you that somehow saw good in me when I couldn’t. I feel the stronger essence of you that is no longer buried and stifled. You are beautiful.