Where to begin with this one, I just don't know. I think I cried the most over R. He changed my perspective on life. He was in all of my art classes freshman year. He got on my nerves, with his highlights and popped collar polos. R was the kind of boy I wanted to get away from when I finished high school. R was obsessed with this one girl from our class, she was really good at painting, but really mouse-y looking. For some reason all the boys went crazy over her. It was probably the fact that she was tiny, but had huge boobs. Every time we would have a critique in art class, her paintings would be the best, she was so good at realism and painting faces. The part that annoyed me about her so much was how she would complain about her paintings and how they were terrible. I'm not sure when R and I started our friendship. One day I said something funny and it was like he noticed I was there all of a sudden. Before I knew it, he was putting his number in my phone and wanting to hang out. R was, and still is one of the funniest people I have ever met. He has this infectious personality that made me forget that I had other friends at school. He's the one person that could make me do things that I normally wouldn't do. I wanted to do them because he would get so genuinely excited for me to experience them. Once he convinced me to try and learn how to ride a bike. He would put me on the bike and steer me down the path so it felt like I was really riding it, another time he held my hands so I could try the hopscotch he had drawn on the sidewalk in front of my dorm.
I don't know how we ever got anything done, we were always getting in trouble. Once, in astronomy class we started laughing so hard about something and couldn't stop, R had to leave the room. We were quite a pair, everyone asked us if we were together, it seemed like we were, but I knew better. They were always talked about how cute you were, but I was never attracted to you. I gave myself the title of being his 'life coach' it just meant I would hold his shirt underneath down while you took off your sweatshirt. He would call me every morning saying, "wakey wakey, eggs and bakey." I always pretended to be super annoyed by his constant phone calls, and how he could never seem to remember our homework assignments, but at the same time, I liked how much he came to rely on me. It made me feel needed.
We had our signature move we always did at our college dances, I would stand in front of him and he would lift me up as I jumped in the air, while he rotated in a circle. It looked hilarious, everyone would stare. Oh man alive could R dance. I made him take my sister to her prom, they cleared the dance floor for them. He was such a slacker, but when he was passionate about something, he would work so hard at it. He was a new Christian, and was in every club and organization on campus. He would always be in the front row at chapel, eyes closed, hands raised in worship. One thing I began to notice about him, was the way he burned bridges. He would be obsessed with someone, or something, then pour everything into that person until they couldn't stand each other. R was always full of energy, and off the wall. My friends didn't really understand what I saw in him, or why we got along so well. We always had identical schedules since we were the same major, he would throw me over his shoulder and carry me down the sidewalk while sharing ipod headphones, people got used to our weird antics. R demanded so much attention, that my other friends would get mad. He was demanding, I know I dropped things that I shouldn't have for him. I was always making him my priority.
I have this one memory of him that really stands out, I was really sick and sneezing everywhere, I looked like a hott mess. R offered to take me to the store to buy me some orange juice (the good kind.) I don't even think he bought it for me, I just appreciated that he cared and drove me there. He was always so selfish though, and I knew he only liked me when I was funny. It was hard to always keep that up all the time. We got so close, that the lines between friendship and dating started to blur. I got confused about how I felt, our closeness was all the time, we were so comfortable together. He was always laying on me or carrying me around. It started to confuse me. We both signed up to go on a trip to Paris and London with our art class. (Confession#5 I had all these elaborate dreams where I told him how I felt about him under the Eiffel tower at night. I was wearing a red beret and an amazing dress, in my fantasy, he would tell me that he liked me back, then he would kiss me and my foot would pop.)
I was at my older sister's house one night and she she informed me that she heard from a friend of a friend that R was gay and had a boyfriend, he was just too scared to come out because our college was so strict. I was so angry with her for telling me something about my best friend. I knew him way better than her, I would know if he had two lives. The thought of this whole idea made me so upset. One night in astronomy class, he confessed to me that it was true. He wrote me a note, I saw it coming and I had my hood up so he couldn't see my face. I almost started crying. He had no idea how much I cared about him, and how terrified I was for him that he was heading down this path.
Paris and London came around, we were so excited. I felt the weight of everything he told me, it was always there in the back of my mind. I felt this need to convince him that his lifestyle change was a mistake, and to remind him of what he already knew was true, that it wasn't how God wanted us to live, it wasn't how he created us to be. I felt so responsible to tell him this, since we were so close. Our first night there, we couldn't sleep, it was so fun having our bedrooms were right next door to each other and we knocked to each other on the wall, from our beds. We met on our tiny twin balconies and giggled about how we were in Paris. He offered me his ipod so I could fall asleep. I fell asleep listening to his music, dreaming that he wasn't gay, that my Eiffel tower dream was so close. I kept gearing myself up for it, hoping I would be brave enough when the moment came, and that our friendship and how he felt about me would mean more to him than his new found sexuality. Since R was my only real friend on the trip, he felt responsible for me. Everyone was always walking too fast and leaving us behind while we were on our tours and trips to the museums. He got so frustrated with me and stressed with his new role. He started to resent me, and distance himself from me. He joined up with other people and tried to push me off on a different group. I cried myself to sleep most nights. I hated that I was such an inconvenience to him, I tried so hard to keep up with everyone. Every night in Paris, when I we would get back to our room, I would collapse on my bed in exhaustion. My legs would ache so badly, but I wouldn't be able to sleep a wink. My mind wouldn't shut off. I felt so much pressure to fix everything, to make him love me, to make him see that his new lifestyle would only bring him so much pain, to pick me instead.
Our trip ended, I didn't feel like telling him how I felt about him anymore, he wasn't worth the effort. I could see how selfish he was, how he was and always would be chasing after the funniest, or the most exciting thing. I didn't get my picture exactly how I wanted it. He kissed me on the cheek, but it was all staged. Someday I wouldn't have to ask a boy to kiss me at night under the eiffel tower. He would just want to, so he would. We barely talk anymore, we have nothing in common, besides our old memories and stories. We got together once and went to visit our old college. We went to the old "cubbies" (where couples would cuddle and makeout.) We had once carved our initials inside one of them with a pen. We wanted to see if we could find it again. We walked around campus, he threw me over your shoulder, just like old times. This time all the students who passed us on the sidewalk were new, they stared at us, so confused by everything. We just laughed. We got to my dorm, only to find they had taken the cubbies out. Our initials were lost forever. R always comes up on my facebook newsfeed. He's always running around in his underwear with another guy. It makes me upset, I feel like I should have tried harder. I found a letter I wrote him, but never sent. I guess it's never too late to show someone that you care. It's just that sometimes so much time passes that our priorities shift, and what used to mean the world to you, suddenly disappears into the haze of everything else that runs through your mind in a day. It just turns into another one of those things you cannot control, one of the things you slowly give up on. I wish I could have been a better friend. Maybe I just gave up when I realized he would never love me. I'm sorry R.
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