My Childhood Friend

I know of a little girl who would sit next to her dad who had passed out because he had been drinking throughout the day. I know of a little girl that would smile when her mom brought home a piece of bread because they had nothing to eat almost all the time.

I also know of a girl that would cry every time school is out because she didn't want to go home, nobody knew how it was back home and she wouldn't dare say it to her friends because that would be unnecessary drama and they might've started looking at her differently.

There was another girl that lived down the street, she was pretty and I used to tell her that whenever I saw her because I knew that she cried each time she looked at the mirror and hit herself because she believed that she was ugly and that she could never, ever get anything right or much less be someone in life. She had big dreams, she told me about them. I saw the life in her eyes when she did, how excited she got when she could, for once, forget the life that she was living and focus on the one she dreamed of.

I haven't heard from her in a long time. I heard that she dropped out of school in grade 9 and my sister says she moved away out of the blue, she no longer lives opposite our house. I was sad to hear that because even though we weren't as thick as thieves, we got along really well. Her dad was a truck driver and her mom was a domestic worker, her parents tried everything they could to give her a good life since she was their only child but she didn't see all that.

She once told me that all she wanted was for her mom to be there for her. That night I lay in my bed and thought,"how else could her mom be there for her when she has been there every single day?".

It's been a couple of years now and I ran into her the other day, she had grown so much and she smiled differently too. I couldn't quite place my finger on it, but a lot had changed about her. She looked more confident, more aware and even more beautiful. She asked me to have a drink with her.

We spoke straight for about four hours, we had a lot of catching up to do. I sat there most of the time just nodding, smiling, staring in awe or just wiping my tears away. She had so much to say to me, things that she couldn't tell me before and after I heard everything, I asked her if I could write about it, she said yes.

The man who I thought was her real dad was actually her stepdad and had raped her twice, that was the first reason she had to get away. She could of course tell her mom, but it wasn't that easy. This man cared for them and was a well-known man in the community, she didn't want her mom to be embarrassed so she chose to walk away, leave her whole life behind.

Upon leaving home, she faced a lot of challenges including an abusive relationship which she couldn't walk away from because it was her only home, two abortions and a life with no education. She smiled most of her time as she told me her story and I knew that it had a better ending.

There was a lot that went on, so much that I have decided to save that for another day.

This little girl was no longer the little girl that I knew, she was grown. Life had taught her so much but I guess it would never teach her enough. She told me how she is still healing from some of the things that she has been through, how she is still scared of what life might throw at her and although this might sound weak, she told me that some days she feels like she has nothing to live for anymore while other days she feels like she can take on the world.

I sipped my orange juice and paused for a while. I didn't know what to say to her. What do you say to someone that you thought you knew and suddenly you learn that you were wrong all along?

I held out my hand to her and said,"I'll always be here for you, sister".

P.S If you know of any friends that are having a hard time, like the one in the story, the best thing you can do is be there for them and help where you can.

hearts, Queen