Plans With My Best Friend

I've been struggling to find the words for the last couple of weeks and it's not that they don't come but that I get overwhelmed with them. My best friend has stage four, inoperable cancer. She has eight months without chemo and maybe 18 months with.

She thinks I have this ugly cold because every time we talk I'm nasally. I don't want her to know that I'm crying because she doesn't need the burden of my sorrow. She needs me teasing her and treating her as if it's just another day. The other day I was in the grocery store and I stopped in front of the pomegranates and cried like an idiot because they are Molly's favorites. I bought one and I don't even eat the things but it's sitting in my fridge, there for me to see when I open the door.

Making friends, has always been very hard for me. I remember when I was in my mid twenties and I called my mom complaining that I didn't have close friends. I'm friendly with people. I know if I'll like them within minutes of meeting. But letting someone close to know me, the real me, not the one I show family or the world. Those are few and fear between. 

Today, I have more, a handful of people I would drop everything for and go to if need be. People who know much of who I am and I'm comfortable being myself with. But Molly is on the same level as my husband. Those two know everything about me.

When I met Molly, it was like meeting an old friend I hadn't seen in a long while. We clicked so quickly and seamlessly I tried to pull away and found that I couldn't. Molly is one of those people who never met a stranger. Good lord, going grocery shopping with her was like a social event. I'm hanging out at the cart waiting and she's talking to every employee she passes. She knew their significant other, children, health, extended family. She has a way of drawing people out.

A couple of years ago, she came to live with us for a while. I kept trying to get her to move into the better bedroom and she kept saying no, she wasn't going to be with us that long--almost three years later she moved. For my 15 year wedding anniversary, Molly stayed with me in the emergency care center because I almost lost the tip of my finger to the mandolin slicing onion without the guard. We were there for hours while Jason entertained our guest at this huge party I'd arranged. When the doctor came in to give me a tetnis shot and whipped out that needle, I burst into tears and called for Molly. Yes, I was a complete wuss. When her mother passed away, my husband and I went to North Carolina with her. She and I walked everywhere hand-in-hand because that is how we are. We garnered many side-eyed stares. He brother asked my husband if we were a threesome. Molly and I laughed until we cried. When my grandmother died. Jason couldn't come to the funeral with me and she came in his stead. My dad and one of my uncles asked if she, Jason, and I were in a "relationship". We touch a lot and they assumed intimacy from what I gathered. The thing is, if I touch you and allow you to touch me or hold my hand, I trust you. I consider that person safe. My dad said she came everywhere with Jason and me. And he wasn't wrong. She did. We thought nothing of it but others did and we didn't care. She's family to me. 

Nothing what I said so far has conveyed how special she is to us. How knowing her has made me want to be a better person. And in an hour, I'm going to leave to spend the weekend with her. She'll find out I don't have a terrible cold and I have to figure out how to wear my happy face for her. I hate that I live four hours away. I hate that she's trying to give me heirlooms as keepsakes. She keeps asking me what I want from her house and I keep telling her the only thing I want is her. I fucking hate that she's dying and there's not a goddamn thing I can do about it!!!!!!!!!!


I cleaned a bunch of projects off my plate so that I could spend this weekend with her and I'm going to see about going over a couple of weekends a month. I didn't have time to build the Saturday Reading Radar post. I had a special one for menage's finished that I moved into it's place.

So, I'm off to see my best friend. Her brother (the one who thought we were a "thing") and his wife will be there, too. *evil laugh* Which is good because then John will be have someone to talk to while I steal his wife. 

Y'all have a great weekend.

Thank you for stopping by and reading!!