He walked into my bedroom and sat down on my bed, surprising me. I couldn’t understand why he was so stiff. I stared at him through my mirror. He knew I had been ignoring him, but he didn’t know why and he didn’t know that I was sorry about it. Deleting his text messages and emails was cruel and killed a part of me, but reading them would kill me even more. He was my best friend no matter what. I felt like inside of me my conscience was running into a room and locking the door so it didn’t have to be near anyone. My old life is falling apart and my new temporary life definitely won’t last if I don’t have his support. He has always had an act that made him look absolutely heartless. Now I was concerned that it wasn’t just an act.

“I’m sorry,” I saw his reflection shake its head. He only believes what he wants to believe, and unfortunately for me, right now he wants to be mad. I added, “It’s true. How many times do I have to say that?”

“About two-hundred more times,” he replied icily, his face hid any emotion he might have had… if he had any emotions. I bit my lip. I was losing him. Why was I sorry? He had that effect on people, or at least me, where he made me feel like he was perfect and did nothing wrong and I was the one who needed to apologize. No one else understands how I can live with his cold remarks and sarcasm. I can’t understand how I can’t. It’s almost as if I want to prove to the world that I can do something that I now know I cannot do; keep a friend. A tear found its way down to my cheek.

“I hate this,” I cried out in my head but I couldn’t find my voice. “I can’t explain what is happening,” I wanted to say. “I… I just can’t. I’m hurt, but I don’t know why. I’m different, but I’m not sure how. I’ve been blaming you, but I don’t want to. Maybe I don’t deserve friends. I certainly don’t deserve you.” One of his favorite quotes was by Saint Thomas Aquinas: ‘There is nothing on this earth more to be prized than true friendship.’

“I used to be a true friend. But I’ve changed. So have you,” I muttered. I didn’t realize that I had actually said that until I looked up and saw his face, still masked, but his eyes burned into mine. He shook his head angrily and stood up.

“F*** this,” He shot back. He left the room and slammed my door behind him. Oddly enough, as he slammed my door, the pictures on my desk rattled. One of the framed pictures had fallen. I picked it up carefully and after a few seconds of recovering from his outburst. I muttered, “You never used to curse at me either.” Beneath the now cracked glass was a picture of him and me when we were eleven. In the picture he had his arm around my shoulder. I dropped the picture on my bed and leaned against my door sliding down to the floor. Tears flowed down my red cheeks and onto my shirt. I held my knees tightly to my chest. I was frozen in the despair of losing a friend. My best friend.