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kingbugz · 4 years

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Green Elephant

You don’t really see someone's true colors until you get yourself undone from their leash. I saw her as a queen, this beautiful chaos, a fearless woman. I admired her bravery; her body had all these scars with different stories. She unclothed herself to me, grabbed me by the hand and let me feel her scares. She wasn’t afraid to show me every part of her. So, I promised that I’d always be there for her, I promised that we were going to be forever. She promised it all back to me.

We did everything together. We’d spend all day at school together, go home and eat everything in sight because our school was way too poor to afford school lunches. Just vending machines full of extremely healthy Hot Cheetos. We had sleepovers almost every night, except when she had to stay at her father's house, even then we would always be on the phone.

She was there when I had lots of my “firsts”. Like my first tattoo, and the first time I smoked weed was with her. It was a warm November day after school, we went to a garden in the park, a basic stoner move. And we shared her weed she bought off this guy at our Lutheran private school we went to. That day was the first time we shared a kiss. Nothing more than a peck, so don’t get too excited with your creepy lesbian fantasies dude. It didn’t feel strange, I didn’t hate it. Afterwards, we never talked about it again. Not because we were ashamed of it, but because it felt...normal?

We spent the rest of the night cuddled in her bed together listening to Frank Ocean while we starred at the dark ceiling. We kept on talking about how much we loved each other, but it wasn’t like this romantic love you see in cheesy rom coms. It was the type of love where you would do anything for them, I cared so much about this girl. We connected so easily.

I still remember the day we saw each other for the first time. She transferred into my school our sophomore year. It was last period and I was in art class. I sat by the door so I could quickly escape my teacher when the bell finally rung. I heard someone slamming their locker, I looked, not to be nosey of course, but because with any noise I am instantly distracted. When I looked up, my eyes matched hers directly and then we were awkwardly starring at each other for what felt like the rest of class. The bell rang, I grabbed my stuff and went to my locker. Which of course was right next to hers.

I wasn’t that annoying girl to greet the new girl all aggressively, so I politely ignored her. It was kind of hard to ignore each other when we had class together, had lockers next to each other. Oh and also went to a school that had only 200 students. I’m not sure when we started talking, but I do remember how we stopped talking, now that had more impact.

I’ll fast forward all the boring high school details:

1. Morning bells

2. Class

3. Lunch bell

4. Hot Cheetos

5. Class

6. Last Bell

7. Leave hell

8. Go to her house and dance instead of do homework.

9. I go home

10. Sleep

11. Repeat steps 1-11

We did this almost every day of the school year until one day she got a nose piercing. Yes, that of all things is what took us out of our high school routine. We loved it, it was fucking dope. But our private school administration thought otherwise. She went to school confidently and the minute the morning bell rang she was called into the principal's office. I offered to go with her, but as usual she fights her own battles, so she told me to stay back. It wasn’t long before she came back with a smirk, me thinking everything was okay. I was wrong, she was being expelled. She gave the principle the big ol’ middle finger, walked out from his office, packed all of her belongings from her locker and walked out the school like a boss. Until she realized that she needed to find a new school.

So, unfortunately our high school experience together had to end short, but that didn’t stop us from being together. She lived right across the street from the school, terrible I know, so we still saw each other every day. Days went on, our routine stayed the same, for the most part.

So, I’m not saying I'm the jealous type, but I don’t exactly like to share. There was someone else who was trying to maneuver their way into our lives. He, who shall not be named because I can’t fucking stand him, was this stupid guy who started to like her. They started to hang out, ditching our weekend sleepovers so they could do some super lame stuff together. At first, I was fine with it, I was happy that she had a little boy toy. Especially after the first time I had to help her get over her last boyfriend. Who is also a pig, long story short; he cheated on the queen. Her boy toy at the time seemed nice, but a bit controlling. He didn’t like her staying out too late with me, even if all we were doing was playing dress up with my dog in my tiny little apartment. He didn’t like the fact that her and I spent so much time together, even though I was in her life much longer than he was and I will always know more than she will ever tell him.

Her and I had this unbreakable bond, like dude you are not going to get in the way of us. Please stay in your lane. Or so I thought, I wasn’t long until I noticed her treating me different, distant maybe? She was always so warm and welcoming. She became colder as the weeks went by, he got into her head. I never thought that someone could come between us, especially not a little twig disguised as a boy.

Our relationship began to fade away like it meant nothing to her this whole time, we stopped talking out of nowhere. She was nowhere to be found.

I felt like I was going through a breakup, wondering what it was that I did wrong. I played nice with the guy you liked, I never got jealous the way he did when you looked at me that way. I was able to make you laugh the way he wished he could. He was the reason why we didn’t talk anymore.

Years went on, I finished high school and finally got that damn degree. She’d cross my mind once in a while, but not often. I searched for friends like her, gosh no one was ever going to fill those shoes. After all those years, I finally healed myself from that breakup. I got a new boyfriend, we slayed prom, all that cheesy high school shit. My life was back to normal it felt like.

Until that night she called me, it was a new number, but I answered. She asked to come pick me up, I gave her my new address because we finally moved out from the tiny apartment. I got into her fire red car when she pulled in front, got in and we just embraced each other. Those “I missed you hugs” hit different with the ones you love the most.

The whole car ride was just catching up after two years. Talked about new haircuts, new pets, my new boyfriend and her same old twig boy.

“Oh gosh, does he know you’re with me?” I laughed.

She was silent, a nervous laugh comes out and she says, “Not really. He thinks I’m with my mom.” I brushed that off, trying to not let anything ruin this night.

The red car took us to the beach, we walked and talked for hours. Laughing like old times, talking about our dreams for the future now that we both finished high school. It was nice to have her back in my life, it felt like things never faded in the first place.

After our long talks, she dropped me off home, she texted me when she got home. Telling me she was safe and that she had a good time and that we need to meet up again.

I didn’t hear from her for weeks after that, I felt like a fucking idiot. Her boy toy probably found out and made her delete my number again. Whatever, I didn’t care anymore. She gone for real this time.

I’m not sure if my women instincts are off, but I could have sworn that her and I were done. But again, she called me. Telling me that her boyfriend kicked her out the house and she needed a place to stay for a while.

And If you think that I am the type of person, who lets someone walk all over them, then you are god damn right. She stayed for a few days, we barely slept those days because she kept me up crying about how he kicked her out over who fed the cats or not. I cuddled her like old times, telling her that everything was going to be okay. But I wasn’t going to let him win again this time. This was her house too, her name was on the lease, she paid more bills than he did. So, one day when he was at work, her and I went back into her apartment and found that he put all of her belongs into big black garbage bags.

“This motherfucker.” I said while grabbing a bag. “Come on! We are unpacking your stuff, because you pay to live here too. He’s not gonna win again.”

She’s silent the whole time we are unpacking, but I play our favorite music and we dance the whole time to Beyoncé's Lemonade album. Iconic. Everything seems fine right, once again like nothing ever happened. But I couldn’t help but to wonder why she stopped talking to be again for the second time.

“Hey, so I have question. I know we are all good now, but why did you not talk to me after we met up that one night at the beach?” I ask.

“This is stupid so basically my boyfriend got really drunk one night and told me that you were prettier than me and that he’d fuck you.”

When I tell you I was ready to go to jail for murder that day, I was ready. I never wanted to push someone in front of a bus before him. He was the reason we broke up! Like how dare you tell her that!

“I got mad at you for no reason. That wasn’t your fault, but I blamed you. I never wanted to look at you again.” She continues.

I forgave her, because I tried to understand the situation she was in. I always helped clean up her mess. It was my job now.

So now you’re probably thinking “girl why did you even let her go back to her apartment with this pig?!” Well, let me tell you, she didn’t have anywhere to go. She called her mom and told her about her living situation and her mom told her she didn’t have any more room for her own child. I wanted to let her stay with me, but my parents couldn’t take her and her two cats in. It was a mess. So, I thought that what I was doing was good.

After we were done unpacking, we parted ways. She kept me updated all night and I told her that she can come over anytime if she needs to. She told me that everything was fine, they talked it out and I felt happy with my work.

Then I was ghosted again. This time three weeks. I hated her now, I wished nothing but the worst. Like how stupid you must be to fall for someone repeatedly. I was so blinded by the toxic love she gave.

I gave up on our friendship, deleted everything from my mind about her. She was nothing to me anymore. I started forgetting about her, I went on like nothing ever happened. Those three weeks went by and you’ll never guess what happened.

My doorbell rings on a Sunday morning. It’s her mom. And then I see the girl that ghosted coming up the stairs behind her.

I open the door, “Hi.” I say confused.

“Hey love, I know it’s been awhile. I need tell you something and I didn’t think you deserved a phone call.” Her mother says, so I let them in and she continues on.

Her mother tells me that her daughter has been in an accident at work. Telling me that she hit her head so hard that she fell into a small coma and lost all her memories up until she was nine years old. She told me that she forgets how to talk, act, and she has constant seizures every day.

She tells me this while I am starring right at my old friend. My eyes don’t leave her, we don’t break the eye contact.

The reason why she has been M.I.A for the last three weeks was because she was figuring out how to walk and talk again at the hospital. While I was sitting at home deleting all our pictures and hating her.

Her mother told me that she only remembered me, she remembered my name. She told me that she didn’t stop talking about our memories at our private school three years ago. She didn’t remember anything after that, she didn’t know that she had a boyfriend, she didn’t know she had two cats. But she knew me, she remembered me and our kiss.

When they were about to leave, my queen grabs my hand and hands me a box.

“I made this for you.” She says in her nine-year-old voice. I take it and give her a hug thanking her. It was an earring set and a bracelet she made. With beautiful green beads and had tiny little beautiful elephants.

“I remembered that was your favorite animal.” She tells me as I hold my tears back. I give her a smile and another hug and say goodbye.

I closed the door behind me and break into a weeping cry.

#creative nonfiction #essayist #writing #art #orginal work

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