I had a best friend once...

     She meant a lot to me. She was the first friend I didn't have to share. She was a best friend who wanted me in her life enough to cry tears when I misunderstood her and refused her friendship. She was the first best friend who I could lay in the same bed with as the sky decided to descend and laugh hysterically until we had to pee and her grandmother yelled from the other room to keep it down. We'd talk until we feel asleep, her loud snores keeping me up a little longer. And as the moon watched over our sleeping figures she'd mumble in her sleep, toss and turn and slap me across the face.
     She wasn't exactly pure, or smart, or pretty, or a relatively calm and sane person, but neither was I. Where I lacked in anger she lacked in forgiveness. When I failed to produce a vociferous voice she would transform into a lioness, standing up for me while I repeated, "It's okay." Knowing full well it was not okay. It was never, okay. At times I, admittedly, wanted to punch her in the face but I never could because like a perfect friend our souls fit perfectly together, complimenting where the other failed.
     Somewhere in between though, everything began crumbling. Slowly at first. I don't even know when the mirror between us shattered but, when I finally noticed it was far too late.
     I could no longer take away her sorrow. I was the source for her pain.
     Because I lived with my mother. Because my mother worries about me. Because I had an older brother who looked out for me. Because I was richer than her. Because I lived in a house. Because I had the latest phone. Because the boy choose me over her. Because I didn't want her boyfriend.
     Because I couldn't see soon enough to soothe her worries and insecurities. Because she was jealous she didn't see what was right in front of her.
     A little brother who looked up to her. A grandmother with a heart problem who cooked and sold food to buy her only granddaughter, that she had raised as her own child, the latest clothes and jewelry made of gold. A grandmother who loved her so much she couldn't bare taking that last breath until her granddaughters voice rang on the other side of the hospital phone line.
     The jealousy made her cold and disgusting. Discarding and patronizing the women who had every right to hate and relinquish every right to her granddaughter but never, could even dream of it.