Today I went to visit my friend Jenny. Jenny hasn’t been my roommate since freshman year, and although that was more than three years ago, sometimes it still feels like I’ll go home to find Jenny sitting at her computer typing away on aol while telling me a story about a “stupid boy” and asking if she can borrow my black boots—“you know, the going out ones.”
The reality is that, although when we get together, we giggle and gossip like we’ve never been separated, we rarely see each other now. We try to have lunch a couple times a semester and talk on the phone a handful of times, but she has her friends and I have mine, and although our groups wave and say hi to each other, we rarely all hang out together.
Anytime I see her, I immediately begin reminiscing about the year we lived together; the year we knew each other inside and out. I always think of the time we stayed up until four a.m. “studying” for our 7:30 a.m. final exam in American politics. “It’s impossible to study without making Velveeta shells and cheese, giving each other pedicures, and talking about our families,” we rationalized all night long. I think about how we never once said good night to each other all year long because we would chatter long into the night until one of us finally dropped off to sleep. I think about how I would tease her for being a computer geek and she would ridicule my addiction to soap operas. I remember how we would instant messenger each other even though our desks were close enough we could have reached out and touched each other. I remember tuning into MTV’s Undressed and not being able to turn it off despite our unanimous vote it was hideous. “It’s like a train wreck,” we would patiently explain to our friends, “you can’t not look at it.” “Yeah,” the other would chime in, “it’s so bad, it’s good.” I reminisce on our super hero names—Super Curl and Phat Girl—and our made up words—churmastotastic—because “great” and “super” just didn’t seem to cover it. I remember how I used to tease her about her fingernails. “You paint them and then immediately take the polish off. Then you paint them again and take the polish off again. I mean, really Jen! What’s the point?” I remember the first night we bonded while sitting on our dorm room floor. “You collected unicorns when you were little? Me too!” “Your mom is an English teacher, speech coach, and drama director? Mine too!” “You were the shortest person in your graduating class? Me too!”
Today we had a conversation the way we used to. I said, “I brought you a package.” I’m sorry about your dad. She said, “Shells and cheese!” My comfort food. You remembered. I said, “Among other things.” Her face twisted and did something indescribable to my throat as she pulled out the stuffed unicorn. “You shouldn’t have.” Thank you. I cleared my throat and said thickly through the fuzz, “I’ll be there on Thursday. Call me if you need anything.” Or call me if you don’t.
And as I left her, walking the long dark sidewalk to the street and watching the glittering reflections of the street lamp bounce off the asphalt, my chest clutched a little as I realized today’s visit was already locked up in the scrapbook of my mind alongside nail polish and MTV and all-nighters, right where it didn’t belong. And my heart wanted to weep a little for her at its finality.
