The Bracelet
Friends forever. What a joke.
Ten years have gone by without a word being spoken to one another. You'd learned the hard way that friends are never forever, and this was just yet another example dealt to you by a cruel world.
You still have the bracelet. Often you sit idly, staring off into space, your fingers running over the smooth beads, which are so cool against your flushed skin. You sit and think of her, and of the past, as you turn each faded bead over between your fingers.
Ten years have gone by since she made you this bracelet, and you have not taken it off since. Not a moment has gone by without the bracelet gracing your thin wrist: not one shower, trip to the beach, shopping extravaganza, or even the last day you spoke to her.
She'd walked in on you kissing Cokie Mason in the locker room. Not a very smart move, but you'd always secretly been one for reckless abandonment, and had just been waiting for life to present you with a moment to seize and allow you to break free, throwing caution to the win. And so there it had been, in the form of Cokie Mason.
You secretly hoped the reason she was so upset was jealousy, but you know better than to get your hopes up. As you'd stood there, Cokie's body pressed against yours, her mouth engulfing your own, you wished it was someone else. Responding to the eager lips pushing insistently on your mouth, you closed your eyes and imagined it was her. Prayed you'd open your eyes and it would be her. Hearing the rattle of the beads slide down your arm, you opened your eyes. Instead of ebony locks and warm, dark almond-shaped eyes, you found Cokie Mason.
That was when she'd walked in and interrupted you two. She never treated you any different afterwards, but you knew what she must think – how weird she must find you. You suddenly found yourself feeling uncomfortable around her at sleepovers, even more than you had before. Not just because of how you felt around her, but because of what you knew she must think of you.
She became immersed in the dating scene soon after, and countless boys came and went. She went farther and farther with each, and delighted in giving you details. Each new conquest drove another stake into your heart, and that that moment, you gladly would have traded places with Alan Gray so you could be the one kissing her and touching her soft skin under her clothes that night.
You were forgotten about, basically. She had no time for you anymore, and so you were left behind. You tried to understand, as you know these things happen between friends, especially as a teenager, but that doesn't make it hurt any less.
And so you keep living, passing her in the halls on occasion, staring after her as you caught a whiff of her exotic perfume, wanting to call out to her. But you keep walking, in the opposite direction, as life does the same and continues to carry you both to different places. It wasn't long before you left Stoneybrook to return to New York, just so you wouldn't have to see her and think about her everyday.
Yet, through all this, you never once took off the bracelet.
Now you're going to see her again. Some former classmate's funeral; someone you barely remember. But she will be there, which is the important thing, and you will take any opportunity to see her again, just to quietly drink in her beauty, unobserved.
So, after all the years, you are going to see her once again. But first, you remove the bracelet, for the first time in ten years, because if she sees it, she'll know you still care.