  I may just be the master of delayed response. I have known Meghan was moving to Gig Harbor for three months or so. And just today, one quick look at my bulletin board, and I was sobbing. The picture I saw was the day we graduated Cataldo; both grinning wildly, so happy to be over with our awful middle school years. My dress is, surprise surprise, pink. I loved the way the dress looked on me. Meghan picked it out. Her dress is beige with red flowers and she has, surprise surprise, a modest cardigan over its spaghetti straps. We look so different, my black hair and her blond, my giantess height and her petite stature. But our braces, our jubilation, our sunburns are all the same.
That’s the way it has always been. We’re unalike on the surface but look a little closer and we’re the same. Meghan and I have never been likely friends. I was an outgoing and sarcastic child, and she was mild-mannered and silly. I don’t remember why we became friends, but it’s obvious why we stuck together. We both needed someone to rely on, and we fit that role for one another. We were fiercely loyal and passionate about being best friends. Together we could be anything, anyone.
We'd imagine we were orphans or princesses and dance to the Beach Boys. We played off each others strengths and shortcomings; I would let her copy my homework and she would do my hair. We weathered so many storms together. The bullshit and the depression and just… growing up… it has molded us. We’ve become these people, these mini-adults, version of the kids who met in third grade. But it was inevitable.
I miss her most when I’m sitting right next to her. Because that’s when it feels most real. I can see her makeup and her straight teeth and her flat-ironed hair. And I know I can never get the eight-year-old Meghan back. Likewise, I’ll never secretly believe in Santa Claus again or want to marry Aaron Carter. And her moving away is the final strand cut loose. She’s really gone, in time and now in distance too. Affectionately… Anna 
