Blinded by Limerence

66 | Thanks for Everything

Morgan

As I walked across the freshly cut grass of Amity High's grounds, I saw Addie across the artificially colored field, and our eyes locked almost immediately.

She wore a bright smile on her face as she excitedly waved me over, and I ran to her at once.

She was standing in line with the rest of our class, and as soon as I arrived, the teacher began the roll call, calling out the names of all my classmates alphabetically.

"Morgan's here, Mr. Tucker!" exclaimed Addie as I wrapped my arms around the girl, giggling for no particular reason like a schoolgirl.

Mr. Tucker checked my name off the list, muttering something incoherent, then strode over to the other classes, probably to make sure everyone was present there, too.

"M, can you believe it?" beamed Addie when I finally turned my attention to her. Her manicured hands gripped my forearms and squeezed them. "We're graduating! After today, we'll all go our separate ways and be off to college."

I flashed her a sad smile that didn't quite reach my eyes.

 "Stanford's gonna love you, A," I said, trying to wrap my head around the fact that I won't be schoolmates with my best friend anymore. She'll be moving away in a few weeks, and I won't be able to run to her house for help whenever I've done something stupid anymore—those days were done.

Addie played with a stray strand of her wavy, ash-brown hair that fell across her vivacious face. "Could you tell I was nervous?" she giggled, wearing a subtly tense look. "How 'bout you, though? You never did tell me where you're going in the fall. How am I supposed to flood you with letters of tales of my soon-to-be crazy college life?"

"Letters? They're called texts and calls, grandma," I laughed, "and I don't need letters to know that you're probably at frat parties doing every guy in the vicinity—"

Addie cut me off with a scoff. "Well, that was uncalled for—"

I held a hand up, trying my best to stifle a laugh. "Hold on, I'm not done," I said.

"Oh, well, then by all means, continue," she commented sarcastically.

"—and when you get bored of the countless dicks inside you, you'll experiment with lesbianism."

A loud scoff slipped past Addie's red lips, and she shook her head, laughing. "What, so I'm a lesbian now?"

I shrugged. "It's a possibility."

Without warning, my heart sank. Our plain banter served as a painful reminder that I won't get to see my best friend on a daily basis anymore. It's probably good that we're finally going to be apart before we begin to realize that we actually hate each other's guts, but still—it hurts to be reminded that I'll soon be leaving the girl who's been there since the very beginning.

And just like that, everything's changing in the blink of an eye.

School was a good way to keep friends together, to nourish unlikely friendships, but now that that was ending, it all felt too real. This is when the real work would come in—long distance... and honestly, I don't know how I feel about it.

"For real, though," I said as we settled down from our laughing fit, "I'm gonna miss you like crazy, A."

"And you think I'm not?" she retorted, hands on her hips. A soft giggle escaped her lips. "I just can't believe how much you've grown since the start of the year to now, y'know."

I snorted. "I haven't changed that much."

"Quite the contrary!" Addie gasped. "You started out as a girl head over heels in love with my brother—then you had that brief stint with Mr. Donavan—I still think it was super stupid to pursue him, by the way—and now—" Addie trailed off, unable to find the right words.

"And now, I'm just a girl in love with a boy I literally have no chance with," I said, finishing Addie's statement for her. "So, I guess I didn't change much, after all."

In response, the girl smiled wanly and comfortingly rubbed my arm. She knew how I was; humor's my coping mechanism.

"Although, the Archer thing wasn't my fault, per se, because apparently we had this wonderful relationship I remember nothing of before my accident."

Addie visibly tensed up at the mention of the accident.

"Yeah, I pieced it all together," I went on, grinning. "Don't worry, I don't blame you for not telling me—I kind of figured someone else didn't want me to know... like your mom and dad or my mom and dad—"

"For the record, it was my mom," Addie smiled sheepishly. "She told both me and Archer to stay away from you—it clearly didn't work out, anyway—but I promised Archer I'd take care of you, so..."

Slowly, the pieces started to fall into place. "Ah, and that's why you hate her," I said as the realization only now dawned on me.

"So," she prompted suddenly before a silence could settle between us, "how long have you known?"

"A few months," I answered.

"Then why haven't you done anything about it?" she inquired. "I mean, you and Arch can finally be together and—"

"Addie," I interrupted, and she froze slightly, her eyes gradually widening in realization and her lip curling into an embarrassed smile.

"Ah," she said quietly. "You didn't do anything about Archer because you've already decided by then."

I nodded, a faint smile adorning my face at her revelation.

As I stared at Addie standing before me, shifting tensely in place, I realized that she had changed quite a lot, too. 

Despite what I said a while ago about her being horny in college, I knew she knew better than that, and it wouldn't be soon before she found herself a new group of friends she'd trust her life with—and maybe even a boy—who's straight this time—to swoon over. She'll soon be the life of every party; it's only a matter of time... 

Stanford's lucky to have her and so are the incoming freshmen. She's going to kick ass in college.

Even though the thought of her finding new friends in college scares the crap out of me (more than I care to admit), I was thankful for every time she'd let me cry into her shoulder for something small and irrelevant that bothered me, every time I'd bug her incessantly with ridiculous questions about what to text back or something, every time she'd pull me back to the real world so that I don't get too lost in my own thoughts...

To whoever will be her next best friend, her next partner-in-crime, to her next ear and outlet, I hope you know how lucky you are. I'm passing the torch.

Swallowing a lump in my throat, I cast my gaze to the ground, unable to look at the girl as I said the words. "T-thanks, Addie," I said softly, "for everything."

Though my words held simple meaning, I knew that she could see in my eyes that I meant so much more than that.

Don't cry. Don't cry. I swear, Morgan, if you cry—

Her eyes crinkled at the edges, and the corners of her lips turned upwards. It never took long to get Addie to smile—a sarcastic remark, a joke, a particularly succinct goodbye... Soon enough, she was grinning, and her own tears were running down her eyes.

Ah, great. Now I'm crying, too.

I couldn't put my feelings into words, couldn't find the right words to sum everything up, and Addie knew and understood that from the years of friendship we've had. She just got me.

So, instead of responding with empty promises to keep in touch or reminders of how much we love each other, she pulled me into a wordless hug, and I nuzzled my face into the croak of her neck—something we've done a thousand times before and yet, somehow, this feels like the first and last time I'm hugging my best friend...

...because the next we meet, no doubt, we'll both be different people.