She was restless, like a wisp of something fluttering about in the wind, constantly in motion. Her curiosity was like the sea, taking her far and wide and enriching her more each day. She was drawn to nature, as if she herself was a flower waiting to bloom within the fruitful umber soil. Her wide eyes were like camera lenses, capturing the shadows around her.
From elementary through middle school, she walked through my life hand in hand with me. She was there for the first time I liked Thomas. Thomas Fischer. He had freckled button nose, with a mischievous grin and sandy brown hair. He always wore this one red IU sweatshirt, from sixth grade until eighth, but I loved him just the same. Thomas was adorable. He was smart, and tried hard in school, but he was still one of the class clowns. Teachers loved him. Girls loved him. Even all of the guys loved him. He was popular among our grade, and within my friend group. He was a three sport athlete: baseball, basketball, and football. His dad had coached sports both at Orchard and at Park Tudor. When Thomas talked to you, you felt as if you were the only one in the room. He was witty, and everyone knew of him in the school. He had a sensitive and sweet side to him, which I secretly loved. When he looked at me, my heart started racing, and when he talked to me, oh boy. She was there for every first.
She's one of those girls who makes you instantly care about her. Within her gaze holds the promise of shaking the world, and the sweeping motion of a blink brings about a certain hopefulness to others for she sees all the beauty, and likewise all the pain. Despite the motion in her eyes, her mouth is the great leveler. There is a steadiness inside her grin and a will inside her frown. Her touch is soft and curious, yet she always makes an effort to appear as though she knows what she's doing. She inhales and exhales an unthinkable amount of ideas and dreams. She's inspired on Sundays, the day she feels the most nostalgia. She thinks of words and puts them in poems that aren’t yet coherent but someday they’ll reflect the masterpieces inside of her. She is moved by the music and lost in the words and she sometimes wishes she had a map in place of her wild heart so she could navigate the art that lives within her. She widens her eyes at broken up visions through the wisps of her wind-blown hair at the breeze of night and the glare of lights that awaken her. The sunlight melting her eyes seems to stop time like a kiss that lingers upon her eyes as feelings do to lips. All she needs to do is stare. Her thoughts are busy like New York City, and her conscience is as vulnerable as bare feet on ice. She leaves a piece of her soul wherever she goes and finds a piece of her heart within every corner scattered across the world in a scavenger hunt to find her life. She believes in the good and invests in dreams, and her confidence in the universe is all you need to trust. She likes her music loud and dances like a vision, people say there’s something special in the way she moves. She watches all people as though they are a gift, and looks at them with a gaze that says “I know what you’re made of.” Her words are her power, for all of her ideas and dreams seep into souls and stain skin like a sunburn. All she needed to do was speak a single word to remind you what friendship was. The inspired and the inspirers both cease to exist without one another. She inspires by simply existing, but she is inspired by everything. Her inspiration is a collection, taking piece by piece all things beautiful and mysterious to make her whole.
Maybe this is romanticized. Maybe this is what I wish she was like. Maybe I didn’t point out her cracks and chipped paint, or the weeds growing in the corner. Perhaps I have forgotten that for every smear of light, there is a drop of darkness, sable and inky, ready to seep through and become absorbed. All at once she was everything, and yet she was nothing; a paradox in the dark, only blooming in the light. Her heart was like a robin’s egg: so delicate with its papery thin walls and tiny fractures yet it sustained a life and a purpose amongst its small quarters. She was a ruminative and introspective person, but never felt fear in reflecting those thoughts upon others. She was not always filled with light and fluttering dreams about life.  Our friendship was not only a whirlwind dance with easy steps and a soft tempo; it was a tumultuous affair leading to teardrops and flushed faces, misguided endeavors and silenced words.
Friendship is the bond between two souls who take comfort in being around one another. The togetherness of two minds and different quirks creates a harmonious contract that cannot be broken. Friendship is just little memories, intertwined and stitched together with a thread made of togetherness, and with each stitch, you grow simultaneously as one. This contract of friendship is not always followed and can become fragmented over time. Sometimes those fragments are a natural progression, but other times they are from the flaws we each have as an individual. My friendship with her was a windshield by which we both viewed the world. By the end of our days, the windshield had become hard to see out of. It was foggy and splintered with shatters of the past.  I believe that those cracks do not represent weakness, rather strength. I believe that they do not represent contempt; they are a testament to our bond.