Six

There is a part of this story which is both sad and beautiful. It regards the people who lived around us, who we met early in life and the ones who stayed with us as we reached the adult age. Friends, acquaintances, colleagues, mates. We’ve lived in many places and the roles these people played along the way were determined from the start.

Let me explain.

Before I came into her life, the first people she met were blood related. That sounds obvious, given that everyone has parents, but I mean cousins… a whole bunch of them. They were her first and only friends, until a certain point. As a young kid, she wasn’t allowed to hang out with the girls who lived in the neighbourhood, cause her parents thought they were bad influences. The brother had friends, went around with other boys, but there was no good company for her. All she had were the classmates, the ones with whom she’d spend a small part of the day. She tried to have friends and to keep them. She wrote in their agendas and asked them to write in hers. They exchanged vows of “friends forever” and she hoped on that promise. But then again, her happiness didn’t last long.

Under a last minute notice, the family decided to move to the countryside. We didn’t have a choice and we were not allowed to cry. She wished with all her heart that her friends wouldn’t forget her and that, perhaps, the new people would be nice to us. It all happened around the time we met, but her reliance on me wasn’t yet as great as today, thus her heart was still suffering from the departure. She was in a city that she’d never heard about. She knew neither things about it, nor anyone who lived there. Her only certainty was that she was bounded to that place and to remain silent.

Four weeks had passed and school holidays were still on. No other kids around, only her bedroom, her books and songs. She didn’t take interest in anything, but to think of her friends. She missed them with all of her heart and wondered if they felt the same. Under such pain, she asked the mother to make a phone call and promised to make it at the time which it wouldn’t cost much. It was a time when telephones were not as common as today, so expensive they were. With permission and condition, she dialled the number of the name in her agenda, but her pounding heart, anxiety and excitement were not enough to stop the shocking answer on the other side. There were no memories of her existence. She gave her name, school, age and description, but no acknowledgment emerged on the other side of the line. “You wrote on my agenda, you said we’d be best friends forever!”, she said in tears. “I know who you are, I just don’t know why you’re calling me”, the voice said.

Polite, yet sad, she hung up. “How could she forget me?”, she wondered in tears. Soaked in her own misery, she promised to never try again.

As the new school year began, she thought of leaving her feelings aside. She was introduced as “the new girl”, but didn’t give much to it. The story was simple: she didn’t have a choice. Everything was new, confusing, overwhelming. She was so young and yet learned to take it day by day, getting on group assignments and learning about her classmates from the outside. We would talk from time to time and although no one else would ever tell, it was clear on how much loneliness still lived inside her. We talked about her birthday, which she liked so much, and things started to change.

She invited very few people. Some boys and girls she used to eat together on the breaks. She had no one else, her cousins were miles away. When they all showed up, her fears became smiles. Such gratitude for a simple and kind act. All pleasant, all very strange. She’d never seen such true amicability before or witnessed anyone so interested in who she really is. It was a brand new world.

Embracing it all together, our ties grew stronger and though the brother still had much more privileges in meeting people, we had finally found true friends. Not only in school, we made new acquaintances from classmates’ friends and built a whole new circle, brand new connections. Almost two years had passed and we carried a feeling of belonging with us when the mother informed that we would return to the coast and that nothing could be done about it. While the brother jumped in happiness, her heart stopped for a moment while I stood there in absurd. She felt her loneliness taking over again and a movie replayed in her head. Nothing could be done, she had to let it all go.

Back to the city where it all started, she decided to leave the countryside behind in many ways. We had a new school, new people and a completely new mindset. Her priorities were others and so were her tastes. I decided to take action as I saw in her silence a need to recover and since we came back as preteen, I got us ready to become a rebel. I gave her the feeling that she was hers and that no one else mattered. There was no point in growing ties with anyone else. Together, we succeeded for a while, but her heart gave up to truly miss the countryside.

Six months later, when she could bear it no longer, she asked me to do the calling. She was afraid of what would come out of it. We picked up the phone and dialled to one of the friends from far away. I had no words, I could not believe. Unlike the time before, there was no need to explain, to say names or to describe anything: the sound of my voice was enough to bring smiles and happy words to the other side of the line. “We were worried about you! Why did you disappear?”, we heard. Tears of joy, a feeling without translation.

Even though we were grounded so far away, our heart and mind had finally found its place. The many years that followed were filled with more calls, letters and visits. Our bodies have grown and developed as much as our love and interaction with one another. There’s always been distance, time and other variables to keep us apart from those childhood mates. New people, new acquaintances, new feelings. The memories are what bond us and show that those two years in a foreign place created a feeling of belonging between those kids.

And as happy moments do, that phone call got us one of the most beautiful gifts of true friendships. We had finally discovered the meaning of home.