it's like. okay. imagine you're a little lonely kid, because you don't have any friends, because day care and preschool is expensive, and your parents didn't beat teen pregnancy so they're always working crazy hours and leaving you alone with an elderly neighbor. and then one day you meet a best friend right. you and this girl are immediately ride or die for each other. cannot be separated for more than a few hours without crying. she's everything you want to be and you're everything she wants to be. and you're with each other for everything- she's there when your brother is born, you're there when her dad leaves. you start school together. gripping each other's hands the entire time. she comes over every day because her mom works even more than your parents do. and you love that! more time with your favorite person! and your parents adore her, too. and you love that! everyone you love fits at the little picnic table in the kitchen that your dad dragged in when he found it on the side of the street one day. she comes with you to visit your grandparents and goes on family vacations with you, she goes shopping with you, she goes to all the little kiddie activities with you- dancing, t-ball, art, singing, soccer, cheerleading, you're always together. and everyone knows you're a package deal. and so, naturally, people start comparing the two of you often. and you don't mind! they don't mean it in a mean way, the two of you can just be very different sometimes! light and dark, rain and sun, that sort of thing. it makes sense that you'd have different strengths. except you start getting older, and you start noticing it's a little different. like, you're good at things, but you aren't anything special at anything. you have straight a's, but you're not considered smart enough for the nerds. people like you, but you aren't popular. no one ever seems to know if you're joking or if you're just stupid. people start telling you they like you- but in smaller doses. you're pretty, but you aren't beautiful. but your best friend is beautiful, and your best friend is cool, and she's smart, and she's talented at everything she tries. and it's- it's different. her mom works a lot and doesn't get to spend enough time with her, and that's a tragedy. but your mom works a lot and doesn't spend a lot of time with you, and that's normal, and you shouldn't complain, because you have it better than her. people tell you that all the time. her life is harder than yours and you have to be gentle with her feelings- and they didn't even need to tell you that, you would never want to make her feel bad! and you give her everything you can, a space in your home, half your food, half your parents attention, and you know she hears people compare the two of you and it makes her feel bad, too (you don't understand why, when she's always the one they prefer), but so you start making sure she has things that are JUST hers. like, you were good at art before, but she's incredible at it, so you give up and just mess around in class, to the point where no one would even bother comparing you there. it's all for her. you would drop anything for her in a heartbeat and you'd never complain about it. and you know she'd do the same for you, just, you haven't found anything that you need to be all yours yet! and that's fine! except one day you meet this boy, right? and he's charming and tall and the way he smiles at you makes you wanna faint a little. he rides a horse through the school for you. he tells you he wants to kiss you. he tells you you bring out the best in him. when he looks at you you feel like you're the only person in the room, and you've never felt like that before. you've always felt your best friend connected at your hip and getting half the attention. you think this is it, this blooming romance, that's your thing, your one thing that is all yours, and you love it! it's exciting, it's relieving, not being compared to your best friend for once, and now you know why she needs art like air. everything is great.
except- except. as you get older, you notice somethings get more stark, right? like, your mom, she loves you, and you know she's busy, but you can't help but notice how she'll drop anything for your brother, or your dad, or your best friend, or your brother's best friend, but whenever you need her for something she brushes you off onto the first person she can. and your dad would do anything for you, drop anything, so it's fine, really it is, but sometimes when you're in a bad mood, you can't help but think about how you have your dad but your best friend has her mom and both your parents. you don't think her mom even likes you- she made fun of you when you were upset about being bullied. you think it's weird that a grown woman would do that, but your mom laughed along with her, so maybe you're being dramatic. people tell you you're dramatic a lot, so that would make sense. hell, maybe you weren't even getting bullied, maybe you took the class saying they 'liked you, but didn't care who played you' the wrong way! wouldn't be the first time! maybe it's like how your friends never want you to be sad- they do this thing where they try and hide things from you, and mostly you think it's dumb and just play along, because when you're in a bad mood they feel bad- so, maybe the rest of the class just meant it like that? not that they didn't care about you, just that they needed someone like you! and it's always nice being needed, right? you have to stop being surprised when people like your best friend more than you. YOU like her more than you like yourself. it's not a big deal.
except. well. you start noticing something between her and your boyfriend. looks, small comments, nothing major! they're friends too, they have to be, because they love you, and you tell yourself not to be dramatic about it, because she would never! you would never do that to her and she would never do that to you- but then she tells you she has feelings for him, that she wants him, and. well. you always give her what she wants. you'd give up anything for her. so you pretend it's not a big deal, even though you feel a little shattered inside, because if he wants her than he was never yours anyway. if he was yours in the first place then she never would have wanted him. why bother! but then you're forced to bother, because they're told you still have feelings for him, and- why does that matter. they didn't care about hurting your feelings when they were flirting in front of you, did they? why would your feelings stop them from dating? did they think you could just turn your heart off like a light switch? but he's insisting he doesn't want to end things with you. and he still makes you feel lightheaded. and...you still want him to be yours. in spite of your best friend's feelings. everyone around the three of you act like this love triangle is your fault, that you're the one holding onto him with claws, that you inserted yourself, but you tried. you tried to back out and leave them be and they wouldn't let you. having the boy who made you feel like your own person compare you to your other half is your absolute nightmare. you understand why he loves her. you understand why she loves him. you don't understand why they're dragging you along, kicking and screaming, why they can't just put you out of your misery. but your heart still hurts, and you were raised by hopeless romantics, so as long as there's a chance, you can't let yourself leave. your mom tells you there was a girl in the mountains one time- maybe this is just that. maybe he's still yours.
but as you get older, it gets- worse. you had to ask your best friend for permission to redecorate your own bedroom. she had a meltdown. everyone sided with her. you tried to make the cheerleading team- everyone comforted her, when you were the one sad about it. the two of you stay in the hole the first day of high school- but everyone is only mad at you about it. you don't even know what about that upset everyone. just that no one was mad at her. no one's ever mad at her, no matter how dumb her emotional outbursts are. she gets one good grade and people parade around her like a toddler taking it's first steps, you get one bad grade and everyone tells you you aren't trying hard enough. she says she's in a destructive move and ends up graffitiing a playground and damn near gets a medal from the mayor, but when you were in a bad mood and ate another friend's cookie everyone acted like you killed someone. all of your friends start acting like its such a chore to be around you, your mother starts getting more short and demanding with you, only getting involved in your life when you don't want her to, your dad starts acting disappointed in you and only knows how to speak in historical references he never explains. you tell your boyfriend that you want him to call you his girlfriend, and then your best friend says she wants to be called his 'girlfriend, equally as much', and you manage not to scream, because she already has more than an equal share of EVERYTHING in your life. he was your boyfriend first and people STILL look at you as if this stupid triangle is your fault, when she's the one who couldn't put her feelings aside for you like you've been doing for her your whole life. everyone sees how this situation is affecting her, she's quieter, her spark is dimmed, and it makes you wanna sob seeing her like that, but why won't anyone notice how bad it's affecting you? why are her feelings always more important? why are you the asshole for not wanting to share your boyfriend with her? she's the one who injected herself into the relationship. and then when he finally, finally, nearly a YEAR LATER announces he's picked you, he loves you, he wants to be with you and only you...he admits that he had to weigh scales to pick between you and your best friend. it was never down to feelings, he didn't have some huge epiphany about how much you mean to him, about how special you are, there was just one extra jellybean in the stupid bag. your friend immediately acts like she's over it, like her crush on him is gone, and you're sure she's lying but. at this point you don't care about her feelings anymore! you are so blindly disappointed in her and your boyfriend but you accept that stupid jellybean because otherwise you just went through a year of hell for nothing, and you can't let that be the case. this is the only fucking time someone has ever picked you over her. and you are going to relish in it if it kills you. no matter how underwhelming it is, someone likes you better than her. a feat even you couldn't accomplish. even if it's just an extra jellybean.
I'm SORRY for girl meets world posting in 2024 I just really believe Riley Matthews deserved to throw a few punches.
