Eri

i have… i had a friend.

we were really close, he changed schools in the middle of the year and I befriended him quite soon. he was very nice, funny, I thought we clicked, just instantly became friends. we went out to eat dinner with other friends several times, we opened up to each other very soon. over the summer, he called me numerous times, just to catch up. (he does not live in the same country as me, that’s why we could not meet up)

but then, the next school year he befriended my brother, and the distance came. he did not see me as a friend anymore, he saw me as his friend’s sister. and I was hurt, truly. I was his friend before that…

At first; he had started treating me as a “younger sister”, then he went off to tell me that I am not his friend, his friend’s sister. We fought over that. I told him I’m a bit offended that he couldn’t just see me as a friend, or maybe just be friends with both siblings. He apologised to me the next day, I forgave him because I cherished him and everything was fine until the distance came again.

Although he is handsome and popular, he had some issues with himself and i would always compliment him, but he’d get shy so I started complimenting him a lot more to try and make him feel better about himself. Then there was another time when some boy had a crush on me, and I really don’t care for dating and I did not want to lead that boy on, so this friend of mine suggested to be my pretend boyfriend. It was fine, he would just say “hi girlfriend” and I’d say “hello boyfriend”. We didn’t have feelings for each other, it was a truly pure friendship I thought we had.

But him... being the playboy he is… everytime he had started flirting with a girl he would stop talking to me. Even though he would ask my brother to call me over so that he could talk to me through my brother’s phone, he would still talk to me as a joke and then just ignore me all the time privately. One of his excuses of growing further apart from me was that I am younger than him… I’m barely 1 year younger than him… and if I was born only a mere month earlier we’d be the “same age”. I found that excuse pathetic.

I just find this very hurtful. I had spent so much time with him, opened up to him, he was truly like a brother, one of my closest friends in school. And now I feel sad as it seems he only befriended me when there were no other girls he could speak to or when he was still too shy to become closer to the boys in school, so he befriended them through me.