I met my best friend my sophomore year of high school. She was a freshman.

Back in the early 2000’s, it was before everyone had crazy colored hair, but it was recently allowed in school. My hair was super long, like down-to-my-knees long. I dyed it purple because I was obsessed with Trunks, a character from the anime DBZ. I’d also recently gotten into what was back then “punk” culture, and Hot Topic was legitimate punk wear and not Disney-fied. I was like a walking billboard for them, lol.

Anyway, freshmen tended to avoid me. I wasn’t mean or a bully or anything, I just looked different enough back then that rumors would spread.

So, I was pretty shocked when this skinny freshman approached me in between classes to ask me a question. She asked me out of nowhere why I decided to dye my hair purple. I was so excited to be asked, I thought I was cool as shit, so I smiled all big and said “it’s an anime thing!” Then continued on to my next class. Years later she said she stood there as I left thinking: “what the hell is anime??” LOL.

Anyway, turns out we took the same bus to school, and we lived in the same neighborhood. She would get on before me in the morning, and leave after I got off, so I never noticed her on there. But one night me and my mom were getting dinner at a local restaurant and she and her father were there at the same time. We waved to each other and she came over to ask me if we could hang out some time. I gave her my house phone number (no cell phone for me yet) and she did just that. We hung out at my house the first time and bonded over the fact that our parents were divorcing. We just never stopped hanging out. I considered her my best friend by the time I was a junior in high school.

I’m far more extroverted, than she is, more bold and decisive in general, and she’s told me plenty of times that she thought I was really brave over my ability to enter a party and immediately make friends and other seemingly easy social interactions. But the reality is, she’s the one who approached the scary girl with rumors floating around, not once but twice. We wouldn’t be friends if she hadn’t done that. She’s the one who’s brave.

We’ve been through a lot io shit over the years, but we always answer the phone and if it’s been a while it’s like we never left each others side. We’ve fought and then made up, both over petty shit and serious shit. We lived together for three years and are still friends, haha. We travel the world together. We’ve been to Ireland, France, Italy, Greece, Spain and Denmark together. We live on different sides of the US now, and fly out to meet each other overseas for an adventure. She’s the best. :)