Nathalie

There is a picture I’d really wanna find back. There are three girls on this picture, two of them standing near a wooden table, facing the camera, and a third one perched on a wooden stool, her head is slightly down, her hair pouring down on her shoulders. Of the blonde girl standing next to me, I have no news since a good 12 years… Of the girl perched on the stool, I just waved her goodbye tonight.

At age 8, the three of us were best buddies ever, almost soul mates. The little blonde one, Sophie, never got on well with the little Brunette, Nathalie, and yours truly was often caught in between. But all in all, when get along well, the way kids do.We had the same dreams, the same fantasy running wild, and the three of us loved unicorns. The stories we created, then lived, made us famous and got us the reputation of “special girls “ (this is the kind rendition). We were gonna marry brothers, and live in twin houses, nothing could separate us, never.

Then life separated us.

As it often does.

I kept contacts with Nathalie the Brunette, however, and despite our lives now so different, I must say that she never, ever forgot me. Never. Up to this day, when she came along and gave my folks and I an invitation for her wedding next September.

She appeared in a simple way, in the courtyard. I was reading a book, perched in a stone, and it took me a while to remember her. Shame, I know. The young lady I had seen a year ago had now grown her hair a bit. How could I forgot her green eyes, I still cannot understand. She said hello, and suddenly all the memories were back at once. It was as if I had seen her about yesterday. So far, yet so close. So close, yet so far.

I feel stupid sometimes, for not being able of linking the people that matter to me, of assuming too fast they forget me, when it’s not. Trust more, and worry less. Because, after worries are gone, all that is left is nothing but void. Friendship is too precious, too fragile to be swept away like this.

I’ll be there on September 15th, and its gonna be Her Day, and I’ll be there to celebrate. I hope I can atone myself for all those years when I lost the contact, for all those years wasted by my fault. She came to me like the friend she has always been, honest and sincere. She shared all my childhood secrets, from saint seya to ghosts stories, from drawings to building treehouses, never judging. She was the brains and I was the happy follower, jumping along her stories like a twin mind. Hey, we even looked alike when kids.

I’ll be the fantasy elf, still dreaming of unicorns, attending the wedding of a princess, radiant in her white gown and castle upon the hill.

Be blessed always, Nathalie 