My Greatest Friendship Had To End Before I Could Find Myself.

At times the endings are just the beginnings.

Our friendship was like a matchstick on fire. Full of warmth and life. We lost ourselves in conversations about everything and nothing. Sometimes in her apartment. Or mine. Or over the phone. We clocked hours together, cooking meals and gobbling down endless bottles of cheap red wine. And we liked it.

We liked it so much we slotted our off days together to do just that. We went places together. From shopping malls and restaurants to parties, movies and everything in between.

It was seven years ago when we first met. We were both on a work trip to the Far East. We met at the hotel lobby through a mutual friend and just like that, we clicked. It was a bond made in heaven. On that evening in a tiny and dark restaurant in Bangkok, a friendship that would span a total of seven years was born.

For the most part, it was pretty awesome except for one fallout at some point. Something which, looking back, was the first writing on the wall. That fallout should have been my first lesson had I paid attention. Only I didn’t. But it’s ok, I doubt I would be writing this if I had.

She became my best friend. My ride or die. The sister I never had. Or was she?

It was as if she was someone I had known from a former life. Or a version of me that I didn’t know existed. We were each others’ shadows. Or perhaps a reflection of each other. I didn’t know it at the time, but that was exactly the point. She seemed to ‘get me’ more than anybody else in my short list of friends. She was always ready to confirm my fears and ‘pull me back to safety’.

Like the one time, I expressed my fear of starting a business. I thought the market was flooded and I told her as much. As always she was there to lend me her ears. After which she gently unplugged me from the latch of my ambition.

Here she was again, ‘pulling me back to safety’. Like the sister I never had. She not only validated my fears of the flooded market, but she also gave me the names of people who had tried and failed in that business.

It would take me years to reach a certain degree of awareness; where I could lose my…