You think that’s funny?

I can’t say that I’ve ever lost anyone I loved to a drunk driver. But I’ve seen people who have, haunted by those they never got to say goodbye to. Those who they loved too late. Or those who loved all they could, and still lost someone they cared about.

I have lost people I’ve cared about. It hurts; you might know this too. I don’t like losing people…I don’t like saying goodbye to people I love ever, be it for a few months or forever. And when you hung up last night, I thought I’d just said goodbye to two people I count among my best and most valued friends.

And you were joking. I was panicked, near tears, and felt more helpless than I ever have before. I was about two minutes from booking the next flight home so I could be sure to attend your funerals. I called you back, I called the only other person I could think of – Carter – and tried to figure out what to do next.

Then I find out you were just kidding, it was all a joke. You think that’s funny?

For the last six months I’ve put up with this kind of bullshit. I rarely mind the fact that you know I can take your constant jibes, attacks, mockery, and humor. And most of the time, I can. But sometimes I can’t. And that’s when you’re at your most merciless, most relentless, and least caring. You don’t notice or don’t care that what you say hurts me because I love you – all of you – so much. I feel like you made the last few months of my life at home alternately wonderful and terrible. I looked forward to seeing you, while being told that you really couldn’t care less if I were there or not. I felt like an outsider, like someone you were just looking after because she gave you someone to direct your mockery at. A test subject for your taunts. And I didn’t mind, at least not to you, because I knew most of it was in fun, most of it wasn’t meant, and most of the time you backed off when I wanted you to.

Most of the time. But when you didn’t, I never reacted; I took it. And then I find that you’ve been cracking jokes behind my back, openly and blatantly making fun of me, and that hurt more than anything you ever said to my face. You’ll post it on your profiles but you don’t have the balls to say what you’re thinking. You’ll reference derogatory jokes I was not a part of – except to be the punchline – to my face, and then get a kick out of my confusion. Do you think I didn’t know you were making fun of me? I just don’t understand why you thought you were so much better that you could treat me like shit. I don’t get offended easily. I was rarely offended with any of you. But I was hurt – frequently – and I don’t know if you have any idea how much or how often.

Why did I keep going back? Because when we were just hanging out, watching hockey or eating cookies or playing on the beach or making music, it was amazing. I felt wanted, like I was part of a group, more completely than I really ever had. It was awesome, and I don’t know if any of you have any idea how wonderful it was to have somewhere to go and something to do and people to call ‘friends’ and really mean it. But the longer I’m away the less I remember those moments and the more I remember the ‘thundercat’ references or the taunts about my height or my passions or any number of other things. I looked past them then, and I still would, I think, if I weren’t able to take such an objective view.

When I tell people why my day was terrible – I spent the afternoon still rattled and upset from what happened last night, coupled with Carter’s subsequent call about what you’d originally planned to do – they look at me in shock. They don’t understand how people can do something like that to a ‘friend.’ And honestly, neither can I. It was said to me several times today, but I’m just now realizing it – I don’t deserve that. I never did. I hate what you do to me. I hated the person I became around you sometimes. Other times I loved myself and all of you and everything, but not often enough, the way I remember things. I hate the person you made me out to be – weak, feminine, worthless, just a tagalong. I hate that you realized how quickly what I’m only just not discovering – how easy I am to trample on, how easy to destroy any vestigal self-confidence I have, how simple I am to make a mockery of. I hate that you saw right through me; that I was nothing more than someone to talk about when I wasn’t there, someone who was only included how many times because she happened to be around, or someone slipped and told her what was happening…only because she lived next door.

I don’t live next door anymore, but I still can look out my window and almost see the familiar cars in the driveway, knowing that either I was forgotten or unwanted – I don’t know which is worse – or that I was about to head over to be laughed at both to my face and behind my back. I also remember the thrill of hopping the fence and knocking on the door, smelling the cookies or hearing the shouts for a game…I remember meeting you all for breakfast, or sitting down at lunch and quoting Eddie Izzard or talking about the Renegades. I remember feeling that I had found some people who understood me, who connected with me, who cared about me like I did about them. And I don’t know if that was right or not; it simply was. There you were; you’d all been next door all the time.

But I don’t live next door anymore. I’m not a present factor in your lives anymore. I talk to one or two of you online every so often. And it’s usually nice. Not always, but few things are always pleasant. I get drunken phone calls from you on a fairly regular basis. I share jokes or memories with my friends and remember laughing ‘till I cried…I remember running next door when I had nowhere else to go, knowing that you would, if not understand or hear me, at least look after me for a few hours while I calmed down. I remember sitting down to my computer at night wondering what would be said tonight – what jokes tossed around, which ghosts dredged up, which past action of mine waved in my face to remind me of what a horrible girl, friend, human being I’d been.

I know that I fucked things up somewhere along the line – probably it all began when I started hanging out in the first place. I admit it. It makes things hard, though, when I’m not allowed to admit it because I’ve been made a pariah without being informed. When everyone but me knows how everyone else feels, when my actions and words and private exchanges suddenly become publicly talked about and mocked. I didn’t mind then, because I was too busy focusing on picking up the pieces to look at everything together. But I can now.

No, this isn’t right. I don’t want to bring these old stories back, bring the ghosts forward that I just condemned. I just wanted you – all of you – to know how much I loved you, and I want to understand why I did. I don’t think I ever will…I had no reason to. There was no love returned, or if it was, it was so cleverly mixed with casual friendship and tasteful tolerance that I often failed to see it. And when you decide that fooling me into thinking that two people who I do love will probably die before the night is out, I have a hard time understanding why I ever thought you all cared as much about me as I did about you. Because I did care, but I don’t think I should have. I cared about backseat singalongs and midnight milkshake runs, but I don’t think I should have.

And I don’t think I should care now, but I do. Because I’m not gone for good, and neither are you, and I do still live next door, sometimes. Because I did love you, because I still do, and because I want to know if you love me too…if it’s even worth coming back across the fence to endure the taunts. I’m not sure, but I want to be.

I don’t think you understand how you hurt me. I don’t think you understand how you could have. But I love you all, miss you all, and look forward to seeing you, whenever we’re all back home.

If, that is, you’ll have me.