A friendship is something that cradles you. Any good friend can make you forget about something bad that's going on in your life and make you laugh when you want to cry. What if one day that friend turned their back on you and you couldn't understand why? You don't know whether to be angry at them or at yourself because the whole situation baffles you. It's not that you didn't see it coming, the problem is that you never thought this friendship that has cradled you for the last three years would end like this. She avoids you in the hallway, doesn't show up during lunch and almost never makes plans with you unless there's no one else available. She's nicer to people she complains about all the time than she is to you, the "best friend". And there you are, reading a text message that you, yourself cannot believe with your own eyes. She says you don't care, she says that you're the one confusing her, and after 10 minutes of words that utterly shock you, she leaves the conversation at that; never to talk to you again. You sit there, shaking with anger on a Saturday afternoon. You're on the front stoop and it's a gorgeous day, you can feel that summer is coming as you watch the clouds slowly move through a perfect blue sky and bees land from one flower to the next. You get this text message. It rattles your bones, makes you numb to the sunshine you're sitting under and you feel as though it's 30 degrees outside and it's getting dark. You look up from the phone, snapping back to reality. You're no longer numb, but you wish you were and in that instant you are hit with so much anger that you reply with a text message so bitter and honest that after it's sent you put the phone down and begin to cry. You don't cry for long though, until Mom asks you how your friend is and you again begin to lose it. Now, you're not alone, you have friends and a boyfriend who in the passed few months have treated you better than that best friend has in a long time. So why are you sad? The weight of all her insecurities, her problems, her fears and her weaknesses that she dropped on you are now lifted. She's gone, so don't you feel free? You will feel free but not until you are able to become the person you were before she changed you. But you are like rubber and you understand that the writing is on the wall with this one. It was bound to happen, and you aren't the first she has done this to. You realize that this girl, your best friend, will never be happy no matter how many "A"s she gets in school, no matter how many people tell her she's just fine the way she is, no matter how many friends she has. You cannot change her and take back what she did to you. It is time for you to be yourself again. You're free