Ellie Heffner told me that the day she graduated would be the day she left her family and ran away forever. She’d been telling me that since we were fifteen years old.
“They’re freaks,” she said. “Hippie weirdo freaks.”
I couldn’t argue with her. She did live with hippie weirdo freaks.
“Will you come back and visit me, at least?” I asked.
She looked at me, disappointed. “You won’t still be here then, will you?”
I had one week to go. Three more school days: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and optional Baccalaureate on Friday and then a weekend wait to graduate on Monday. I still got postcards and letters from colleges and universities in the mail every week. I still threw each of them away without opening them.
It was Sunday night and Ellie and I were sitting on the steps on my front porch facing her house, which was across the road.
“I don’t know,” I answered. “I have no idea where I’ll be.”
I couldn’t tell her the truth about where I thought I’d be. I almost did a few times, weak times when I was gripped by fear. I’d almost told her everything. But Ellie was… Ellie. Ever since we were little, she’d change the rules of a game halfway through.
You don’t tell your biggest secrets to someone like that, right?
Anyway. I had a week until I graduated. I had zero plans, zero options, zero friends.
But I didn’t tell Ellie that either because she thought she was my best friend.
It was complicated.
It had always been complicated.
It would always be complicated.