Kiss Kiss. Bang Bang.

I have one friend left from my many many years with the Ex. Actually, when he first met her - he came home and said,

My friend's new girlfriend reminds me exactly of you when I first met you.

So, naturally, I liked her right off the bat. Now this was many years ago, and we were friends right away. But the type of friends that are created by boyfriends, really. She came to my birthdays, we met up as duos for drinks and drinking, ran into each other on holiday weekends. We bonded while chain smoking outsides restaurants over fashion, shoes, ebay finds & The Boys. Rarely, if ever, did we see each other one-on-one.


She should have been a Parisian.

Then, last summer, when I found myself - as you well know - without a boyfriend, without his family, and without friends of my own, it was she who I turned to. She was on a brief break from her boyfriend at the time, so she and I met up for drinks on the rooftop bar of that gym where you can charge your drinks to your gym membership. Three mile run followed by a pitcher of Coors, anyone? From then on, she always made it a point to keep her plans with me when everyone else was wavering, flaking & probably couldn't stand me due to my constant lamenting over my my life sans the Ex. I was going through a hard time, she knew it, and she stood by me & actually listened. She returned my calls, she invited me to parties where I wouldn't know a soul, just to get me out of my house. She kept my secrets and told me hers.
Standing in my tiny kitchen last summer, mixing wine spritzers in to-go cups for the beach, I opened the freezer with my left hand, followed by a hammer from the jar on the table with my right, and started pounding away at the ice block that had formed in my store-bought bag of ice, she laughed her infectious laugh and said,

See!?! Look at us! We don't need no stinkin' men!

In that instant, for first time in a long time, I felt like I finally had an ally standing next to me in my new single studio apartment. On my own for the first time ever, I finally had a Friend of my own in my tiny town. Ironically, it is through her that I have met most of my other friends - my life now is actually the result of my friendship with this little doe-eyed Girlfriend of a friend of my Ex. (Say that three times fast.) She was the key to me creating my own bubble as opposed to walking on blistered tiptoes around my Ex's.

She is dark, hilarious, snarky and fiercely loyal.



We once showed up to a coffee date wearing the
exact same outfit in opposite colors.
NoSeriously,WeDid.



She is the friend that will tell you when she's pissed, but then follow that up by blowing you a kiss.

If I am a Rebel Ballerina, she is my Renegade Little Sister.

Bijou, bijou mon amour.

Joyeux anniversaire. xx 

To know her is to love to hear her say the word, Fantastic:
Fintaaaaaaahstic.

Sidenotes: I feel a bit more anchored today; have done a lot of thinking, went to bed ridiculously early last night (for me at least) but not before relaxing on a Japanese latern-lit patio at a barbeque with a couple glasses of Pinot Grigio and Good People.