Sandy Harrington and I were best friends for as long as I can remember. I can remember our happiest of times together, even after all these years. We spent summers at the beach, and had sleepovers. We were complete opposites, but no one, not even our husbands, could ever tear us apart.

It all started when we were in elementary school. First grade to be exact. My mother was the leader of brownies. We became close this way. We never thought about social prejudices at this time. We were too young to understand anything like that. Though, through all of our adolescent problems we were there for each other.

I remember once in second grade her other best friend Kelsey Burnet and her got into an argument about Sandy reading her diary. That was the end of their friendship for the time. I was rather happy about that. I never liked Kelsey. After she and Sandy got into that fight, Sandy began to spend more time with me.

An elderly woman stepped into the front seat of a black vehicle. Each silver hair was pulled into tight bun at the back of her head. Her sweater was a strange color that it blended with her skin. She sighed and buckled her seat belt and sat back waiting for the car to start.

I think it was in fifth that I noticed a bit of a change in our relationship. You see, Sandy was a blond-haired beauty with bright blue eyes. I had hazel eyes and brown hair and glasses. This is when Sandy became interested in boys. Of course, her little puppy loves meant nothing yet. I tried to convince myself that she wasn’t spending as much time with me because we had just seen so much of each other in the summer, and we weren’t in the same class that year. That had to be it, because we promised each other we would be friends always.

I was wrong of course. Sandy and I were growing, and maturing and she began to notice, that I wasn’t what everyone considered attractive, and she was the definition. I always had a strong envy for Sandy’s looks. I was plain as the moon in the sky compared to her. Even though she was pretty, and even though it did go to her head sometimes, I loved Sandy like a sister.

The only fight we ever had was in third grade, and that was at out friends’ Halloween party. Her crush was there, and she had kissed him on the cheek illicitly. He was completely dismayed, being as he was only about eight years old. I had went to talk to him about it after Sandy went inside to bawl about being turned away by her crush, and about everyone else picking on her.

Apparently Sandy’s other friends didn’t like the idea that I had tried to talk to her crush, and they yelled at me and told Sandy untrue things about me. It got me mad. To be conspired against my friend.

That fight was over within two days though, after we had talked it out. I was so happy that our friendship wouldn’t be over because of a fight.

In sixth grade, when Sandy and I went to middle school, we didn’t last. She quickly grew to like her newer more popular friends over me. I had some friends too of course, but it wasn’t the same.

Sometimes in lunch I would look over at my old friend enviously. I grew to think bitterly toward her. All of my friends hated her. I went along with it too. I never really hated her, and she wasn’t all that my friends were convinced she was. She was actually really nice. Unfortunately she was only nice when her friends were around.

The people who Sandy hung out with were… not good people. At least half of them were doing drugs or on their way to prostitution and having twelve X-husbands. Not to mention thirty-five kids. I didn’t want that to happen to Sandy. Even if I felt a bitterness toward her.

In seventh grade I had to do a project with Sandy. We had to create a diagram of a coniferous forest. I realized then how much Sandy had changed. She was a ditz. I remember telling all of my friends how much of a ditzy blonde she was. I couldn’t believe it. It made me wonder whether she had changed, or if I was just too naïve to notice when we were little.

The elderly woman looked at all of the scenery. It had been so long ago, but she remembered it all clearly. She closed her eyes as she passed the run down middle school. She had heard somewhere that it was going to be knocked down soon. Good riddance. She smiled. Middle school was the worst experience she had ever had.

As I aforementioned, Sandy’s friends were a group of people who deemed themselves of higher superiority then everyone else. They were rude and mean to me and all of my friends. They hated us for some reason. They always seemed to pick me out of everyone for their games of torment. Sandy never joined in on the affliction of me, but she never said anything to stop them. This only made me hate her more.

It was so strange. I couldn’t imagine someone like her being friend with someone like me. She was a heartless rude arrogant whore, and I was a nobody. My envy often made me cross toward her when we had to communicate.

Although I was envious, and angry, and hurt because of Sandy, I regretted our growing apart. I never had another friend like her. Most of my other friends were, in a word, embarrassing. I was at the bottom of the food chain then, and my friends definitely acted it. I never said anything, not wanting to anger or hurt them.

I will have to ask you to try and remember the worst day of your life. Many people cannot remember this, being as many people have equally horrible days and cannot single one out individually. I know exactly what my worst day ever was. The strange thing about it though… is it was also the best day of my life at the same time.

Let me explain. Sandy’s friends always targeted me, as you know. Well one time, they took it too far. A pound of marijuana had been stolen from the town drugstore. The girls decided it would be fun to use this against me.

I had gone to my locker to get my math book during class. The halls were completely empty. As I turned the corner to my locker, I saw five of Sandy’s friends standing in front of my open locker. I found out later that they had snuck into the filing room to get my locker combination later.

“Hey!” I shouted at them.

They turned around abruptly. “Oh shit!” The leader of the girls shouted. They began laughing and ran away. As they turned the corner I saw Sandy turn around and follow them. She had seen the whole entire thing.

I walked over to my locker to check for what they might have stolen. As I got closer I saw a bag fall out of my locker. I picked it up as a teacher opened her classroom door. “What’s going on out here?” She looked down to see the bag.

Her eyes widened. I looked at the bag. It was a grassy looking substance. My heart stopped. Marijuana.

“It’s not mine!” I defended quickly.

The teacher gave me a skeptic look and before I could register anything else in my mind, I was in the principle’s office with the police on their way to the school, and my parents were in the waiting room.

“It’s not mine!” I swore. “I saw them put it in my locker! They did it!” I shouted. Soon they were in the office too pledging the complete opposite.

“Why would we put drugs in her locker? We don’t know her!” They defended.

They surprisingly had a good record with the principle, so he didn’t have any reason to believe them over me. There was no way to prove that the drugs weren’t mine.

“Were their any other people around who could support you?” the principle asked us all.

“No!” The girls quickly defended.

I hung my head low in despair. Then I perked back up in realization. “Sandy Harrington” I said clearly.

The principle nodded and called her down. Sandy’s friends were smirking and my hopes crashed back down again. Oh that’s right, I thought. Sandy is their friend.

The old woman stepped out of the car and into the office. At the assistance desk she stood and waited for the secretary to speak to her. The secretary turned and around and said, “May I help you?”

The elderly woman smiled and replied, “I am looking for an old friend.”

Sandy was brought into another room to be interrogated. All of her friends were obviously calm and assured that she would vouch their innocence. I was nervous and felt sick.

After about five minutes that seemed like hours to me, Sarah and the principle came out. She kept sending sympathetic looks in our direction, but I couldn’t tell who she was sending them towards.

It seemed her friends couldn’t either. This worried them. I heard one of them whisper something about her being right about Sandy being to nice to be friends with them.

The principle turned to me and said, “You’re free to go. Sarah said she saw the whole thing. We are sorry for accusing you.”

I felt a large breath escape my lips at that moment.

“You traitor! You bailed on us!” One of the girls shouted. Sandy and I were ushered out of the office while the adults dealt with the group.

The elderly woman got back into the car. It had been so long since she had visited. As the car got closer and closer to her destination, she felt a sudden warmth at being so close to her friend again.

Sandy sat down on a chair and burst out into tears. “What?” I said

She turned to me and enveloped me in a hug. “I am so sorry that all of this happened!” She sobbed. I was shocked, but I just listened.

“But, you helped me! I am not in trouble!” I said.

“I should have just told them from the beginning!”

“It’s fine” I said getting teary eyed as well.

It was then that Sandy and I became friends again. We were inseparable after that moment. We graduated high school together and were their through all of each others rough times through college.

And when we got married not even our husbands could keep us apart. We never left each others side, not for anything if we could help it.

The elderly woman stepped out of the car and walked up to the large gate. She pushed it open and walked into the yard. She journeyed further and further, passing weed covered remembrance monuments. She knelt on the ground in front of a fairly new grave.

“Hello Sandy… it’s been a while…” The old woman said to no one in particular as she lightly touched the stone.