abuse magnet
well, having been a slightly odd and quiet kid, skinny as a twig and frequently bullied, I did seem to attract 'best friends' of the bolshy, over-assertive, spoilt brat kind.

My first best friend was a boy, who we will call J for now. He was actually very sweet, funny and clever, though he did taste of fishfingers, which isn't a great motive for kissing boys. I'll get back to him.

M, who was a spanish girl who spent her whole time leaving out information when we played games etc. so she would have a chance to make a fool of me and laugh about it to everyone else in class.

Then it was E, a spoilt little girl, who spent the whole time pitying me, allowing me to play with her and my tragic lack of a horse. It should be noted at this point she was wildly posh, but my family are pretty averagely middle class. we never really went short of anything, so treating me like a benefits kid was somewhere between a bit much and a sign that she was a bit scared of the real thing.

Then G - she should have gone to an Italia Conti drama school. Constantly spoke in a fake Yank accent, sang all the time in that musical nasal noise and was generally just annoying.

I could go on. But lets skip to near the end of secondary...

K. Short, sort of round, claimed to be bisexual (well, Suede were big at the time, it was fashionable to say that, though i'm more gay than she ever was and i'm straight) and bearing more than a passing resemblance to Maladicta's lady stalker. I was, by this point, the very definition of the quiet/ugly friend. She hung out backstage with bands, i was the lookout. She dictated my outfits, and developed a kind of weird emotional hold over me. By the time I arrived at college, a different one to hers, she really had a quite fierce grip on me, even down to convincing me what my taste in men was. She got off with my childhood sweetheart, J, which if I'm honest really quite pissed me off.

I had a bit of a life-changing moment on arriving at college, surrounded by some fantastic people, and realised a) I choose my friends, not the other way round, b) I'm actually reasonably attractive, c) I do have a voice of my own, and d) I'm not into wan looking girly men. On getting my A level results, K rang and asked for mine, I got three As (fluke), she hung up on me. I didn't hear from her for six months.

At uni, my roomie and I were also fairly intense, but for slightly more tragic reasons. She suffered a terrible allergic reaction on her first night in halls, and i spent the week nursing her. She then slipped into a chronic depression, but through this we were extremely close and still had some great times. She is still, in my mind, my very best and closest friend. Can't say a bad word about her, except she did tend to hog the sink a lot.

During this first year, K rocked up again. After trying to get off with various friends of mine, and sneaking back into my life through a series of manipulative moves and some crazy shouting, decided one night to admit her undying love to me going way back. Which slightly f***ed me off. Who crawls back into someone's life, acts the friend, before trying to get off with them? Stayed polite and said I wasn't really bent that way (which is true, but if I were it sure as hell wouldn't be with a crazy woman in a shocking pink poncho who tells me all my friends are evil). She went away after ringing during me and my flatmates all watching Magnolia on video and I asked her to call back in ten minutes - never heard from her again. Shame. Ahem. Last I heard, she was living with a post-op transexual, who ex was stalking them. Guess she'll realise her dream of one day appearing on Springer, then.

Anyway, these days I have all my lovely GOOD friends, some very old ones who I would never have counted at the time but are all-important now, some college mates, uni friends, all fab. And a lovely man.

Sorry for length, it's all very cathartic this.
(niceandwarmandhot vive la résistance, Tue 1 Aug 2006, 11:49, Reply)