A Love Letter to My Best Friend On Her Wedding Day

I like to think I’ve never been much of a fighter, but with you I can start an in depth argument about why brunch is brunch and not just lunch on the weekends; or why we should walk a mile home at 2 a.m. instead of taking a dumb Lyft in a strange city, or about how you dare come back to the car with a gallon of water and no ingredients for s’mores, even though we’d just spent the entire ride to Whole Foods discussing how we were gonna make s’mores back in the apartment. On that particular argument, I remember I rolled my eyes hard, put the car in park and stormed out wallet in hand, only to come back 20 minutes later — very expensive graham crackers and chocolate in tow and a slow, creeping smile that tugged at the corner of my lips before we burst out laughing.

Thirty minutes later, we were back in the apartment effectively wall twerking to the “Harlem Shake.”

All these things legitimately happened at your bachelorette party in April. I can confidently say I have never argued that much about minutiae in my life, but I think this is precisely why I love you — because it’s so easy to argue. Because we can. Because we know we’ll always love each other no matter what.

There’s always freedom in knowing you will be loved, regardless. Regardless of that year when we were both 16 and learning to drive, when you took the wheel on our drive back from one of our summer escapades around the island, and almost positively killed your sister and I going 60 mph on an exit ramp. I know what you’ll say, “Bullshit.” But I remember that ramp as if it were the reflection of the rest of our lives. You, both hands straight on the wheel, back pressed against the seat, face scrunched in concentration. Me, simply flailing from right to left, wailing in the background.

That was — and still is — the real proclamation of who we were. You: always sure, restrained, stubborn. Me: fiery, spontaneous, gentle. Also stubborn. And over the years, we graduated our arguments to things like figuring out who stole whose spoon in a game of, well, Spoons; not having enough drinks, or having too many drinks; you worrying too much, or me not worrying enough. Today, I’m thankful they are mostly moderated by Matt, who’s known for keeping a cool head above all things, a skill we never learned in all our years of professional bickering.

When I met him about five years ago, I knew he was the perfect match for you even though I kept quiet. He says he endured a few months of stink-eye from my part, which I don’t deny, but only because I was afraid of change. The truth is I could tell he had the kind of quiet, steady, reassuring nature God didn’t entrust either of us with. Over the years, I’ve seen him handle your fiery nature with dexterous hands. Here’s a really lame simile: the truth is you’re like an expensive bottle of Champagne and he’s the flute that keeps you contained. Pop, bubble and fizzle.

Have fun, don’t fight! — Said everyone ever. Your mom, my mom, your dad, Matt, Josh, our teachers in high school …

One of my favorite things about him is that he didn’t just walk into your life and start writing a new chapter. He started reading backwards. And that included years of chapters with me in it. We were a constant fixture in each other lives for more than ten years, and when I moved away for college, I was afraid I’d miss knowing all the nitty gritty details about you. Like which two movies we were watching that Saturday, which outfit you were wearing for that party in San Juan, who had done better at that calculus test, all our carpool karaoke, our duet to “Superhuman” by Keri Hilson, or “With You” by Chris Brown, your beach condo in Vega Baja I knew so well I could find anyone playing hide ‘n seek with the lights out, our Rock Band “The Shetbags.” Your horrible singing to “Lay All Your Love On Me” by ABBA. (Nope. Don’t say it. It was just bad and you know it. ) And I’m so touched that the three of us can be together as if he’s been around for all of it.

There’s a certain inscrutable longing that comes with this thing of getting older. A sense that, perhaps, we reach a certain point in our lives when that diverting streak of infinite parallel universes reduces into one — certain — track. And we get a little afraid that we’re stuck like this. In this city, in this career, with these people, these distant memories and these bad habits. But when I think about us, I’m back on the roof of my house when we were 15. That place we used to climb to after homework was done and it was dark, and perhaps my mom was fixing some dinner in the kitchen and Jowell & Randy still resonated from my brother’s open window downstairs. The sky was always clear and the stars bright. And up here, we were still a million people in one. I couldn’t put the electricity of our youth into better words even if I tried, but it looked and it sounded something like this:

The Big Dipper was bright like a torch in the sky, but our world was still so small. Those “Buchanan” boys we met that year were still, for all we knew, part of our forever. Those college applications we used to fret about still shone in a halo of possibility. The crickets and coquís croaked in the middle of a concerto. All I wanted then was to go to The University of Puerto Rico with you and work part-time at your mom and dad’s shop, while the rest of our lives was a big multiple choice question. We used to stay up there talking for hours. Or more like dreaming of what ifs and could’ve beens and all that was still to come. You were always in love — with the beginning of things, and life, and that Mamma Mia movie, and that boy who made us both ugly laugh, that one I couldn’t stand, and that other one who broke your heart.

I remember you up there like it was yesterday. Dialing some boy’s phone number from your Motorola flip phone with nervous fingers for the first time. Me looking up at the stars, listening in for moral support, wishing I could only be as brave as you to let love in. I’ve always thought it funny that at that age, we legitimately had nothing to talk about but we could make conversation about the future — or sing along to songs — for hours. I’m glad I got to share in these moments of everything and nothing with you. I’m glad that those relationships fizzled. That I moved away. That anytime I came back it was always the same, even when we weren’t. And that it all led up to this.

It is a treasure to me that my mother loves you like another daughter, that when my father asks me about you he says, “How’s my best friend?”, that my brother called us both bitches at very critical times in our lives: basically, anytime we came home together from school — God knows we needed those words of affirmation. Thank you for always sharing in the weirdness with me.

Thank you always for teaching me the value of a good fight. You’ve taught me what I know about doing it well and learning to pick each other in the end, no matter what. And I just pray that both you and Matt also learn to fight with each other and for each other in the trying times. That you, just like we did, understand this thing evolves and is about more than just winning — it’s about climbing the mountain together and building a life and a relationship that you’re both proud of. I mean, I don’t know, Pat Benatar said love is a battlefield, and I’m thinking she had a point. I also think love is a springboard unto an arena of possibility, and I just hope that when you look back on your wedding day, you too are back at the rooftop of my house.

But anyway, I was trying really hard to think of other arguments we’ve had throughout the years that are worth laughing about… but I couldn’t think of any. They’re so stupid I’ve forgotten. You know what Walt Whitman says. That thing about, “We were together. I forget the rest.” That’s exactly how I feel about our friendship. Over the years there’s been a lot of them: sore losing over Ticket to Ride, and the begrudging midnight hangouts in Dallas when no one wants to hang out but we’re still out anyway, and a whole bunch of “K’s,” but more than that, there’s so much joy, loyalty and comfort. No bad time or good time can ever compete with this sisterhood that not only can climb mountains, but can move them too. And the rest? Well… you know.