Dear Camila,
High school really was the best years of my life. I didn't believe my mother when she said that high school was the time where you had the most fun and where you would finally figure out what you wanted and who you were. It was true, because I finally found my place on this earth for once. But I hadto disagree just slightly with the statement the high school was the best years of your life. College waseven better, despite all the tests and stress that came along with it.
After we graduated high school, you and I spent that whole summer locked up in your room watchingmovies and chowing down greasy pizza slices one by one. You wouldn't say it to my face but I could see in your eyes that you were scared of losing me. Trust me. I was even more frightened about losing you than you were to me.
I was heading off to WSU to become a mechanic while you were heading off to some college in California to study English in hopes of becoming an author one day. I believed in you so much that it was almost insane. I wanted so badly for that dream of yours to come true because all I ever want is to see you smile.
Before we parted, on the last day of summer together, we set up skype accounts for ourselves and signed up for every social media possible. We promised each other that we would call, text, message and skype whenever we could. And we did.
We spent that whole first year of college skyping and texting. Late at night just before I was going to bed, I would call you on my cellphone and I would lay there for hours talking to you, telling you about my day and you tell me about yours. My roommate eventually got tired of losing hours of sleep at night, so she switched to another room, leaving me to a dorm by myself. I couldn't complain.
You visited me plenty of times here and there with holidays and breaks. You and I were both surprised that our bond was stronger than ever and when we told people we were mostly in a long distance relationship, they laughed and said we wouldn't last for much longer because they believed that a long distance relationship was doomed. But for us, that's not how we saw it, and if it were to ever end, itwouldn't end like that.
You and I graduated around the same time and went off on our own for a while to search for a job. We moved back in with our parents where we stayed happily for a while. Being back there was almost like being in high school again, and we treated it like that when we came back. We snuck out of our houses, climbing in through each other's windows and had quiet phone calls that consisted of us whispering to each other, careful not to wake our family.
College really was the best years of my life because those years are the years I can recall very clearly, almost as it had happened five minutes ago.
I have a scrapbook full of pictures of us during college and it sits in a box in my closet. The pictures are fading and starting to have that old paper smell to them, but you can still see the memory that it holds.
Sometimes I wish I could go back and re-live my college days with you. I'm sure you would think the same.
Sincerely,
Lauren Jauregui
