Tales of an Unknown

Best of Friends

A losing entry for the #MyHandmaidsTale contest.

The tale of two best friends creating their own paths in their restrictive world.

***

We played together every day. In the same school, with the same friends, on the same playground. We laughed, cried, leaped, fell, slept, and ate together, performing identical actions until everyone thought we were twins. We merely laughed and ran ahead of the others, lost in our own world, comprised of space ships and vast oceans, created from our colossal imaginations. Diving headfirst into our world of pretend, we would stay there from dawn to dusk, exploring dark bedrooms doubling as perilous caverns and treacherous forests masked as grassy slopes. The thought of separation never crossed our minds because it simply did not exist; he was a boy, I was a girl, and we were the best of friends.

Our mothers and fathers obstructed our fun first, advising us to focus on contrasting pastimes; they ruled our choices with an iron fist, similar to a totalitarian government. Our fathers took him aside, told him, come, watch a game of football with us. Be tough and act like a man; don't be soft or emotional. Stand up for yourself and be proud of your accomplishments. Never accept defeat. He was trained in the art of being a man, something which I could never attempt. Our mothers taught the course of being ladylike, and I was the solitary student. Be womanly and don't eat too much. Don't be outspoken or garish, but be gentle and elegant and poised. Wear makeup to cover your flaws and always dress nicely. Never play rough or in the dirt or with those rowdy boys.

And so our play was altered as we grew. We diverged onto different paths, journeys filled with playmates of our own genders, conformed alongside us into perfect little girls and boys. We girls were encouraged to amuse ourselves with dolls and miniature makeup sets, to braid each other's hair and gossip about crushes, to cook and clean and garden so we could share our activities at our future book clubs. We were assumed to be caring, compassionate virgins in search of love. The boys were a different species, a neighboring civilization composed of sports and rough play and strength, built upon a foundation of emotional unavailability. They were stoic and strong, shamelessly sleeping through partners until one caught their eye.

Yet as he now sobs into my strong shoulder unabashedly, I feel the raw anguish coursing through him, the pent up, uncontrollable pain of his father's death. We are no longer the fragile young children we once were, naïve and unselfish. We are now of age, fully ripened fruit glistening in all their piquant glory, ready to be picked at the hands of inevitable obligations of a future yet to come. We are abstract paintings at first glance, undecipherable and complex, a disparate view in the eye of each beholder. We are no longer the children our parents desired us to be, but it does not matter; he is a boy, I am a girl, and we are the best of friends.