The Difference Between Getting and Needing

t h r e e

can you tell me why i hold on to you
and you hold on to m e . . .

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Wednesdays were significant to me. For whatever reason, it was the only day of the week that I got out of work a little earlier than usual. Donatella never told me why it was Wednesday, but then again I never questioned it either. I treasured that extra time like it was a whole twenty-four hours, versus just one.

While clocking out early was a blessing in itself, Wednesdays were important to me for another reason. It was when I'd get together with the person who was like the other half of my brain – the only way I'd want to toast to the middle of the week.

Believe it or not, it wasn't Gus. As tempting as it was to have one of our nightly dinners that had a fifty-fifty shot at being lackluster or enjoyable, that wasn't a typical Wednesday for me. It never made Gus jealous either that it wasn't him who I'd have these weekly rendezvous with, because he knew by now how deep our connection was.

I severely lacked the ability to put into words how much Collin Pemberton meant to me. My soul mate, my main man, my lifeline, my day one homie. The one person I knew that would be in my life until the end of time. We'd been through everything and more together, and nothing could separate us.

He had moved to Clearloft from the west coast when we were nine. At first, I figured he was just another new kid that we'd have in class for a year until the family picked up and moved again. That was the drill whenever we'd get new students in primary school, so I thought nothing of his arrival. He was the blonde boy from Utah that pronounced some things a little funny and wore clear-rimmed wayfarer eyeglasses.

It wasn't even a week and the two of us became inseparable.

The thing of it was, Collin happened to enter my life during a somewhat miserable time for me. I always liked to think he was sent to me for a reason, but he'd always tease me for believing in "junk like fate", as he'd say, for the rest of our lives. He came to town right after my original best friend had moved away. In a way, he saved me.

Peyton, who was practically my soul mate pre-Collin days, lived around the corner from me. We'd met in preschool and were attached at the hip from that moment. We were the ideal pair of best girl friends. We were a package deal; one never came without the other and everybody knew that. Until her dad got promoted to a higher position at his job and they had to move to Sacramento.

It all happened in what felt like a millisecond. She broke the news to me, we cried, she packed up, and then she was gone. I knew I'd never see her again. I was also dead set on the fact that I would never have another best friend, because by then all my classmates had established who theirs were. We were two years away from middle school at the time and friend groups were getting tighter and clique-ier.

I became the outsider without a best friend. Then Collin appeared and the rest was history with us.

Now we were here – living on opposite ends of Philly but still as thick as thieves.

On that particular Wednesday, two days after the infamous shoe-chewing incident, I was running a little behind. I'd left work on time at four o'clock, only to get stuck in traffic on the cab ride home due to construction in the middle of the city. It was hard enough driving on the narrow streets with infuriating one-way roads every other block, people either speeding like maniacs or going far too slow, and bikers or pedestrians weaving in and out of cars. Add in some construction and it was like everyone forgot how to operate a car.

Eventually I got back to the apartment after a tedious hour long commute, beating Gus home since he worked until six. All I had to do was feed and quickly walk Ziggy, switch my work tote for a smaller purse, and use the bathroom. Knowing Collin's drive from his place to mine was thirty minutes without traffic, I decided to tell him to just meet me at the restaurant, rather than waiting around to pick me up.