My story draft (3)

(5th March 2009)

3.1- The early years of friendship 

I had always enjoyed the family dinners, conversations ran well and I learnt a lot and just enjoyed the company. There was one particular occasion to a Greek restaurant in Melbourne last year where the most memorable moment occurred, all of us broke into a raging debate over The Da Vinci Code and its meaning and what it represented, and for one family we were all at opposite ends in that debacle.
But one of the hardest parts in these dinners, once the main group conversation had died down everyone breaks off into ‘couples’. It is one of the more detestable parts to the dinner. In the car to the restaurant is an uncomfortable ride seeing everyone else looking loved up and me nothing but the extra wheel. 

I’m not in the least part bitter everyone else around me has someone to share their intimate moments with, my mum and sister especially deserve all the happiness they can now enjoy and that makes me very happy. Nevertheless it has just quietly bothered me more and more lately this ‘extra wheel’ title. Certainly I am in no rush to go looking for that person but every day the loneliness grows and grows, because there is only so much I can tell me friends and I’m rather reluctant to put too much trust into them. 

That is probably where the loneliness comes from, all through the years I made a lot of good friends at school, of course there was always one or two friends I’d stick with all the time since we had the most in common and they could understand what I was about. To me trust is important in friends and even family, once that is broken it is much too difficult to keep the respect for that person. One of the earliest experiences I had with a lack of trust in a friend started in primary school. I’d become good, good friends with another Asian girl; Jennifer, at Marshall Lang Primary. From the start we were in-separable, we had so much common we’d often joke about being twins. There was also a time when the two us and one of her friends made our own secret girlie club

Over time though we all grew apart as kids do, but the first time Jennifer had ever hurt me was when the three of us were at her house. I didn’t know this at the time but she and her friend, Ellen had a history together then went back somewhere to preschool so they’ve known each other a long time. I wasn’t threatened by their friendship but I’d caught them numerous times have their own private conversations leaving me completely out in the cold. I couldn’t face either of them after that, and I never saw either of them again, until about a year ago when I found Jen through a school re-union website. We still touch base a little now but we’re very different compared to all those years ago. 

Another stand out moment of mistrust in friendships came some years later between Intermediate (Year 7 & 8) and high school (Year 9 & 10). I was attending Remuera Intermediate in 1994-’95 and quickly made friends there with a girl named Cherie. We clicked from t he start and hung out loads together we even lived just 10 minutes away from each other. The first couple of years everything was fine but perhaps one of the first signs things weren’t good was when it came to boys. Typical girls our age we always like certain boys and at first we had different taste until second year. Cherie thought it would be fun to go after the one guy I did like, though I had more of the upper hand since he was in my class. It’s silly really looking back now, getting into petty arguments over boys, we didn’t have any fight over this boy but I sensed she was always moving in on me, wanting a share in everything. On the side Cherie, just like Jen also had a long time friend hidden in the background, Tracey and she and I were always at opposite ends. I knew instantly Tracey had a disliking towards me, as I for her although I made it less obvious. Gradually I spent less time with them until I was informed of a rumour that somebody had spread about me and I second guessed it was Tracey that started it and Cherie was in on it. Everything went sour right after that I confronted only Cherie and let rip over the course of a couple of weeks. Prank calls, angry tape recordings and going to her house and really yelling until the neighbours heard. 

In time we managed to sort it out but the trust was long dead, she hated me for my rampage but if she hadn’t been part of the rumour spread I wouldn’t have thrown the tirade against her. Then came high school, at Penrose. With Cherie and Tracey long ignoring me from day one, which hurt but in a way I knew I deserved that, but still, I had grudge to keep and pride at stake. For a while I still talked to Cherie but it was frosty and made worse when another boy came into the picture. Enter blonde-haired blue-eyed Australian; Mark. Lucky me he was in all my classes too so I saw a lot of him, Cherie didn’t but she begged me constantly to introduce her to him, I refused not because I wanted to win this battle but I was selfish still hurt from what happened before I left her in the lurch. My exact words were: 

‘If you want to get to know him talk to him yourself.’
She didn’t dare, too shy where as I was never shy around the guys. So Tracey decided to interfere again and soon I saw less of Mark around the grounds, but I wasn’t interested in him anyway so I wasn’t bothered and instead he was one of my good friends. And he ended up being the one to tell me he was going out with Cherie! Sometime later another rumour about me broke and my tirade against her and Tracey came back I knew they’d started it, Mark and Cherie broke off he went back to Australia.