I Let Her Hear the Most Embarrassing Version of My Thoughts

Dear Delyara, I think that may be the purest form of friendship I know now. I didn’t give her the noble version. I gave her the ugly one. The comparison, the envy, the tired bitterness, the fear that I am behind, the private humiliation of still wanting more while already feeling overused and not quite equal to what I already have. I expected kindness. I did not expect steadiness. She did not brighten the room too quickly. She did not tidy me into something more admirable. She did not withdraw slightly in the way people sometimes do when the truth gets emotionally unattractive. She stayed. And that shrank the shame in a way nothing else could have. Because shame hates witness that doesn’t recoil. That’s exactly what she gave me.