Verse Two
Have you ever broken up with a friend?
I remember the last time I saw my friend, Mark. We grew up together in the same neighborhood and went to the same elementary school. We hung out ever day on his porch up until our freshman year in high school. He went to one high school. I went to another. We slowly lost touch over the years after elementary graduation, visiting each other occasionally over the last two years of our relationship. We eventually had different friends and different interests. I never really said good-bye to him. I heard he got married a couple of years ago to some girl I vaguely remember from our childhood.
He came by the house one day and sat in my front room. We barely spoke to one another. He slept half of the time. I listened to music. He woke up and we began talking about how our lives were very different. We both agreed that we had drifted apart. He told me that he wouldn’t be coming by as much. I told him I was cool with it. He left and I never saw him again.
Several years later, I broke up with another friend of mine. We played Playstation. His girlfriend became angry about something I can’t recall. They got in a fight. He broke her down, knocked her to the ground. They went upstairs and continued arguing. I sat in the basement, listening, waiting for it to stop. They got louder. I heard things falling and breaking. I think he beat the shit out of her. He came downstairs. We went outside. She was inside a bedroom with the door closed.
We hung out for a couple of more hours. We went to the lake. He drank some beer. I sat and watched him. We talked about how we were completely different from one another, how we had changed from when we were little boys. We got back in his car and drove around. He took me home and I never saw again until a couple of years later.
He dropped by to see how I was doing. He saw I was still me, in the same damn place doing the same damn thing. Apparently he had moved on. He was big time. He was working at a hotel. I think I almost laughed in his face. My girlfriend at the time stayed in the bedroom. I copied a tape for him and he left. I never saw or spoke to him ever again.
I had a roommate named Jill. Jill was the sweetest woman in the world. She loved to dance and sing. She also loved to talk. At the end of the day, she would hang out in my room, play my radio or my cds, lay in my bed, and talk for hours. I never slept with her. I never questioned our relationship. I enjoyed having a girl for a friend.
She moved out a month after we graduated from college. She went back home to another city in another state. We spent our last hours packing up her stuff to a box set of James Brown cds. She kissed me before she drove off. I spoke to her several times a year until seven months ago. She told me that her schedule had become hectic. I told her mine was the same. We promised to keep in touch. This time, really…
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