Karen Noble

You go out together to a party or bar, ostensibly to wingman for each other, but just end up going home together.

Your best friend has probably been around longer than your boyfriend. They are reliable, loyal and entrenched in your life.

You look forward to nights you can go out with friends without them.

If you were in a relationship? It’d only slow you down.

You believe they are really talented and they also think you’re something special.

You find yourself lingering on stuff that smells like them — their T-shirts, their sheets. When you catch a whiff of them, you feel happy and safe.

You wanted things from me and you knew how I felt about you and you used those feelings and you used me. So I want you to know how I feel now, since you knew how I felt then.

I dated sporadically and unsuccessfully in college, fluctuating between a lot of tears and frustration and not being able to understand why I was so unlovable and gleefully listening to other people b-tch about their relationships while I wore full-on acne masks to bed in a comforter covered in Cheez-it dust.