Original Edition: Six| Friends by chance, Sisters by choice

                                    

                                          
Whether it lasts a day or a lifetime, no friendship is ever a mistake.
I met my first 'bestie' in kindergarten. We'd bonded over glitter glue and Big Comfy Couch only to later became bitter frenemies all of three weeks later. I'd learned a crucial, vital lesson with that devastating heartbreak:
Finding true 'friendship' is tough. Keeping it—even harder.
In its earliest stages friendship is fragile, delicate but fierce with promise. It must be tended and nurtured, allowed to grow and thrive and flourish in a light, easy grip that doesn't bruise or suffocate, which is often easier said than done.
These sinuous connections evolve as we grow, often transitioning from the ones we hung out with on mommy & me play-dates, to those we chose for ourselves as we navigate the terrifying minefield of boys, major skin issues and homework. And what happens beyond those days of school when you no longer have the threads of class or the mutual commiseration over boy drama to tether you together?
It's easy to get sucked into petty jealousy when our friends grow closer to someone else and you'll hate yourself for being envious, but there isn't a damn thing you can do about it. Life happens, and it can either drive you together or wrench you apart.  
Sometimes, despite all efforts, friendships die. That's an inevitable truth that is impossible to fight. So when another comes to a close, don't get swallowed up in anger or fall into the blame game over unavoidable circumstances. Accept it for what it is—that this person was drawn into your life for a purpose which has been fulfilled. Smile over what you shared, and then open your heart to the possibilities of something new and equally beautiful yet to come.
Then there are some friendships—a very rare and lucky few—the not only survive, but endure.
I was fifteen when I met them. My Sisters.
I'd come to New York, as I did every year, to while away the summer with relatives. The late June air was hot but not humid and the sky a wash of denim blue. The sun, bright and dazzling in its warm, danced across my skin until it almost sizzled. As if the rays were sliding through my pores and filling me with light, casting away all the gloom of dark shadows that clung inside of me like cob webs. 
A truly gorgeous day. The kind that hummed with promises and changed lives. 
I was in line at a Starbucks, nose in a book as usual, when some douchebro dumped his honey latte frappucino over my head and cackled with his friends. I stood there, locked in a mortified tableau that stuttered in halting frames of movement as the iced-brew slid down my face, soaking me in coffee and shame. I was no stranger to this kind of behavior, but that certainly didn't make it any easier to swallow every time some jerk thought it hilarious to humiliate me.
But I wouldn't change that moment for anything, because that was when I met Shayne.
Like me, she was...different, though perhaps not so obvious on the outside with long hair of unassuming brown, a lean build with symmetrical features most guys would consider hot but were equally attractive to girls, and without a single tattoo or piercing (those didn't start to appear until she hit twenty).
With a kind of swagger about her that was all attitude and honesty, she stepped forward to defend me when no one else would; this shy nerd that she plucked up and dusted off after I'd been kicked down for daring to be different.
For daring to be me.
After cleaning me up in the bathroom--giving me a spare shirt from her bag to wear, she talked me into hanging out with her at Pizzeria. There, she introduced me to the remaining girls who would become the greatest loves of my life. My best friends and truest family.