She called me one afternoon, while I lay half dozing on the couch watching Jackie Chan movies. I thought about just letting it ring, caught as I was in that peaceful dreaming-awake state, but I finally levered myself off of the couch to answer that tinny ring. I heard her voice on the other end of the line and I smiled in spite of myself. She had a way of talking excitedly in a near falsetto, her words tumbling out seemingly at random, that always made me laugh a little inside. She told me that she had rented some creepy videos and wanted me to come and watch them with her. I smiled bigger at her drawn out pronunciation of “creepy” and told I would be there soon.

I can still smell how her house smelled when I walked in the door. I remember the color of the green shag carpet on the floor of the basement family room where the television was. I remember her giddy smile and her long “rat-tail” as she bounded down the stairs in front of me. We watched “X-tro” and she alternated between screaming and bouncing up and down on the couch and burying her head in my shoulder. The movie was terrible, but I took little notice. I was too busy enjoying a girl so alive she was electric. She stayed in a constant state of motion, wriggling, covering her eyes or mouth, screaming or clutching at me or the couch cushions. I did my best not to laugh out loud, but now and again a little chuckle slipped out. Those were the only moments she sat still long enough to give me a pouty glare, with one eyebrow cocked as if to question my sanity for laughing at such a serious time.

We took a break between movies to smoke a cigarette upstairs on the back deck. She did her careful balancing act on one two by four of the deck. She did this to avoid a slug inadvertently touching her bare foot. I discovered she had a sort of phobia about them crawling up from between the deck boards. I laughed again and suffered “the eyebrow” as I blew a cloud of smoke towards heaven. It was a glorious early fall day and the sky was cobalt blue. There was just the faintest touch of Autumn in the air. In the cooling breeze and that unique scent of Alabama in the fall that it carried upon it. As soon as she had finished her cigarette, she hustled me off of the deck to avoid an imminent slug invasion. I held her soft hand on the way down the stairs this time and stole a kiss at the foot of them. She paused and smiled at me, and I felt just about alright with the world.

We sort of watched “Squirm” while we talked and cuddled and all too soon, we heard her mom come in the door upstairs. We adjusted ourselves and appeared to be perfect angels watching a really bad movie when she came down the stairs. Unlike most moms, her mom really liked me and the feeling was mutual. We exchanged pleasantries for awhile while I made my way to the door.

We had been friends for awhile, and that day was an enjoyable but awkward expression of feelings that ran a little wilder than friendship. We had a few more encounters here and there, but for the most part we were friends. I remember walking with her under the stars in winter, the smell of Budweiser on our breath and our lips cold when they met. I remember so many things about her, as clear as if they were yesterday. I remember her disgust at black olives at Pizza Hut and her compulsive shoplifting of cassette tapes from Oz. I also remember the call that I got one Sunday afternoon from her mom. I say that I remember the call and I do, but I am not so sure of the exact words. My whole world turned gray and faded in and out while I sank to the floor. My back pressed to the wall so I would not collapse and the phone reciever gripped in a weakened fist. I don’t know how long I sat there, too shocked to cry, too lonely to speak. I remember concerned faces and helping hands and I remember being outside at twilight wishing that I could go too, so that I would not have to hurt like this anymore.

I did not go to her funeral, and I have regretted it to this day. At the time I could not force myself to see the box that held my friends earthly remains. I could not bear to think of that sweet, expressive face staring for eternity into cheap satin. I just went a little crazy for while I think. I looked for solace in bottles and cans, but none was to be found. Sometimes I cried myself to sleep and sometimes I broke things. More than once I found myself dialing her number then feeling a rush of anger and confusion when I remembered that she was not there.

Many years later, when time had healed me and had even faded the scar of her passing a bit, I stood at her grave and told her stories of my life and how much I missed her. I rattled on about how sometimes I thought about her at the oddest times and that black olives always made me smile inside. I told her too how I did not go into a Pizza Hut for several years and Scandal’s “The Warrior” was banned from my radio. I told her all of those things and then I remembered that she was not there.

She was not there and had not been there for a very long time. Instead she was somplace else. She was inside of me, still living and laughing. Still cocking her eyebrow and chattering in a tumble of falsetto words. She was everywhere that I had been and everywhere that I was going. Even now she is on the Internet in an essay written at the crack of dawn while my new kitten mewls at my feet. No, she is not there. She is everywhere. I think that I am okay with that.