See you again my friend....

I recently lost my long life best friend to an addiction that caused her health to deteriorate and eventually took her life. In the last few years she and I had a bit of a rocky relationship as I thought if I gave her some tough love she would realize the one person who has always had her back, always forgave her for her mistakes and always told her the truth regardless if she liked it or not; that she would snap out of it and get her shit together. But, she didn't.

We've known each other since we were just babies, our parents were friends and I didn't like that girl one bit. I was passive and very shy. She was aggressive and loud.
I use to dread when her Daddy would bring her with him when he hung out with my parents.

.When I was around 14 years old her father brought her over, I hadn't seen her in awhile and she changed, she wasn't as personal space invading as previous visits, she had a blue raspberry slushie and a pack of zebra Fruit strip gum. She reached out the pk of gum to me and said "want some zebra stripped gum? it's really good"..... and in that moment we became sisters.
From that moment on we were inseparable ..literally. 

She was everything I wasn't and I was everything she wasn't. I was her calm and she was my storm. People would be shocked to see one without the other. I remember people always saying if you see Sharon you'll see Shelbi and vice versa...She called me every birthday to sing to me, She's been known to make death threats to people she thought were trying to steal her best friend from her, anytime I call she would jump to get to me when I needed her, she loved me a lot and I her. We made so so so many memories and I'm thankful for every single drama filled one. Life was never boring with her, actually it was a little to exciting at times. As we got older and started our own families we were still very close but went down different paths. The last 2 to 3 years were very hard for us both. That damn addiction caught her..... the same damn addiction that took my Daddy. I just wanted her to get better. I really thought that of all the people I know.... SHE could beat it after watching Mom beat it.. She looked up to my Mom, my Mom was her Mom... Shelbi was very embarrassed about her drinking and she would be so mad at me right now for blabbing about it BUT I want who ever is reading this to know how much addiction has destroyed lives. It took my Daddy and now my life long best friend... It left 3 awesome kids without their mother.. I fking miss her. I just wanna call her and make a "plan" and hear her silly singing and over dramatic gossip.. 

I miss pre-addiction Shelbi.

R.I.P friend