My first best friend :)

Remember when you were in second standard, somehow all the adults made a huge deal about who your best friend was? The first question would be ‘what are the names of your friends, and the second would be “who is your best friend?”. And yes, like everyone else, I got excited choosing my ‘best friend’ and proclaiming to the entire world that she was my best friend. And literally blushing with pride when I heard her reciprocation.
My first best friend. I was in second grade when I learnt about someone called a best friend. She was new to my school. And I was told to talk to her, and be her friend, for she was lost, and new. It was simple. There was mutual respect and affection. Saw eye to eye. Uncannily, and unknowingly purchased similar swimsuits. Ace rivals in class. Hated her guts for competing with me. But couldn’t do without her as well. We walked together, talked together, studied for pcm exams, made excuses for not going for swimming classes, spent time gossiping in the playground under the pretext of resting during pt classes, chanted the bhagawad gita, attended enrichment class, vied with each other to be the teacher’s pet every year, managed to bring out a mid school magazine with other friends, made her listen to my rantings and obsessions with presidents and the genetic code, had our own arguments, and after verbally abusing each other, albeit with our limited 'abuse' vocabulary, agreed to disagree and moved on,tried talking high school philosophy, bunked classes to go for millions of extra curricular ‘competetions’, carbon copied notes for each other when the other was unavailable, copied each other’s handwriting to make ourselves more similar,tried reading shakespeare,read a lot of other books,wrote articles and poems, me in english, and she in sanskrit,avoided getting caught for the anniversary plays, she successfully, and me unsuccessfully, made other friends, bursts of jealousy in between,moved apart for a while, we managed to finish school and grow up. Parted ways after the tenth board and I saw less and less of her.Saw her last, 5 years ago. Lol. Psenti stuff.We're miles apart, literally, and figuratively, she being an engineer, and a soon to be mba, and me a doctor. But she’s still my first best friend, and no prizes for guessing who she is. And best friend, if you’re reading this, I miss you!  I miss being 10 years old and being excited calling someone my best friend. 