Changing times

This post has been simmering in my mind for a while. Since Christmas to be precise.

But better late than never I always say.

Remember the friends I talked about here?

We've been, for as long as I can remember, the eight of us. KD, RM, LS, AP, LL, NR, NE and me, with a few people coming and going over the years and friends outside our extremely tight circle. Four guys and four girls.

I shifted out of my old colony and we rarely met, what with college, exams, sports, trips et all.

We normally met on birthdays, Easter, Christmas, New Year, family functions, with a few people missing sometimes.

But no matter how often we met or not at all, the bond was always there, strong and holding fast. Binding us together.

We always knew we could call each other at any time of the night and know they'd be there for us in a second and that's the way it stayed.

Christmas Eve especially was a special special night. No matter, what else we might have missed, Christmas Eve was something we were always together for.

First midnight mass and then a party. Some times just the eight of us, with a couple of other people maybe and whoever were our significant others, sometimes more. Sometimes a whole house full. But together we were.

I remember some fantastic times. I had my first sip of alcohol with them on Christmas Eve. My first flame shot. The first time I got high.

But over the last year and graduation, our friendship has slowly and surely begun to splinter. It's gone so far, I don't see it ever coming back to normal without something drastic happening.

What's caused it?

Insecure boyfriends.

Two girls in the group, LL and NE, have new boyfriends acquired over the last two years approximately, who are not comfortable with them being around us and the rest of the guys.

Especially the guys and they've been issued ultimatums.

I fail to understand their boyfriends and their relationships, but more than that I fail to understand LL and NE.

How they could have so easily turned their backs on a friendship that's stood strong over the years. How they managed to turn their backs on us. How they didn't manage to defend their friendship.

Or were we just that expendable?

And don't tell me it's love. Love doesn't issue ultimatums. It doesn't demand that you cut off ties with your friends. It doesn't tell you to stop talking to a guy you've known for 6 years just because he's a bit of a flirt.

If you love someone, you trust them. It's that simple in my book. And if she didn't fall for him all these years, why would she fall for him now?

But the biggest disappointment of all has been LL. Feisty, loud, brave. The last person I'd expect to bow down like that and behave this way would have been her.

And she's been the worse of the two. She doesn't pick up our calls. Refuses to talk to us when she's online, in fact I'd even go so far as to say she's blocked us, considering I never do see her online now. When we go over to see her, she chats with us at the door and doesn't invite us in. Doesn't even call or sms on our birthdays.

And it hurts. To see the breaking up of a group that hung on so tight all throughout.

It strikes us at the oddest of moments, when we're reminiscing and laughing over something, and we remember the two that aren't there with us.

It's a shaft of pain that runs straight through.

It's like a death, but in some ways it's worse.

Because they chose not to be there.