I don't think Lainey even remembers that time but to me, that moment defined us. I would forever be just watching and letting her do as she pleased.

This was how I didn't cherish her and how I still can't.

What we were to each other were like two poisonous snakes, biting at each other and filling ourselves with more potent venoms. And she wasn't the only one feeding my darkness.

If Avery liked toxic, Lainey bathed in it.

I befriended Jillian our freshman year in high school though we’ve known each other since junior high.

Many of us graduated in the same middle school only to meet again in high school.

Our families found it convenient to attend a school not too far from home. Another convenience of a nearby school was less transition with making friends. At least, that had been the case for me.

I didn't have to start all over with icebreakers. There wasn't a need to create another mask. I was already wearing the one I needed.

Jillian and I were in the same beginning art class, my first ever and hers as well. Everyone in that class was rowdy and total opposite of the image I had created for myself. It was like that for Jillian too.

I'm sure I was convenient for her as well as she was to me.

She became my buddy in being frustrated with the world, with parents, and with boys. These were topics I couldn't tell Lainey.

With Jillian, we were on the same level of toxicity. We understood each other's danger and rather than biting each other, we tried our best to bite others.

When she moved after our freshman year, suddenly there was no one to walk home with talking about school troubles and random shared hobbies. It was one less venom in the sea of poisonous snakes.

Summer went by and before I knew it, it was the start of my sophomore year. I didn't have Jillian to rant all the tensions of my life to. So, I found myself burying things in the depths of my mind, slowly drowning in my own toxin.