my best friend is called rosie. she is bright and impossible to ignore;

people tilt towards her like flowers to the light, faces turning instinctively in her direction.

we met when we were nineteen, our birthdays on the 5th and 6th, one right after the other,

like we were always meant to follow each other, baby-faced and wide-eyed,

ready for everything the world promised us.

we made it through fuckboys, and boys who cheated, boys who regretted, boys we barely remember. remember cabbage boy?

remember the skirt-lifting incident?

we bonded over bad films, bad tutors,

and our wild unpopularity throughout university, the kind of friendship that made not being invited feel like freedom.

we've shared secrets, and drinks, and beds,

and more stomach-aching laughs than i could ever count.

and just recently,

we found ourselves giddy over matching rape alarms laughing as if they were jewellery,

as if this is normal. and it is, but it shouldn't be.