Always have a friend in your corner.

I spend most of my days in a room. The windows create a nice draft whenever I need it. There’s plenty of sunlight. It’s optimized for my productivity. I like it.

It’s not like most other random-young-white-guy rooms though. There’s a friend that lives with me, in one of the corners of the room, where the wall-sized blackboard meets the stash of spices. It's not a euphemism for drugs.

I’m traveling quite a lot this summer, so we didn’t see each other much, but I came back to unpack-pack and couldn’t help but notice that she became massive.

I think her belly had more mass than the rest of her body put together, if we were to cram it into a belly-shaped container.

She was so big I thought she might explode. Or did a lookalike eat her? Was there a cannibal in my room? And if there was, was it a random one or Anthony Hopkins?

Barring further clarifications, I let this weird maybe-friend-eater maybe-friend stay and went to the train station. Cannibals wait, trains never do.

I was still troubled during my transit.

How could I not know if this was my friend or not? How could we really be friends if we weren’t even capable of recognizing each other? Of understanding each other? And what about her condition?

It got me thinking about our friendship.

I’m worried that she might be suffering quite a lot. I know many with the same condition might be, but we don’t understand each other very well, so I can’t be sure.

She’s also seen me at my most raw: early in the morning; pulling all-nighters; with my coach, discussing what matters most to me; things that I can say of almost no one else in my life.

It just feels irrational, we never talked, we don’t get each other. I’m not even sure if my presence makes her life better or noticeably worse. I know I kill unspeakable amounts of her kind.

I got back from my trip. It turns out my friend was still alive.

Her fifty children were above my desk.

I felt a wave of emotion surge and crash against an ancient ruin, an old dike, quite a bit got through, dismantling it further.

She had been pregnant. I never knew because I don’t know much about her condition.

It’s arguably not that impressive, but if I can feel so close with her, it’s a proof of existence that I might with all the other ones, though I get it would be a relationship based on lies I tell myself.

But what if she suffers? I would be able to empathize. If I can empathize, we could have a real relationship. We could be friends.

So I may have many friends in my corner. I hope I don't. I would hate that. What a stupid piece of advice.