Disclaimer: This is a very senti post. The funny thing is that I’ve written about us before. I’ve realized sometimes a million books filled with a million words isn’t enough to describe a feeling. That’s what this is. But that doesn’t mean I will stop trying.  If you’re not in the mood for corny sentimentality and sickeningly sweet nostalgia with a splash of female hormonal emotionality DO NOT READ THIS POST. You’ve been warned. 

So the basic anatomy of the human heart is that there are 4 chambers. Left and Right Atriums, and Left and right Ventricles. Blood comes in and out;  muscles constrict, valves pump oxygenated blood through the body, and it all works together to keeps us alive. May be thats why contrary to fact**, yet far more poetically, all ideas of love, and emotions are related to the heart.

**The Brain is actually responsible for the pumping of the heart, and all other functions of keeping us alive. But you can’t really say “I’ll hold you in my brain, forever and ever…” Odd.

I miss them. Those two boys who have taken up residence in my left and right ventricles. My best friends.

Now let me clarify, I have been accused of “best friend slut-tery” and I have to admit I have lots and lots of best friends. Different best friends for different situations, best girl friends, best high school friends, best college friends, best Boston friends, best New Delhi friends etc etc etc…

But beyond all these amazing people I have in my life, there are these two boys (more men now.) There was a very low point in my life, a dark place where at first the light seemed non existent, and later felt very very very far out of reach. Somehow these two down-to-earth, wonderfully normal boys found me. And Saved me.

They found me at the bottom of a very very deep well. They didn’t just throw a rope in and pull me up; no these fools jumped in and showed me how to climb out.

At first I wanted to stay in my dark pool of water. I was stubborn, bent on self-destruction, resistant to their light. But they saw something in me, the real me, something worth saving; so they tricked me, they laughed with me, laughed at me and distracted me out of the water.  Each step of the way surrounding me with their positivity and strength we climbed; when I slipped they caught me, and when I couldn’t find the next step they showed it to me. In this very extended metaphor it seems very clear how they helped me, but it was far more complicated, and incredibly subtler than that. I didn’t even notice it. But suddenly I was in the sun, dangling my legs over the side of the dark place, sharing a beer with my best friends.

I miss them today. It’s been years and years since that time. And many years since the three of us lived together in the same town. We see each other from time to time, and even as we each head along our own paths we never lose sight of each other.

I miss them. Today I went for a drive- blasting Shinedown and Godsmack, I drove along as dusk set in and the only thing missing was them. My boys. My heroes. My knights. My best friends. I share my happiest news, and my worse heartaches (and headaches) with them. I bitch with them. I get completely smashed, totally wasted and pass out with them. I wake up and do it all over again with them. I let myself be myself with them. The three of us could be alone with nothing to do on a desert island and have the time of our lives. Fun just happens when we’re together.

We jam together. We head bang to Crossfade together. We cry together. And oh do we laugh together… we laugh and laugh and laugh together.

We collectively and individually have many many many friends. Best Friends. Amazing people who are there for us. But there is something different about us. A different kind of love. A different kind of friendship. May be because we shared our worst times. Or may be because we shared our best times. I don’t know what it is, but its solid.

People have tried to dissuade me of the foreverness of this friendship. But it’s impossible. For though I have doubts about everything, and I believe nothing lasts, if I had to put my faith in one thing- it would be the friendship of Eshan and Bathiya. My left and right Ventricles.

I miss them tonight. I listen to Sully Erna sing the last notes of Serenity and I see Eshan’s  warm, slightly crooked smile. I hear his contagious laugh and feel the warmth of his arm around my shoulders. I see Bathiya make a face at me before quietly reaching his hand out to grab mine. I feel him squeeze a gentle reassurance as he walks ahead of us. In the warmth of Eshan’s big-brother protection, and comforted in the trust and freedom of Bathiya’s love; I am home.

We are far away from each other, scattered across the world, like leaves in a breeze. But my heart keeps beating, right atrium, right ventricle, left atrium left ventricle. And they are with me, in every beat. For always.