Fair-weather friend version 2!

Storms were no stranger to eight-year-old Daniela, but this one in particular was keeping her awake. She sat on her bedroom floor, watching the rain pound her window, wondering how a storm could be perfect.

“A perfect storm...God, how do I explain this.” Daniela’s mother ran a hand through her hair. “Well, you have to realize it doesn’t mean a real storm. They mean, maybe, a person who’s really...dramatic.”

“Like Jen?” Daniela’s best friend.

“Yeah, like Jen,” her mother responded. “and you know, Jen has her flaws. She’s so crazy, all the time. She’s so dramatic, and she’s a little bit...fiery. But she’s sweet most of the time, she does all her work. And I mean, she’s really beautiful, don’t you agree?”

Daniela felt a small pang in her heart, but nodded. Jen was prettier than her.

“She’s crazy, she’s wild, but at the same time, it’s makes her perfect.”

Daniela squinted her eyes and tilted her head as a gust of wind sent the trees outside her window leaning to the left.

Jen was the storm.

Ten candles blew out on Daniela’s birthday cake. On her right was her mother, and on her left was Jen. As Daniela beamed out at the table of people, Jen leaned down and whispered in her ear.

“What’d you wish for?” Jen asked, grinning. Her curled blonde hair brushed against Daniela’s cheek, near the newly formed acne on Daniela’s cheeks and forehead. Secretly, she was worried about what Jen would think if she saw. Jen’s skin was perfect.

“I can’t tell you!” Daniela smiled back. “Then it won’t come true.” Jen laughed. Daniela had wished that she was as pretty as Jen.

Later that day as the party wound down, Daniela overheard her mother talking to another parent.

“We better enjoy this while we can, Lily.” She said, chuckling. “These years, right before they’re teenagers? This is the calm before the storm.”

There was the storm again, Daniela thought. Was Jen still the storm?

Sophomore year, both sixteen, Daniela and Jen sat together at a lunch table. Normally they were surrounded by their friends, but today they were alone, focused on one person. His name was Casey.

“Come on, you have to go talk to him! This is your chance!” Jen egged Daniela on. “Just go for it! I’ll go with you.”

Daniela agreed at the idea of company. She stood cautiously, and Jen popped out of her seat. Daniela walked with her shoulders tensed, while Jen pranced.

The two walked to the table where Casey sat, sliding into the seats across from him. Before Daniela could speak, Jen’s bright, eager voice did. “Hey!”

Casey smiled at them. “Hey, who are you two?”

Daniela felt the brush on Jen’s ponytail on her neck as Jen flipped her hair. She had that smile again, the one that made her look so confident. “I’m Jen. This is Daniela.”

Casey was smiling too now. Suddenly, the chime of the bell sent students scattering.

“Well, you two seem great. Wanna talk tomorrow?” Daniela’s heart fluttered to the pattern of Jen’s eyelashes.

“Oh, Daniela, don’t you have to go to the library tomorrow? Some make-up test?” Jen asked sweetly, looking down at Daniela.

“Uh, that’s next week.”

“But you better get it done soon! Better now than later.” Jen’s hair flipped at Daniela again as she turned to address Casey. “See you tomorrow!”

Daniela watched Casey leave over her shoulder.

“Don’t worry, Dani. I’m just gonna break the ice, tell him all about you.” Jen assured her.

Daniela went to the library for lunch the next day. She thought about Casey and Jen alone at a table. She thought about the ice that Jen said she was trying to break.

There would have been no ice if the storm hadn’t frozen the lake.

Junior year, another lunch period. Seventeen-year-old Daniela felt the brush of Jen’s sweater as she slid into the seat next to her. No one said a word.

Jen and Casey had just broken up, just a few days before they would have been together eight months. It had happened last night, and though everyone had been texted, called, or heard through the grapevine, Daniela found it strange that her own best friend had yet to call her personally.

She turned to look at Jen, to give her a hug and tell her she was sorry, but was surprised to see Jen’s head looking toward the ground, avoiding Daniela’s gaze.

“Hey, Jen, sorry. Really.”

But to Daniela’s surprise, Jen didn’t even acknowledge her. She barely even moved her head in Daniela’s direction before getting up and moving to the other side of the table to rest her head on the shoulder of a girl named Emily.

Daniela sat for a second in silence, hurt. Quietly, a boy named Brandon and a girl named Jackie slid over to Daniela and put an arm around her shoulder.

“Don’t worry too much, Dani. She’ll get over it.” Said Jackie reassuringly, patting Daniela’s back.

“And you know Jen.” Brandon continued, “When it rains, it pours.”

Jen brought the rain.

The end of senior year. Late-spring born, Daniela had just turned eighteen. Jen had been eighteen for one month and six days on the day of their graduation.

When Jen’s name was called out, Daniela screamed for her best friend. As she clapped and cheered, Jen stood up and sashayed to the front of the crowd. She didn’t look back.

When Daniela’s name was called, she couldn’t help notice less people cheered for her than for Jen. She glanced over her shoulder halfway down the aisle, she looked for Jen to see if she was cheering. When she found Jen in the crowd, she saw that she was laughing at something the boy next to her had said.

Jen never said congratulations, goodbye, or thank you for being my friend. She didn’t look back at Daniela, or take a picture with her during the after party. She didn’t take the time to sign Daniela’s yearbook like she had every year before, and Daniela didn’t feel like approaching her.

Daniela went home with Brandon and Jackie that night. The three of them stayed out on Jackie’s porch, on the swinging chair in blankets, talking about where they’d be in a year, or two, or ten. The sun set and the stars came out, and soon the clouds of a familiar summer rainstorm began to roll in.

“What about Jen, Dani?” Jackie asked. “You guys used to be, like, best friends. I always pictured you two together in your graduation caps, taking a picture together or something.”

“Yeah, I don’t know.” Daniela signed. “Something went wrong along the way. I can’t put my finger on it.”

“I don’t think it was a small issue.” Brandon spoke up. “I grew up with you, Dani. I was there for your from your first grade birthday party all the way until now, and I always thought something about her wasn’t right. And after a while, problems like that add up, and before you know it, the problem is bigger than both of you.”

“Bigger than both of us.” Daniela repeated to herself.

The pattering of warm rain on the roof of the porch began. Big storm clouds rolled in, enveloping the stars. For a moment, as the three stared at the sky, it was almost like Jen was there.

Eighteen-year-old Daniela sat and watched the rain. She was in a cafe now, away from home. It had been almost six months since she’d spoken to Jen.

Instead of Jen, a boy named Kenneth sat next to Daniela.

Kenneth had seen Daniela alone in the cafe, staring out the window at the storm clouds were rolling in. He’d sat down next to her, handed her a coffee he’d claimed was supposed to be for a friend who’d “cancelled on him”, and struck up polite conversation. Barricaded in by the now-pouring rain, the two had been talking for hours. Particularly, about high school. Particularly, about Jen.

“I knew tons of girls like that in high school.” Kenneth said, shaking his head sadly. When he shook his head, his hair shook too. Kenneth’s curls were similar to Jen’s, but they were real and they were brown. Big, loopy curls that spilled over his eyes in a way Jen would never let hers do. “They’re fake, toxic. Fair-weather friends.”

Daniela frowned "Fair-weather?”

Kenneth smiled. It wasn’t cold and condescending like the way Jen had looked at Daniela when she knew something Daniela didn’t. It was sweet, caring, and warm. “Fair-weather. They’re around when they need you, but never when you need them. Only when the weather is fair.”

He looked out the window again, and Daniela followed. The rain was still pouring, and wind bent the tall evergreens to the left.

Jen was the storm. She brought the rain and the wind and she bent trees and buildings. But once she began the storm, she left. She didn’t return until her storm was over and the weather was fair again.

The weather was stormy now, and Jen was gone.