As time went by, Thabo and I grew up to become very close friends. Some who knew us would disagree to my claim that we were just friends but the assumptions of others are beyond me. My concern and my care.

Sometimes i would think to myself, if i had met him a few years later, when i was no longer just a naive child, would i still befriend him? The answer to that question creeps up behind the curtain of my conciousness, unaware as to when it should show itself as it never knew if i was ready to accept the truth.

Because for years and years, i convinced myself 'Yes!'

He is my bestfriend and most importantly, my comfort. He is there to consolidate me in times of a crisis and there to cry with me in times of worry. How foolish of me to even question him.

-

But yes, for years and years we remained friends. Until one day, that was.

Thabo and I used to walk home from school together as we lived on the same street. My house was a little further than his but he would still walk me home, then back to his.

It was a friday afternoon in autumn and we were walking down the petalled roadside towards our street.

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'You should come meet my parents.'

A little taken aback, i asked why.

'I mean, we are best friends. Why not.'

I agreed and followed him home. There, i was greeted with his parents in a huge house. Between them was also a little dog that they called Pippa.

The tiles were made of marbles, and carved pillars stood elegantly along both sides of the entrance. Long silk curtains flowed along the wind coming from the open windows behind them.

'This is my best friend, Meera' he told his parents.

'Best friends huh?' his mom winked, nudging him. She too, had long blond hair and blue eyes just like Thabo.

I hid the arrival of my gut towards my mouth with an awkward laugh. It was second nature to me.

As i looked up, instead of gesturing his tendancy to vomit , Thabo remained unusually quiet. I quickly smacked his stomach and laughed.

'Ew' i said.

'We really are just friends'

'If you say so...'

His mom left to the kitchen and came back with a tray of cookies and coffee. She gestured me to take a seat on their white leather couch and then left with her husband.

I felt out of place. As a brown individual in a western country, its easy to blame all my difficulties on my race but overtime, i had conditioned myself to disappear in a crowd. I monitored my every movement to ensure that i don't appear as the dirty, smelly, curry muncher we have been labelled as. I could hardly bring myself to reach towards the tray in fear of tarnishing something around me. I was sitting on egg shells.

Thabo took a seat next to me.

'Is it really that horrible to envision us together?'

Perhaps it was. But it was even more terrible to envision losing the one i had grown up with.

And so, that day it started. Not just a relationship but also the days in which i would endure the most lack of self- respect that i had in 15 years of living.