Tiara,

Hello my best friend. You’ve been on my heart so much lately, for no real apparent reason. Actually you’re always on my heart as we spend every single day together- in the same city, the same school, the same house, yes even the same room.

Isn’t our room beautiful? Everyone knows it. Everyone’s jealous of it too, you can tell by their expressions as they walk in and notice the quaint furniture and flock of black birds spread out across the walls. They wish their rooms had that much time and affection put into them.

Who else can say they spend every night with their best friend? We don’t even need to talk to notice the good it does to our lives. Being so physically close to you since I moved in a couple months ago has somehow blessed me in a lot of ways. As if we weren’t close enough before, this whole sharing a room thing has made it even more so. Sometimes, yes, we wake each other up. Sometimes we talk and laugh too late into the night and wake up zombies the next day. But, and I know I speak on your behalf as well, it’s so worth it.

Both of us have joked in the past about how our relationship reminds us of marriage. If this is a glimpse of what marriage is like, I can’t wait. We share everything. We balance everything perfectly: the room, our personalities, our chores; my ying and your yang, my contentment and your absolute zest for life.

Whatever God was thinking when he put you in front of me one day when I wasn’t looking, it was genius. I would imagine it was something like this: “They don’t know it quite yet, but they’ll become two of the most important people in each other’s lives. They’ll never find a better friend in anyone else. Oh… and they’ll realize how lucky they are to have one another as soon as they’re on their own in college.”

I don’t mean to quote God, but this is what my imagination gave me when I thought about His plan for us. “Once they spend some time together, they’ll realize part of the reason I made both of them was to be there for each other, to help each other grow through both hardship and laughter, and of course love.”

How right he was. You’ve been there through it all. Listened to every word I’ve had to say, contributed advice only when I needed it, and let me figure stuff out on my own when I didn’t.

However, I can’t go through this whole spiel without mentioning the little issues we’ve had. You know… the occasional, “what exactly do you do when you procrastinate?” or whatever it is you said to me that one time that made me give you an angry face that no one ever really takes seriously. Oh, or my personal favorite: the fight we had about a certain someone spending some time on our couch. In the end, it was all meaningless banter. They were arguments that prove we’re humans with feelings- and sometimes they get hurt, even by our best friend. It’s okay… there will be more. And that’s okay with me J

Then there are the not-so-meaningless issues, like the one you approached me with last Thursday about your struggle with jealousy. That night proved as much as any other that only my best friend could come to me, after feeling convicted by God, with total humility and apology about somewhat unfriendly feelings. I commend your courage, Tiara. I wonder if I would be strong enough to admit what you did if the tables were turned and God convicted me about my shortcomings.

So, thank you. Thank you for always listening to God and respecting me enough as your best friend and sister in Christ to admit those feelings to me. It meant the world to me, my love. It will remain in my memory as one of the most commendable actions someone has taken toward me, I swear.

Anyway, I just want you to know that when we spend days and nights together, as we tell each other “I love you,” every night before we fall asleep, I mean it. I mean it as if I were saying it to family. I mean it as if I were saying it to someone I’ve known my whole life. I really do love you, my best friend. I know I can trust you with my life.

Excitement lies ahead within the next few months for us, as we plan to travel and spend more time together, but on a different continent. I so look forward to traveling and showing you more of the world I came from, as if you don’t know enough about me already? J

I pray for you all the time, thanking God for blessing me with the crazy plan he made long before we were even born: Joce and Tiara will become best friends. They will teach each other many things about love, happiness, responsibility, the world and me. I’m sure right now he’s thinking to himself, “You know? They’re not doing half bad.”