Day 04 ~ Something you have to forgive someone for.

In my growing up neighbourhood my best friend had an outdoor swimming pool. That makes for the very best kind of best friend because outdoor swimming pools kick some awesome summer day ass.

When i was very young her mother taught me how to swim in that pool. I spent an entire summer having my mother march me over for lessons three times a week. My soon to be best friend was only five at that time and she could already swim. Really well. And there began a seven year competition with each other over every sport and activity. I think the only thing i ever did better than her was "go, go, stop!" She was that kind of best friend, the one you loved to hate or hated to love, whichever,  she was good at everything.

This isn't the story of my best friend though. This is the story of her brother. Her brother was mean. I never really liked him. The feeling was mutual.

When i was somewhere around ten or eleven or twelve he was a much bigger boy, i think he was a teenager. I don't really recall. In my memory he was seven feet and three hundred pounds. One day we were playing a game in the pool, my friend, the brother and me. He wrapped his legs around me, pulled me under water and reached his hands in my bikini bottom. I struggled to get free from him and he just held me there. Under water. I thought i was going to die and adrenaline and fear ripped through my body with an intensity i didn't even know existed until that very moment. Panic.

I don't remember the rest of the story. I know i got loose and stormed home. That was the last day i had that best friend. I lost out on lots more years of friendship because of that unwanted groping. Childhood slipped away that afternoon.