A nice run in

The first girl I could call my friend was one of a pair of twins from primary school. She was half Ethiopian and her mother always packed the best snacks for break time. She was a tom boy if there's such a thing in kids not old enough to know that their genitals will come to ruin their lives in  a little under a decade. She climbed gave trees with me, beat many of us boys at arm wrestling, knew how to skip rope(I assume her father must have been a soldier or boxer. ) and had a lunch box with masters of the Universe on the cover.

She was just plain cool. Hanging out with her was easy.

I was reminded of this when I run into her this weekend while I was out doing sophisticated things(I was smoking shisha and sipping sodas at Legends, but I was doing it while wearing a monocle, so it was sophisticated).  I jokingly punched her in the shoulder at which point she complained that that's no way to treat a lady. I was tempted to ask where said lady was, but I love my life so I just apologized and we got to talking and I realized that more had changed than just her ability to take a playful jab.

Our rhythms were different. She was a girl now. She laughed softly and complained about how she wasn't talking to one of her friends because he hadn't called her in 3 days. 3 days!! Who was this person? I realized that I had been excited to see because I had expected her to be the same girl with He-man and friends on her lunch box.

She wore high heeled shoes and a skirt that did wonders for her legs by letting us get a good look. She looked good. Her hair long and wavy looking, no longer the baby Afro she used to have. A weave now stood in it's place.

We only spoke for a while and after wards she said she had tried to avoid me earlier int he night when she'd seen me. Befuddled, I asked her why.

"Most guys treat me like a dude. They say shit to me they have no business saying. They forget I'm a girl and what not. Fuck it. Nze sili musajja. "

I nodded quietly.

"I mean, why the hell would you treat me like your girlfriend, then all of a sudden just stop calling? Take me on dates when you feel like it and get my hopes up, then just introduce me as a friend"

I wanted to protest that I had never done these things to her..But then in that moment she disappeared. I could hear the voices of many girls before her who could make legitimate claims that I had done that to them. I had treated them like a lady when I didn't know them, been very aware of the differences between us, and slowly taken them for granted. Treated them like one of the boys.

As I drove home, I realized that I had to remain conscience of the fact that boys and girls are different. Despite what we may say, our brains are different and we interpret things differently. Only a foolish man will not learn this.