Forever friends

Dear sis,

The universe got a little brighter the day you were born. Mum loves to tell the story of how I was in the birthing suite watching you be born. Every few minutes I would wipe mum’s face with a wet cloth and go back to have a look at her birthing you, mum’s little helper, she called me. That was the day I met my forever friend, best friends for life.

Unfortunately, I don’t remember watching you go from a baby, to a toddler, to a child (the early days.) What I do know is that my love got stronger for you each day, corny, I know, but what can I say, you’re my little sister. Thankfully, photos of us from that time exist, because without them, our memories would cease to exist.

When you were little, the doctor diagnosed you with a global learning disorder, which affected your speech. We didn’t know if you would ever be able to talk, but it just took a little longer to develop. All the words that came out of your mouth were wrong or muddled up. For example, you would pronounce hospital, as hospiddle. Sometimes I would joke that it sounded like horse piddle. You couldn’t say my name either, so instead you would refer to me as wee wee. I hated being referred to as urine, but now that I am older, I can laugh about it.

Nobody fights as good as siblings do. I feel sorry for mum that she had to deal with two hormonal teenage girls at the same time. One minute we loved each other, the next we were pulling each other’s hair and screaming how much we hated each other. Just your classic sibling rivalry. Remember that time that you threw a toffee at my nose in an argument and broke my nose? Because you forgot that toffees are hard. Yeah good times. We would always make it up to each other by the end of day, hug it out and go back to being best friends.

You’re my partner in crime, literally. Flashback to that time that we made a real-life version of cops and robbers. I am not sure what went through your mind when you got the idea to rob our dad’s shop. At first, you took a small amount of cash from the register, just small enough to go unnoticed, but then the greed kicked in. By the end of it, there was no cash left. We hid it in our lunchboxes. You were always the mischievous one and I was the goody two shoes. Dad noticed the money gone and came out to ask us if we knew anything. I made up a story about a guy who went in there while dad was in the toilet. He believed my story and called the cops. I had to repeat my description of the guy to the cop. After an hour or so passed, dad said that the police had caught the guy. Some more time passed and dad managed to figure out that we did it. He checked our bags and took the cash back. To this day, I still don’t know if the police actually caught the guy, or dad said it to see our reaction and if he could sense our guilt. Dad was well known in the community, so he probably knew from the start that it was us and thought he could scare us into telling the truth.

It is a fact that you can’t choose your family, but if I had a do over, I would choose you, every time. Thank you for always making me laugh, especially, when I am too sad to get out of bed. I would be lost without you, you’re my rock and keep me grounded when I have lost all hope of being happy. Our bond is stuck together with the strongest glue, we will never unstick. You’re stuck with me for life.

Love always, Louise <3