I had a friend when I was growing up. I loved him and he loved me. There was this girl whom he fell in love with. And then I met her and unfortunately...fell terribly in love with her. You know how your first love is. It was magical. It is twenty years and I still remember her perfume and the taste of her lipstick. It is also twenty years since I lost a good friend. He may be dead, might be living a good life somewhere or maybe, like me, struggling with definitions of a good life. Wherever he is, I miss him and in some corners, so does she. He was a special friend. Before we parted, he was my friend for about 8 years. If he were around he would have known...that beautiful girl he lost to me twenty years ago never really went on to become mine. I failed miserably when it came to ownership of all things nice and wonderful. Like parallel railroads to eternity, I and her have stared at each other relentlessly across a small but unfathomable distance. The trains of time have rolled over us