A short flash fiction story by Erica Fransisca.
“Anna and I were never friends, at least not in the way most people define friends. Sure, we knew each other for more than half our lives, but there was never a point where we shook hands and, well, became friends.
She is, to me, what you might say an insignificant other. And what, you ask, does that mean? Exactly what it says on the tin, because for years we danced on the periphery of each other’s lives: me a speckle on the margins of her book; her a pinprick on the edges of my story.
I want to be able to say that Anna was a close friend. Or even an old friend. The truth is no matter how I try to spin it, we were only ever acquaintances. Yes, we met forty years ago as teenagers, but acquaintances nonetheless. It didn’t affect me that she was a renowned designer or had built herself an empire because her life had no bearing whatsoever on mine.
And I’m not saying this out of disrespect. I’m sure, no, I know, that she felt the same way. She couldn’t care less that I traveled halfway across the world, jumped off planes, moved back to my dad’s basement, got married, or taught at our old school. That’s because none of the things I did had any significance on the things she could do.
At the same time, Anna was always there. A faint outline in the background, a distant figure, but still, there.
When you’ve lived as long as I have, sometimes it’s the faraway yet familiar face that you need. Childhood best friends turned into strangers and ex-boyfriends became textbook history, but Anna remained. She was the one constant.
It was not until last week when Anna’s husband asked me to speak here today, that I realized how truly significant her insignificance had been for me, and mine for hers.
When I packed my suitcase and made the road my home, it was impossible to keep track of what went on back home. But not Anna, who was always loud and unwavering. She knew what she wanted to be, and somehow, my subconscious held onto that. I believed she would go on to accomplish what she wanted, and she did.
Truthfully, I can count with two hands the number of times we’ve talked over the decades. And I learned from our conversations, brief as they were, that she regarded me the same. I wasn’t someone she thought of frequently, but occasionally she’d remember, and smile when she imagined me on my worldwide adventures.
For so long, it never occurred to me to think of her as a friend. And I know I was never on her mind the way her friends were. Yet despite our lives never truly overlapping, they were also not entirely separate.
She wasn’t the first person I called to share good news, but once, I found myself writing her name on a postcard in Chiang Mai. Likewise, she didn’t know my birthday, yet I’ll never forget how she helped me when I first moved back home. I wasn’t writing to a friend, not really, and she wasn’t obliged to lend me a hand.
Ours wasn’t a friendship where two people who used to be best friends are bound by some past favor they have to repay; it was just two individuals who knew each other enough for mutual appreciation.
I think everyone needs someone like who Anna was to me, if only to keep us grounded and remind us of the things that truly matter.
If you’re here now, think about that one person who has always been on the fringes of your life, never treading too close, but never straying too far either. Because trust me, the world will feel different when your insignificant other is gone. Let them know that before the opportunity passes.
So, no, Anna was not my friend. She was my insignificant other, and in a way, that makes her very significant.”
Insignificant Other was first written for Flash Fiction Month 2021 on Deviantart.
If you enjoyed this short flash fiction story, check out this collection!