Niki
When I was fourteen years old, the thought of not being best friends with my high school ‘squad’ terrified me. These girls where the people I would tell my darkest secrets to, share my hopes and dreams with and cry to when my parents grounded me for silly reasons.We were inseparable. Every weekend one of us would host a sleepover, and we’d stay up late. The thing we were all excited the most for was our future together. We were going to all move to L.A, I was going to be an assistant to the hottest music stars, one of my best friends was going to be a clothes designer and the other was going to be a dog groomer. We were going to own the swankiest place down town, and we’d be together forever. That was the dream.
Fast-forward a few years, I’d pretty much lost contact with the girls from school. Friends forever didn’t come to much.Life got in the way. A dodgy boyfriend for me, and the high school squad had all had babies. (Except me). This time two years ago I’ll admit, I felt completely alone. My family had been through a really hard time, and I’d of given anything to have one of my old friends to come to me and say ‘Niki, I’m here’. It was the toughest time of my life.
I went to a musical preview in London. The musical was written by my favourite artist of all time, and that was the one day I look back at now, and see that my life chnaged for the better because of it. There was a few of us ‘Fan-girls’ there to see the show. And outside in the queue, I met one girl. She’s a few years older then me, with an infectious laugh, a blinding smile and I instantly wanted to know her. We began speaking about our excitement for the show and our passion for the artist. After the show, we followed each other on Twitter, and we carried on speaking daily. She had a best friend, who like her had that kind heart. I also became close to her.
Around this time, our favourite artist announced he and his former band were reuniting after 10 years, and doing a reunion tour. Me, my two new friends, and a few others planned on doing the same tour date, together. Another girl who also shared our passion, and lived locally to me (I’d actually met her at a concert before briefly) was also going to join us this day. It was set to be the best gig I’d ever been to.
The day came, and as planned we all met up.The strangest feeling happened, something I’d heard my mum say, but never thought real.The feeling of knowing people a whole life time, that is all I can describe this feeling as. We laughed, sang, ate cake and smiled the whole day. The concert itself was insane. One of the best I’d ever been to. But that friendship feeling was even better,
In time, our small group had expanded. We did summer shows for this band together, other musicals our favourite artist had written were shown, so road trips to Brighton were obviously attended by us. We had similar tastes in other artists, so their tours were made into a mini break. A few months ago, we all went to the Isle of Wight to stay with two of the girls for the weekend. But apart from these amazing adventures we all have together, we also have each other. We speak every day. Even if its just everyone messaging in a group chat to say that it’s this many days until we’re reunited again, there isn’t a day that has gone by without knowing we all care.
Last week, I met up with one of the girls from our group, to spend the day together exploring, cooing over the Dolan Twins, and just spending quality time with each other. We were in the middle of talking about how adorable Grayson Dolan is (well, I was) when she pulled out a purple envelope. She handed it to me and I opened it. Inside was a beautiful hand crafted card, with beautiful messages from each of my friends. Not only that, they’d all been sneaky Sue’s and pitched in together and brought me a ticket to the show our favourite band are doing to celebrate 15 years since they’d formed. I was in shock. Tears leaked out my eyes, and I couldn’t stop shaking. I still now, 10 days later cannot believe that my friends did that for me.
I guess you could say one band did change my life. Not only is their music my favourite sound, but some of their fans are the best part of my life. I wish sometimes I could go back and tell high school me that it’s okay when you drift away from friends. You can call it fate, destiny or even just luck, but some how, some when you will find the friends who won’t walk away. And also, I’d let high school Niki know that the band I adore and have posters of everywhere will bring me so much more happiness as I get older, and not to cry too much as they will get back together.
Let me know if you’ve also found friends through being a member of a fandom. Tweet us @Fuzzable or me @NikiNoox, I’d love to know your fan friendships.
Peace xo
