Please, God, Help Me Stop Missing Her
I was scrolling through psychotherapy memes on Instagram a few years ago when Hannah popped up in my friend requests. We each had new last names and new looks.
I had decided that since I had to wear wigs anyway (as an ultra-Orthodox Jew), they may as well be blonde instead of my natural dull brown.
She wore a mixture of wigs and other creative head coverings. We “hearted” each other’s posts, not daring to break our silence with actual words. “She seems happy,” I told myself, my fingers hovering over her photos. “Don’t start anything.” Still, I found myself imagining her as the girl I once knew in braces and a messy bun, without makeup or laugh lines, who slung her backpack down near me on the first day of tenth grade in Borough Park, Brooklyn.
While our classmates penciled equations onto graph paper, she drew on her arm in neon gel pen: “Hannah.” I rolled up my identical navy checked sleeve and put ballpoint pen to my own pale skin: “Malka.” She smirked.
