The Goose

My friend (my special friend) is getting hitched.

The Goose and I have known each other since we were size 0’s with grasshopper legs, sliding down muddy banks in cardboard boxes. We were both accompanying our Heroes (hers, her big brother, and mine, my two big cousins). At first I eyeballed her with suspicion. She wore a floral skirt. On a fishing excursion. I was muddier than she was and wearing boy’s shorts.

I warmed to her when I discovered we shared the same interest in dressing up (me in my grandmother’s crimpalene dressing gown, silk gloves and high heels 5 sizes too big, her in a silky blue number and kilos of lipstick, fanning herself with a feather duster). We looked like two emaciated, underage drag queens.

Our pursuits gradually became more versatile – we played with dinkie cars but we also had dolls. Baked cakes but rode BMXes. Barbies and pool-cricket.

We were conned into hours of tickling the Heroes’ backs for zero payment. It was a slow learning curve – the R2 coins we were promised per ten minutes’ graft never materialized (we were so happy it didn’t occur to us to toyi-toyi).

Goose did ballet and I did horse-riding. We created the best damn hotel in KZN at age 10, for her little sister and her friend to come and stay in: Hotel Pearson. We made the most killer promotional video for it. It was Freddy Mercury meets Lifestyles of the Rich & Famous. The service was astounding.

We waitressed together. We went to Westville Boy’s High socials together, not knowing a soul, and would end up slow dancing with the same two dorks every time (me with waistcoat-and-glasses boy, her with a little child-gecko who came up to her shoulder, transfixed by her beestings).

We painted our nails Tippex-white and read Blush magazines and talked about boys. A lot. Ad nauseum.

Then we went to Varisty and held each other’s hair while we chundered. Ever the control-freak, she insisted on having a bath once when we were 17 sheets to the wind. I demanded that she sing to me so I knew she wasn’t drowning. She picked ‘I luuuurve Paris in the Springtiiiiiiiiiime …’ Special.

After Varsity I missed driving around Grahamstown in her hunk of junk listening to tapes. The Goose went to England with her family and I moved to Jozi. That didn’t really separate us, in fact, for a while, we were closer than ever. We both found ourselves in the stinking armpit of hell regarding the men in our lives at the same time that first year, and there were large quantities of mutual snot and trane spilt down various cathartic channels (phone/email/text).

Since then it hasn’t really mattered how often we’ve spoken/emailed/texted. We still see each other’s inner grasshopper every time we meet.

And now she is getting married. I suppose this is where our parallel lives dramatically diverge for the first time. She has found a wonderful, crazy, funny, intelligent guy who adores the pants off her. And I can’t think of anyone who deserves it more.