A Long Way Home

Danna Reich Colman
4 min readFeb 2, 2024

Justin was four when he first met Allie. He knew right away that they were meant to be together, but he didn’t know how to say it. He liked everything about her, and he could tell she felt the same way about him. One day on the playground he told her that he knew they would be married someday. She shoved him, and he fell while she ran off crying.

At first Justin was proud of how pretty his best friend Allie was becoming, but as grade school turned to high school his feeling changed. Boys, older boys, cooler boys, began to notice her, and she had less and less time for him. She became popular while he grew increasingly awkward. She dated, she surrounded herself with friends, she became the focal point of the school’s social life. She rarely had time for Justin, but when she did it was like she had never drifted away. They were perfect together. He knew it, and at those moments, she knew it, too.

Different choices, different paths, but Justin knew he just needed to wait until Allie was ready. He watched all of her movies, even the ones where she had only one quick walk through. He knew other men found her physically attractive. So did he, but that wasn’t the point. She was his friend, and his friend happened to be a beautiful celebrity.

Over the years, Justin followed her life, both public and private. On social media he saw that Allie was into musicians. Justin had…

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Danna Reich Colman

Writer, author and copyeditor. “What doesn’t kill us gives us something new to write about” ~ J. Wright