When Murphy Died.....

Did you ever have a friend who brought out the best in you? Made you bigger and better than you are. Someone who made you feel good about yourself and the whole world. I was fortunate enough to have someone like that.
Lianne Murphy was my best friend in highschool. We were always together. Fric and Frac, my English teacher called us and sometimes Tweedledum and Tweedledee.
She was just Murphy to most people; Murph to me (unless I had a few beers and then she was Murrr). She became known exclusively by her surname because of a habit she clung to throughout high school. You see, Murphy was not a morning person. Every morning in home-room would find her slumped over her desk, sound asleep. That's why she always chose a desk at the back of the room, usually behind a massively built football player. When the teacher took attendance and called "Murphy,"it was my job to poke her awake so she could answer, "Present." When that failed and the teacher called a little louder and meaner,"MURPHY", I often answered for her. I could do a fair impression of her voice. I still can. She had a sweet, lilting, musical voice, perhaps harking back to her Irish roots.

When Murphy woke up, the sun came out. She was brilliant. She was beautiful to look at, beautiful to listen to,  just beautiful right to her soul. She was filled with joy and humor and she shared both generously. She was spilling over with music, always singing. When the teachers told her to stop singing in class she would hum. When they told her to stop humming, she would whistle under her breath. We took violin lessons together and played well in tandem. We played many duets at many assemblies and theatrical productions. She played better, without a doubt. She was everything I was not and wanted to be but I was not envious.

Oddly enough, she was envious of my drawing talent and my job, writing on the school newspaper. She could speak and sing like an angel but she could not string two words together on paper. Nothing would delight her more than when I drew a funny little picture and passed it to her in class or wrote her a limerick or rhyme. Many a note was intercepted by a teacher and sometimes we were detained after school. But a time or two I caught the teacher smiling at some little cartoon or poem of mine.

Boys clustered around Murph like bees around an exotic bloom. She was as golden haired as I was dark. But we were as close as Siamese twins and I benefited from that and was included in all the fun and chaos that followed her from place to place. I was even asked for dates by boys who probably wouldn't have looked twice at me if I wasn't in Murphy's posse.
But all was not rosy in Murphy's life. Her parents' marriage had always been stormy and they had begun to argue a lot and snipe at each other and even worse were the cold silences that could last for days. One night, I was startled out of a deep sleep by a tapping on my bedroom window. I was about to scream for my dad when I heard Murphy's voice calling my name. I opened the window and she practically cannon-balled into my room. She had tears streaming down her face and was talking so fast I could not understand her. I shushed her and got some tissues and a glass of milk and told her to talk slow and keep her voice down.
Between sobs and gasps, I gathered that her father had walked out on her mom; out of the house and as it turned out, entirely out of their lives. He later married a younger woman and moved out of the province.
Murphy was devastated. She adored her father. She cried herself to sleep, curled up on the end of my bed. I stayed awake for a long time thinking about the contrariness and selfishness of adults. I never thought he would be so callous as to abandon his beautiful daughter so completely. I realized then, as never before, that I was the fortunate one. I was cherished by my dad.
Some of the sunshine went out of Murphy after that. Oh, she was still charming and funny and charismatic but something was gone and she didn't sing so often any more.


To Be Continued