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One of the most surprising and unpleasant lessons I’ve had to learn over and over again throughout the course of my life is that friendship isn’t always permanent. When we have a connection with someone, we believe we’ll share that bond forever. But in actuality, those relationships are rare. What’s far more likely to happen is that people change. Life happens and relationships end up being casualties. Most of the time, we can’t even pinpoint a specific moment that ended the friendship. But sometimes we can. In this new series, “She Was A Friend Of Mine,” we’re chronicling the exact moment a friendship went sour.
This first story is about love lost between two young women who met in college. Check it out below.
I met Zauna freshman year in college. We were in a shared dorm, um, at Notre Dame. They had special interests floors, for like LGBT folks, sports folks and Black people. So we were on a Black floor, um, but I actually knew her through one of my best friends who knew her from growing up in childhood. And so we told ourselves, ‘Oh, when we come on we’re going to be on the floor together, we’re going to be best friends. And we were.
We were both virgins when we started, which was different for a lot of people because a lot of 18 year olds had already had sex. So, because we had both pretty much waited for religious reason. I later found out that hers was for more religious reasons than mine. Like for mine, I always grew up and knew that there was something special and soulful about sexuality. I wasn’t waiting for marriage. I was just waiting until I found somebody I was cool with whereas, she was much more of like sex is a sin. That type of intimacy is a sin, if somebody sucks your titty, that’s a soul tie. So it was different. But because I was a virgin, she was just like, we’re still on the same time, but I got the sense that hers was a little more extreme than mine.
MN: But you didn’t think that would be a problem?
I didn’t think so until Zauna lost her virginity before me, which was interesting. And you know, she said she was ready and set up the whole thing and I was like, ‘Okay, whatever.’ Who cares. But then she came back and told us all she wasn’t actually ready to lose her virginity. The only reason she even had sex was because we were all talking about sex a lot Because even I was a virgin, I was still like messing around with people. I just, there was no penetration. So I did talk about sex and sexuality and doing stuff, but she said that because our, friend environment talked about sex so much it pressured her to want to experience it.
So she ended up blaming all of us for her, losing her, even though I was still a virgin.
MN: When you say she blamed you, how did that come out?
So she ended up blaming all of us for her, losing her, even though I was still a virgin. So when you say blaming, like what did she say? How was she, how did that come out? Yeah, so that’s where the separation started to happen because when she lost her virginity, she was having sex with the guy, she was cool. And I think there was even a couple guys that she had sex with after him and she was still cool. But we went away for a summer because of summer break and I just remember when she came back, she was super distant from all of us. And so I’m just like, ‘Zauna, what’s going on?’ She always like life of the party, always dancing, always talking. But she was just very aloof. And so I sat and I asked her like, why she was distancing herself from us and she said, because I felt like all of you guys talking about sex all the time and putting that like in my ear gates, you made me interested in it in a way that I wasn’t before and it made me make a decision before I was actually ready.
MN: Do you remember how you felt hearing her say that?
I thought it was completely stupid. Um, at this point we were at least 19 now. I also didn’t understand how I was the one that put the pressure on her because at this point I was still a virgin. So I’m just like, you fucking, I don’t know how I was the one that put the pressure on.
MN: And it wasn’t like a one-time thing…
No, she had sex with multiple men. So I was just kind of like, ‘How is it me?’
In addition to Zauna’s feelings about her newfound sexuality, the separation between her and Marie expanded when she learned that she was exploring other religions.
In that same summer break, I had went to Hong Kong and I used to write in a blog and she would read my blog and comment, and I was studying Buddhism at the time and I started reading this book. It was like Living Buddha, Living Christ. And I just started to explore Christianity and Buddhism and how they worked together. And she was horrified that I was even like researching Buddha. At one point, and again, I was 20. I wouldn’t say this now, but at 19 or 20, I had said, I feel like I’m a Christian Buddhist. And she was disgusted. And so that conversation and the sex conversation kind of happened all at once. She told me in the word, it says, ‘Do not yoke yourself with unbelievers.’ And she felt, because I was studying Buddhism and because I was pro-sex that her being in my direct circle was her yoking herself with an unbeliever. And even though I was like, I still completely believe in the doctrine of Jesus Christ. I love Jesus, she felt my exploration was sacrilegious, blasphemous.
Because Marie was an unbeliever in Zauna’s book, she cast her and other members of their friend group away.
When I was noticing the other friends that she kept around who were also women who were sexually active, I was like, okay, so I’m not even having sex, sex and you put me to the side, why are you leaving them around? And she was like, well you for you, you were also exploring Buddhism and you were talking about sex. And those things combined made me put you in the pot. Cause she was like, even though these women are sexually active, they still feel guilty when they have sex. They’re still striving to not have sex, whereas you’re out there. So she ended up maintaining friendships with the women who felt like guilty about sex and feel guilty when they were intimate, repented when they were intimate. Whereas there’s this other group was kind of just like, ‘Who cares?’ She completely stopped talking to all of us. We tried to restore it a little bit because I was like, ‘Okay, I want to fix this. Is there a way like is there language I shouldn’t use around you? Like how do we make this situation comfortable for you?’ To ask you why you wanted to fix it?
MN: Why did you want to fix it?
I just loved her and she was such a good friend and this was probably like year three into our friendship and then because my best friend from back in the day was also close with her. , I just felt… It just was a loss and I took on a lot of guilt. Even though I was like, we grown. I was like, damn, I made you feel that uncomfortable that you like really feel like you lost something? Cause I used to say all the time like I didn’t, when I did have sex, like I didn’t lose my virginity, I gained the experience of sex. But all of that type of language or any type of positivity towards it,.she was like, no, I need to be around the women who condemn this. So I wanted to create a space just because I didn’t want to lose the friendship. I was like, maybe if I just make her more comfortable, we can still maintain some kind of balance. I was close to her mother, her sisters and even when we were in school, some weekends when I just needed a home to go to, she would take me home with her. So I think I just felt really familial ties to her. But I was trying to figure out what to do.
In an effort to do just that, Marie asked Zauna if there was anything she could do to help her feel more comfortable. Zauna, noticing she had been left out of certain activities with her friends, told Marie that she could tell her where they were going and invite her out. Marie did that, thinking it would help strengthen the relationship.
‘But every time she would say, ‘No, but thanks for asking.’ And at that point I got sick of it because I asked her, I said, ‘So, every time I ask you this, you’re going to always say no?’ And she said yes. So then I was like, I’m not asking anymore because this is strange. We tried for a little bit, um, but she basically never really spoke to me again. She moved away and got married, changed her name. Her name Zauna means “to be alive” and she was so proud of her name. Nigerian people have such a pride over their names and what they mean. She had it tattooed on her foot. But I guess, she met some man. She moved away from LA, married that man and changed her name to Faith.
So then honestly when I found out she changed her name all of my like feeling that maybe I was a bad friend or maybe … it was gone because there was some kind of identity issue that was happening that was beyond me. So when I heard that, I don’t know why, but the name change thing was devastating.
I remember looking like stalking her on Facebook and seeing her wedding photos and getting a little sad. But when they said she changed her name, I realized it was beyond the sexuality and spirituality.
Two of the men she slept with, they just treated her like sh*t. And I do think that when she was coming out of that, trying to recover, she did find a lot of comfort in her religiosity.
I think with a lot of women that set of rules makes you feel safe. I think that’s what happened. It was like I was not operating under these rules and look at all this hurtful stuff that happened. If I return to all the rules I’m going to be at peace and safe and protected. But if your sense of faith is so fragile that you can’t even exist in a room of people talking about things without faltering, your sense of faith, isn’t secure and strong.
