I can count on one hand (and have fingers left over) the friends (that I'm not related to) I've kept in touch with over my life. We moved a lot when I was a kid so I never put down roots. I've have a couple friends, but once we moved, they were gone.

Dad got a job in upper management when I was in middle school, and we actually stayed in one location long enough for me to attend one school for my high school years. I met Shelly through a friend. I was uptight and unschooled in the ways of the world. Met some people during and after high school who broadened my horizons. Shelly was straight up Punk, pink mohawk and all. I was khakis and button downs. We kinda clicked, but we never really dated. We'd sit at Waffle House for hours just shooting the shit. She moved a couple of times, but we always kept up. She rolled back into town with a really nasty heroine addiction. I helped her get through it. Every time she got in a bad situation, I'd ride up on my white horse and haul her ass out.

Couple of years ago, she moved back to town for good. She found a guy and shacked up. He was bad news. They'd have fallouts and she'd stay at my place until the dust settled. Then she'd go back to him.

She called me up on winter night. It was freezing and a particularly rough winter for the South. She was sitting on a curb slicing her arm to ribbons with a box opener. I stayed on the phone with her until I could track her down. The cuts were bad, but the cold probably saved her. I got her basic first aid, picked up more stuff at a pharmacy and got her back to my place. I'm trained in first aid, or I would have taken her straight to the ER. Once I got her to my place, I put her back together with butterfly bandages, gauze and tape, I got her settled down for a couple days. Even grilled her a ribeye which she ate like it was her first meal in weeks.

She went back to the toxic asshole. Soon after, she was abusing prescription drugs. She dried out at my place for a few days. I held her when she was cold and had the creepy crawly shakes. She was clean again. There were a few blowups with the toxic guy she insisted on staying with. We ran with different crowds, though. She was job to job and ran with a punk rock crowd. I'm pretty vanilla and started a family. She'd drift in and out as her needs required my support. She was still my friend, though.

Early one January morning my wife woke me up. "I think Shelly's dead." Fucking Facebook is how I found out my buddy OD'ed. Nothing I could do to save her anymore. She's gone. 20 years ago, I wanted her to be more than a friend. Now I just miss my friend. People make choices, but I regret that I couldn't be there to help her with that one.

Seems like the older I get, the more I see people I care about make poor decisions. This one just happened to be fatal. I'm skipping a get together with other people who knew her, because I just don't want to talk about this face to face.

Shelly, I hope you're in a better place. You were a good person who had flaws like we all do. You flaw took your life. Lotta what ifs.

Sorry if this is the wrong place to post this. If there's a better sub, I'll delete this and post there. Seems this stuff isn't casual enough for /r/casualconverstation

TL;DR: One of my best friends of 20 years OD'd a few months ago, and I'm still dealing. Mods here are cooler than other subs where I've posted stuff like this. Had to kill the last post, so please excuse the complete lack of paragraphs.

Edit: Did some edit stuff.