Farasha (butterfly)

It was a moment I had been dreading; I didn't know how to bring it up, and quite frankly, I didn't want to. She is one of my closest friends, and in all honesty, probably the one person who could make me change my mind; the one person who could make me stay at MKS. How do I tell Faten that I'm leaving? Faten, my dear Egyptian friend who taught Arabic to my class for two years, who makes me laugh harder than anyone else at school, who tells my students that I'M the one from Egypt and she taught ME English, rather than the other way around; Faten who walks arm in arm with me down the hall, who teaches my completely unhelpful Arabic words like monkey and diarrhea. How do I tell my best friend that I'm not coming back next year?

I didn't plan on telling her that way, but maybe that was God giving me an opportunity because I wasn't ready to bite the bullet. I was quite upset that day because the school was giving me a hard time about my annual ticket home, and everyone was being unhelpful and just plain rude. I came back to my class, and Faten just knew something was wrong. She asked me if I was ok, and of course I said, yes, because it really wasn't the time to discuss the issue. But she knew I was lying. She always knows. She found me later in the afternoon to ask me again if I was ok. I explained what happened, and she randomly asked me if I was coming back next year. There it was: that dreaded question. As hard as it would be to tell her the truth, it would have been harder to lie. So I told her. She didn't believe me, didn't want to believe me, so she asked me again and again. She thought I was leaving because of the issue with my ticket, so she offered to pay me the extra money so I would stay. When I finally turned to look her in the face, I found her eyes filled with tears. I realized in that moment that both our hearts were breaking. I turned away knowing that if I stayed looking at her, my own tears would begin to fall. After a few more minutes she fiercely kissed me on the head and left. I should have known that wouldn't be the end of it.

The next day she teamed up with the PE teacher, another Egyptian woman, and began her quest to get me to stay. Little did she know that every plea made my heart ache and made my decision even harder to bear. Finally one day as we were sitting together, I brought up our friendship; partly as a change of subject and partly out of genuine curiosity. I asked her how in the world we became friends. As far as I can remember, she just plopped down in my room one day and started talking (and hasn't really stopped since!) Without missing a beat, she looked me in the eye and simply said, "God." God wanted us to be friends, so we are. As simple as that. As I sat back in wonder I thought, 'She's absolutely right. Probably more right than she even realizes.'

......

Today was our last day. She came to say goodbye and made me promise that I would meet her before she left for Egypt for the summer. The other fifth grade teacher was there and started giving her a hard time (as he always does) saying, "I thought Jena was your friend. Where are your tears? You aren't sad that your friend it leaving? If you were really friends, you would have tears. Now I know you have just been faking it; you aren't really such good friends." Faten, always quick with a response, looked right at him and said, "No, Jena is not my friend. She is my sister."

My sister, Faten...