Leslie loves to remind me that I thought she was a 26-year-old hippie. She walked in the apartment to find me and my parents debating which room was actually mine, wearing colorful damask pajama bottoms and a tank top with Birkenstocks.

I thought we’d meet, introduce ourselves and practically never speak much after that. Little did I know, hours later, we’d be sitting in our living room discovering that our uteruses faced the same direction, that we were both Virgos with moon air signs and water ascendents—basically our entire natal chart was a perfect match—and only nine days apart in age. 

It was only two days into being roommates. I barely knew anything about Leslie except for her natal chart, the direction of her uterus and that she had a UTI. I had just gone through surgery, a lump removed from my breast, a few days prior to moving in. We were both feeling a little betrayed by our bodies. I was fresh out of the shower, only one bandage left to go and having a freak out sitting on my bed in nothing but a towel. I had already come close to fainting while taking off the first layer of bandages, so this was not a fun situation. 

I texted Leslie, asking if she could come look at my boob, following a long stream of “sorry if this is weird” and “TMI but” But she came. She came, calmed me down and looked at my scar, telling me that everything was okay, that it was supposed to look like that and that it wasn’t as dark as I first thought in horrible bathroom lighting.  

The next couple months were filled with trips to the grocery store, late-night Walgreens trips and staying up till 3 a.m. talking. Our conversations could start from what we were eating to our past trauma, who our families were and what we feared most in the world. At this point it was never just the two of us, it was three of us, as roommates, having late night adventures that brought us closer. Like the time we all sat in the hallway of our apartment, and Leslie described her sex life to us and showed us her vibrator. We’ve made every Thursday our walking day to get a coffee. We make it a point to do something together whether we spend an hour together or 10 minutes. Our days were filled with late nights at Marshalls, TJ Maxx, metaphysical shops, and going on drives at 3 a.m. listening to our playlist filled with Disney soundtracks, Florence + The Machine and random songs from different Barbie movies.  

This didn’t really fully solidify as a long-lasting relationship until winter break started. I went over to Leslie’s boyfriend’s apartment to work on homework and watch movies. It went from watching “Atlantis” and “Brother Bear,” to crying on the couch about anything and everything. We realized how much we relied on each other and how similar our brains worked. We joked about how we were now in a codependent friendship. 

I think that night, we finally felt like we could tell each other how we truly felt being in the same environment together. It turned into a thread of stories and issues we both seemed to have with our third roommate, and we sat there trying to figure out how we would address the situation further. I think being there for each other and having something click in the way we live and what really bothered us, was key to trusting each other. 

The three of us started as a magically fit trio that we were surprised fit so well. We insisted it was some form of fate that we got along so well. Crying together, staying up past 2 a.m. talking when we had an early class the next morning, going grocery shopping together, talking about weird bodily functions we wouldn’t share with anyone else. We even spent an entire evening talking about Leslie’s vibrator. We went in a late-night mission to retrieve it from her boyfriend’s apartment, encountered a stray cat and a suspicious biker along the way, only to come back and talk about sex, get a demonstration on all the levels of said vibrator and eat pickle chips until the bag was empty. Sometimes it was small things like trips to buy candy, giving each other the flavors we didn’t like but they loved (always the yellow starburst).

And then just like that, it turned sour over Christmas break. Every word that someone would say felt off, everything said in the past was reevaluated. It no longer felt safe to be who we were with each other. 

It remained different with Leslie, not clouded in misunderstandings. We tell each other everything and feel no discomfort or judgment. She knows if I correct her, I don’t mean it in a condescending way, but as a habit of my analytical brain, and I know if she doesn’t answer my texts, I’m not being annoying, she just sucks at replying. We joke about how we’ve crossed all boundaries, saying “If you can’t see your best friend naked, are you really friends?” 

It is a friendship I find the most comfort in, where I know I am heard, loved and appreciated. I’ve had a lot of people drop me as a friend, telling me terrible things about myself and that I was the problem in our relationship, so I’ve had a hard time trusting someone with all of who I am—the bad and the good. But in my friendship with Leslie, there was an abundance of trust and a lack of tension. 

We were there for each other, even when we both felt scared. Like when we went to get COVID-19 vaccines together and her fear of needles was the first thing on my mind over my own anxieties about the situation. I was there ready to make sure she wouldn’t pass out, and she was ready to make sure I wouldn’t push myself too hard just for her. Sometimes when I get too in my head, late at night, home alone, the first person I think of calling if I were to get injured or attacked by a burglar, is Leslie. I know that if I called her in the dead of night, she would jump in her car to come help me. And I would do the same for her.

Modeled after the New York Times’ Modern Love series, College Love is a column about all kinds of love stories—friendship, romance, flings, family, self-love and anything in between. Interested in telling your story with the help of our editors? Submit your love story at [email protected].