I don't need Mark Darcy

Back in February, my best friends and I went to see the new Bridget Jones movie. We walked to the local cinema, a tiny building that smelt vaguely of damp and stale popcorn and had the smallest doorways and uncomfortable seats.

We waited for the film to start, already in fits of nervous giggles when one of us dropped her sweets on the floor. I’ve always loved Bridget Jones, and I was prepared to be wrecked.

During my year abroad, if I ever felt sad or homesick, I would watch one of the movies, smiling at Christmas scenes from my bedroom in Porto in mid-July. Walking into this final film knowing beloved Mark Darcy was gone made me nervous.

I had already warned my friends I would cry, and cry I did. In fact, I think we all did, exchanging startled glances as our tears shone in the light of the cinema screen, surprised by just how much we felt it. We were coming out of a rough couple of months together, and this film was both cathartic and heartbreaking, and there was something sacred in the shared tears under the comfort of the low light.

it wouldn’t be fig jam without a shuffles collage

We left the cinema in a stunned silence, tears drying cold in the winter air, and crossed the road to the pub. We sat outside in the garden, glowing and warm under the heater, and healing by the second from the emotional outpouring, skin warm from the lamp and the laughter we shared.

I absolutely love the romance in the Bridget Jones movies, and am minorly obsessed with Mark Darcy. While his storyline is heartbreaking and did mildly devastate me, Bridget’s friendships made my heart feel so full as I left the cinema with my own. Watching their little group still together, 24 years on from the original, made me wonder where my best friends and I will be in 24 years.

If I get my way, I’ll be at their side still laughing at their jokes and hanging on their every word.

Like I said, it’s been a rough couple of months, and the fog is only now clearing. And I can say with full honesty that I wouldn’t have made it through without them.

Without our angry venting in the kitchen and our pyjama-clad hugs or our rounds of tea and cooking meals together. Without our kitchen TV time and shared custody of the grater and laughing at the slippers I bought one of them for secret santa.

My friendships are the most sacred thing in my life and I’m so grateful for the people I share myself with and who I have the pleasure of knowing. I’m so lucky they show themselves to me so earnestly and our love is so unconditional.

It’s taken me 22 years to really solidify these friendships. They formed years ago, but they’re blossoming now. And let me tell you, it was worth the wait.

I love the way that Bridget and her friends accept each other in whatever form they come in, whether it’s piss drunk, cramped into a tiny car, or in grief. They show up for each other, and they sit in it together. It’s a kind of quiet acceptance that I’ve always yearned for, and I think I really, truly, am lucky enough to have it.

I’m writing this during the last time I’ll visit home before I move back here after university, and my heart breaks a little when I think about it too much. There is so much magic in the mundane of living with your friends, in the laughing over our chaotic food shops (I’m talking about a family pack of plums for four days) and our magic ability to lose things in our own bedrooms. The daily ladybird updates on the guests we have in our flat and the constant awe over how much hair we shed on the carpet.

If you’ve been around here for long enough, you might remember one of my old posts. I talked about the difficult of female friendship and how hard it is to navigate. If only I knew the way things would change.

I wish I could go back and talk to myself from 8 months ago. Granted, her eyes would fall out of her head if she heard half of the stuff we’ll go through to get here, but she’ll sleep better at night knowing the peace that waits for her. The ease she’ll feel in this friendship. The security and the peace and love that will only ever have her questioning when she’ll next be able to talk to them, and never whether they love her.

I wish there were more films about these friendships instead of romance stories that always leave a little more to be desired. Because it’s safe to say that I don’t have much of a Mark Darcy on the horizon (contrary to my greatest fantasies), but I do have my very own Tom, Shazza, and Jude in the form of my two best friends.

I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m about to graduate with no prospects. No love life. It’s a bit of a mess, but a mess I’ll gladly be in with my friends. None of us have much of a plan, actually, aside from the fact that we’ll be honorary aunts to each others’s children one day. And maybe, for the first time in my life, not having a plan will be okay. I can try and fail and try again. I can screw things up and make a mess of it all and break down in tears and laugh again.

It isn’t perfect

But it might be

And while I couldn’t listen to Olivia Dean for weeks after the movie for fear of spontaneous sobbing, I now listen to her with the knowledge that these are the years people write movies about. Living my life and making a mess with my favourite people in the world.

And I know that after the hardest academic year, a bucketload of drama, a graduation that will feel like a goodbye and a hello all in one, listening to Olivia Dean live in the sunshine with my two best friends in just a few months will make every tear worthwhile.

my people. for as long as they’ll have me

Now that I’ve sufficiently gushed about them, I suppose it’s time I address them directly:

To my best friends in the world 🦋

I LOVE YOU. A whole bunch. Like a lot. So much that I could cry when I think about it because little Frey dreamed of having friends like you. I love that I can tell you anything I’m thinking, even the silly times when I know I’m being ridiculous but you’ll listen anyway. I love how much I love you and I love that I can feel you love me back.

I can’t wait to grow up with you both and watch you blossom. I’ll support your every endeavour, even if it’s blue soup (or bloup, perhaps. I know you’ll appreciate that)

As Rachel Green once said, “I’ve got my girls.”