Introducing Number One

First, a little explanation:  in order to give people I care about some semblance of privacy, I am going to be referring to the women who have been part of my life with numbers rather than names.  I think using fake names would be a form of dishonesty, so numbers are the solution.

To fully understand the story of me and Number One, we must travel back to childhood.  Back to when the world was new to us, making friends was easy, and time had very little meaning.  I was the new kid in school, and Number One was one of my first friends.  As I remember it, we spent time together almost constantly, as childhood friends should.  Eventually, Number One moved away.  I was a little sad at first, but since I was young, that sadness faded as I was distracted by other things.  Now and again, she came back into my life.  It was often just a brief meeting, but I treasured the time we had together.  This pattern continued into our high school years and beyond, Number One always showing up in wonderfully unexpected ways every few years.
Sometime during high school was when things started to get a little difficult for me.  In her absence, I formed some sort of idealized picture of Number One in my head.  I ended up falling in love with this image of a girl I no longer really knew.  These sort of thoughts weren't helped by hearing rumors that Number One had some sort of drug addiction.  The way my heart was set, I couldn't help but believe these things and assume the worst.  I didn't do this out of pessimism, but out of caring.  I've found that love sometimes has a strange ability to shut out reason, and give full control to the emotional side of the brain.  Maybe that's just how I operate, but that was the situation I was in.
This continued for some time until I happened upon Number One in another wonderful coincidence.  We spent some time catching up and established contact which we still keep alive today, through the magic of the internet.
It's a very difficult thing to express in words, but I feel that there is a deep, personal connection between Number One and I.  I wouldn't call it love, exactly, but it's something extremely close to it.  It's something that I've never experienced with anyone else in my life, even my own family.  I feel as if I could tell her the worst thing about me, and she'd somehow find a way to make me feel better about it.
Just recently, I told Number One all about these feelings I'd kept hidden for all those years.  I was very worried about how she would respond, but she let me know she understood, and it was okay.  This was what I needed to hear, and it helped me to deal with those feelings, and move on with things.  There is still a very large part of my heart that belongs to Number One.  A small part of me is still stuck in the past, not willing to move on, but the rest of me knows that I need to let go at some point.  It's complicated, I guess, but I get by. For those of you who have your own Number One, treasure that person, whoever they are.  For those of you who don't, I'm sure there's one out there, and you'll eventually find each other.
Whenever I hear this song, I think of Number One:   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZGHTkmhxgQ