I think that Chelsea picked me because she knew that I was willing and malleable, a brown clay girl sprouted from ragged roots thirsting for water, my Otherness as imposing and pervasive as a beached-whale rotting beneath the tug of an occasional wave. In those days, I was always picking at my cuticles like they were flecks of gold. I think that we all have that one friendship that defines the confusion of girlhood. The…