This is my second story here. The first one is here :
Julia and I went back almost 20 years. We’d been friends on and off since I was 16. We first met when she visited the UK on a school exchange, and she was staying with one of my classmates. Over the years we chatted, exchanged Christmas and bday cards, and followed each others lives on social media, but we hadn’t seen each other for 7 or 8 years at this time. She was there to listen when things went south with my ex, and the separation started. The summer after it all happened, my boss asked me to go on a 6 week work placement to Julia’s city. I jumped at the chance to get away, as the separation was still raw, and I was missing my son.