when i open my mouth you can see 25 cavities

i'll never forget what he said to me after our saturday meeting. we had just all presented our projects and i'd gone home for lunch. he then texted me and i called him back to tell him how much i enjoyed seeing his project. then i told him it was first time i'd done such a thing and how strange my presentation was. in turn, he said, "there were definitely ones much worse than yours." i didn't take it as an insult, perhaps it was even beyond a compliment. in many in ways, i was untouchable to him. but all those ties that we hid behind cleared the way for the type of honesty usually only shared between the closest of friends.