Hi, this is NPR's life kit, I'm Julia Phirland.

The beginning of a friendship can feel very much like the beginning of a rom-com.

You know how it goes, like a woman sitting at her desk and she's got a shiny new job right

out of college, she's just minding her own business, then another woman gets hired and

boom, it's like a little friendship montage.

You know, she asked me to go to lunch, we, you know, meet up on the weekends, we go for

happy hour, and at first I didn't really realize she was trying to make a real friendship,

but she was.

That's Adriana Aero.

We talked to her recently about the moment she realized she'd made her first real best

friend as an adult.

We, we were going to get together for dinner and we both were living in the suburbs of San

Francisco at the time and nobody really wanted to come as far south as my suburb and she

was like, oh no, you like that restaurant, I'll come down and I was like, really?

You're going to come all the way down here and visit me?

And she was like, yeah, no problem, I'll just get in the car.

I was like, oh.

For the next few years Adriana and her friend were the portrait of BFFs.

They were texting all day, they were talking on the phone for hours.

They kept it up as they started new jobs and their lives changed around them.

Adriana was even the maid of honor in her friend's wedding.

But then, you know, things shifted.

...