Me and my imaginary friends

Three: where is he from?

I woke up later than I usual do because today was Saturday and I didn't have to work. I know there are more important things I could spend my Saturday doing but I decided it was the best use of my time to figure out who this Toby guy was. I pulled up Google on my laptop, typed in 'Nerville from Annoying Orange' and began my search.

By lunch time I had found out alot of information, but none which I found useful. frustrated and hungry I decided to take a break.

After lunch I calmed myself down and recounted what I had learned. his name is Toby Turner, he plays Nerville on Annoying Orange, he has three youtube channels and a wide fan base, he came out with an IOS game last year, and he lives in LA an grew Niceville, Florida. Still I hadn't found where I knew him from.

I kept digging until it the sky turned a pink color as the sun set. The only new thing I had found was he was in the movie Smiley with Shane Dawson.

Smiley was one of my favorite horror movies so I thought this was the answer I was looking for. it wasn't I just knew in the back of my mind I remembered him from somewhere else. I didn't want to search anymore but I knew I had to other I wouldn't let myself sleep.

I closed my laptop and began to think.

Suddenly something clicked in my mind and I walked over to my closet. I opened it and pulled out a dusty box from the top shelf. scribbled on the from when I moved to this apartment was 'childhood memories'. Could it be that I knew Toby from when we were kids? it seemed unlikely but not impossible. I had learned that Toby grew up in Niceville which wasn't far from Destin where I grew up. Also my grandma lived in Niceville so it was possible that Toby was a childhood friend. something didn't add up though I remember almost all of my childhood friends, so why don't i remember Toby?

I opened the box an began to dig through the contents. the box was filled with little kid books, a file folder full of drawing I drew when I was a kid, a few dolls an stuffed animals, my first flute from when I was nine, a smaller box full of birthday cards, another smaller box filled with pictures and four scrapbooks.

I was too tired and didn't want to look through all of this but something kept telling me I had to.

I started with the birthday cards looking at who each one was from, But not one was signed from Toby.

next I began looking through the drawings remembering I frequently drew my friends as a kid. There was pictures of zebras and lions and pictures of two little girls, and bunnies, but It wasn't until I got to the end of the file folder that pictures of colorful scribbles resembled a little boy that looked alot like the man I saw yesterday.

The pictures were of a boy who had a green shirt on and messy brown hair. In one picture his eyes were green, in another they were hazel. In some pictures we was alone, and in others he was playing with a little girl I knew was me.

Now I was intrigued and began to search for more evidence that i knew toby from my childhood. I looked through the box of pictures and but found no little boy that looked like Toby. Then I searched through three of the scrapbooks with still no luck.

When I finally came to the last scrapbook I was about to give up hope.

The last scrapbook was titled 'me and my best friends.' it was a long shot but I knew if I was ever going to find answers it had to be in this book.

I opened it and looked at the first picture and was already confused. it was a picture of me standing in front of my old bookshelf holding out my hands palms up. The caption underneath the picture read

Me with Candy and Mindy, the tiny sisters.

That is when I realized Candy and Mindy weren't real, but they were something my child self had made up, that I had imagined. I looked at the picture and the caption on the next page, supposedly I was snuggling a bunch of imagined bunnies. I flipped the page where I was picture playing with a zebra named Dan and a lion named Phil. I smiled this book was a compilation of all o my imaginary friends. All the childhood memories came flying back to me. Finally I turned the to the last two pages. it was a double page spread of little girl me posing with the air next to me. The caption read,

photo shoot with Toby <3

I stared at the pictures for a long time. This was the answer I was looking for but it shocked me. Toby Turner was in fact a best friend from my childhood but the only problem was, he wasn't real.

The annoying thoughts of Toby had ceased, but they were replaced with the new thoughts of 'how could it be?'

The Toby I had met yesterday was real, living and breathing. How could it be that my imaginary friend from my childhood was real?