I truly think that if you don’t have the ‘best friend’ thing figured out in highschool or university and if you’re not an exceptionally out-going, charismatic, ‘magnetic’ kind of person, it’s probably not going to happen. People generally stop seeking out new people, they become more absorbed in their romantic relationships, their lives get busy, and it gets harder and more awkward to try to form new relationships, let alone new close, ‘best friend’ type relationships. I don’t think moving to a city is going to change that experience, although you’re more likely to find people who have also just moved to the city and might be looking to meet new people (though by and large, in my experience, those people are looking to join established friend groups, not become attached to a fellow loner).

I personally have fully accepted my existence as a satellite friend. I feel lucky to know as many people I do who are all happy to see me and treat me warmly when I see them and generally will help me out when I need it. I’m on the hunt for a long term romantic partnership because I truly think that’s the only way people in our situation can get that experience of having someone to be consistently involved in our lives and to actively care about us day to day.

I know my network of non-best friends are also there to help me when I really need help, even if I wouldn’t make it onto their zombie apocalypse team. I’ve pretty solidly decided to swiftly opt out of life if zombies start showing up or when climate change and/or late stage capitalism make life too unpleasant to bear anymore, so I’m not sure what kind of thing could possibly happen that would cause all the partners and best friend units in my social circle to all simultaneously abandon me.

I guess you could try thinking more deeply about where your fear of abandonment comes from. You could work on creating a life for yourself that you like living in and that makes you feel taken care of (even if its just you doing a good job of taking care of yourself). That way, your friendships become not a matter of life and death, but just an enrichment of the good and stable life you already have.

You can also recognize that feeling jealous or sad when you think about being left out of the best-friend game is a natural response. It’s okay to feel that way from time to time and then to conscious go through the process of reminding yourself that you are okay and life is still good and fine even if you’re not anyone‘s first pick socially. We’ve evolved to be social creatures who crave acceptance and love and inclusion because, long ago, not having that meant being ousted from the tribe, which meant death. Just one more example of how our evolution shaped our psychology in a way that is mismatched to modern living conditions.

I’m rambling, but I guess my point is that your situation is probably a lot more common than you think, even if not in your direct friend group, and its an okay reality even if it doesn’t always feel amazing.