The Friends We Keep

by Holly Chamberlin

  Brad and I were married the summer after graduation. Eve and John weren’t at the wedding. It was held on an island in the Caribbean—Brad’s parents’ choice—and neither of my friends could afford the price of airfare and accommodations. I was disappointed they couldn’t be there for my “big day,” but at the same time I was so giddy with excitement—the dress, the ring, the reception, the exotic location!—I almost didn’t notice their absence once the festivities began.

  It wasn’t long before I was pregnant. Jacob Michael Holmes was almost nine pounds at birth and delivered by a C-section. Jake was a healthy and a happy baby. I doted on him and so did Brad, to the best of his ability. Brad knew how to do all the right things but he wasn’t, still isn’t, an affectionate man.

  When Jake turned three we relocated to Los Angeles. Brad got an offer he couldn’t refuse—for the sake, of course, of his wife and son—from one of the big studios. Brad’s career flourished and the three of us lived very comfortably. For the first few years I was lonely for my hometown of Boston, but eventually, I adjusted. Twice a year I traveled back East with Jake, and sometimes Brad came along. His parents, who were fairly well-off, came to see us whenever their busy social life allowed, but they never stayed in our home, preferring instead a luxury hotel. My parents, solidly lower-middle class (at the time there was such a thing), did stay with us when they visited, which was usually in February or March, months that are often dreary and depressing in New England.

  Over time our parents traveled less frequently. Age took its inevitable toll on their mobility and their desire to be far from home. When Jake was twelve, his paternal grandfather died. After that, his paternal grandmother went to live with Brad’s older brother, Gary, in a suburb of Chicago; her last trip to LA, with Gary, was for Jake’s college graduation not more than a year ago. She looked terribly frail and, not to be morbid, but I suspect that the next time I see her will be at her funeral. Gary confided that Mrs. Holmes has cancer and that she’d decided not to undergo a long and painful treatment.

  And my parents? Now they divide their time between their modest house in Freeham, Massachusetts, and their modest condo in an over-55 development in New Smyrna Beach, Florida. They seem content and their health is good but for the usual, annoying ailments that come with advancing age.

  Anyway, back to my life in LA. When Jake reached high school, I found myself with time on my hands so on a whim I took a real estate course and got my real estate license. Honestly, the job was always more of a hobby than a career. We didn’t really need my income, but I enjoyed the social aspects of the job, meeting new people and having someplace to be every day. Everyone wants to feel needed.

  And with no close friends, a son who was growing more independent every day, and a husband who spent most of his time with his colleagues, I did need to feel needed. Until, I don’t know, I just sort of lost interest—and quit.

  So where was Eve all this time? Back East—and out of touch. Over the past twenty years or so my friendship with Eve, once so strong, gradually slipped away. There were no bad feelings, simply two lives diverging. I’ve often asked myself why.

  Maybe the answer is that after college our lives took such different paths. My life played out pretty much as I’d wanted it to, but Eve’s did not. For one thing, Eve never married. She’d intended to, and had planned on having two or three children.

  I can’t help but think that Eve’s not marrying and her not having a child alienated her from me, and me from her. Maybe if she’d shown an interest in Jake our friendship might have survived. Eve could have been a sort of aunt to Jake; I would have liked that. But Eve rejected every attempt I made to involve her with my new family. I know she was upset about her parents’ deaths and about having to postpone graduate school indefinitely. Not that she ever admitted to feeling sad or angry or depressed. But she must have been and maybe that was part of the reason she rejected a relationship with Jake . . . and part of the reason she chose to abandon a friendship with me.

  Maybe it doesn’t make much sense but it’s all I can come up with. I’m not sure I’d ever have the nerve to ask Eve why she didn’t want to spend time with Jake and me. I’m not at all confrontational. Maybe, someday, she’ll tell me on her own. Maybe she’ll open up about those years just after her parents died and her life was thrown so wildly off course.

  I hope so.

  4

  Dear Answer Lady:

  A few months ago I met this really great guy. We started dating and have even talked about getting married. My friends think he’s adorable. Anyway, this past weekend we visited his mother’s house (his father is dead). I was coming back from the bathroom when I overheard his aunt and mother saying: “Should we tell her about him?” and “No, he’s different now, everything will be okay.” They shut up when I came into the kitchen. Since then, I’ve been wondering if they were talking about me and if the “he” was my boyfriend and if so, what are they not telling me? Should I confront my boyfriend? What if he’s hiding something awful about his past? Or should I just forget what I heard and go ahead with our relationship, which, as I said, is really great?

  Dear Person-Who-Needs-to-Know-That-Ignorance-Is-Not-Always-Bliss:

  Ordinarily, I advise against the need for full disclosure. Everyone has a right to his or her past. But in this case, I advise you to get to the heart of the matter before you wind up in several bloody pieces strewn throughout the house. This supposedly great boyfriend could, in fact, have a criminal record and be guilty of anything from embezzlement to murder. And be sure to bring reinforcements when you confront this supposedly great boyfriend. A large man armed with a semiautomatic weapon is a wise choice of backup.

  EVA

  Where the hell was my assistant? On the fifth ring I picked up the phone.

  “Eva Fitzpatrick.”

  “Oh. Is this Eve Fitzpatrick?”

  “This is Eva Fitzpatrick. Who is this?”

  “I’m sorry,” the voice said. “I was looking for an old friend from college, someone named Eve Fitzpatrick.”

  “I didn’t catch your name?”

  “Oh, I’m sorry, it’s Sophie Holmes. It used to be Jimenez.”

  I had a strong urge to disconnect the call. I shook off the urge and said, “Sophie, this is Eve. Except that I changed my name to Eva.”

  The voice, the woman, Sophie laughed with relief. “Oh, my gosh, it is you! Hello!”

  I sat heavily in my desk chair. “Well. Hello. It’s been a long time.”

  “I know, too long.”

  “So, why—I mean, where are you living these days?”

  “That’s why I’m calling. I’m back in Boston. Brad and I, well, we’re divorced.”

  I had never much liked Brad. Very full of himself. “Oh,” I said.

  “Yes. Anyway, my son’s in school here now so I thought, why not come back East? Plus, I’d be close to my parents and it would give me an opportunity to look up some old friends.”

  “Yes, well.” Oh, I thought, here we go. I was going to kill my assistant for this. It was easy not to return a call. It wasn’t as easy to reject a person face-to-face, as it were.

  “So,” Sophie went on, “I was wondering, would you, you know, want to get together some time?”

  Why, I thought, can’t people leave the past alone? It was past for a reason—it was over.

  “Eve? I mean, Eva?”

  “Yes,” I said resignedly, “okay. I could meet for a drink.”

  I suggested one of my favorite restaurant bars. If I was going to allow myself to be hauled down memory lane, at least I could be eating oysters while at it.

  5

  If you gain a deserved reputation as a keeper of secrets, your social value will soar. Everyone wants a friend to whom he can spill his ugly guts without fear of those ugly guts being publicly displayed. Plus, you’ll probably get a lot of free meals being such a cherished friend.

  —The Social Value of Keeping Secrets

  JOHN


  My keeper of the gate, my right-hand woman, and, though this might be unusual, my friend, is a woman named Ellen Mara. She’s been with me, with the firm, for almost five years now and I hope she’s with me—wherever I am—for the next fifteen at least. Why Ellen didn’t go to law school I’ll never understand; she’s one of the keenest minds I know. She claims she was too lazy to get her law degree but I’m not buying it.

  Ellen is fifty. I know this because she told me. I hope I’m not breaching professional ethics by saying that she has a great body—what I’ve seen of it, of course. She often wears fitted skirt suits, but tweaks the sophisticated look with one-of-a-kind jewelry she buys at craft shows.

  Ellen’s husband, a guy named Austin who I’ve met on a few occasions, is in finance at one of the major firms in town. They have a small vacation home on a lake somewhere in Maine; they keep the exact location a secret to avoid pop-ins and never invite friends or family to stay with them. Ellen has told me they feel it’s important for a couple to have a place entirely their own. I suppose she’s right but I can’t imagine ever trying to keep my family from barging in on my vacation house when I settle down enough to buy one. They’d track me down like bloodhounds. Besides, the guilt would kill me. In my family, what belongs to one person belongs (potentially) to every person. This is one reason why I chose to live in town rather than in Windhill, where Teri, Chrissy, and my parents all live. Some buffer zone is required if I’m to live any sort of independent life.

  I was on my second cup of coffee, which means it was about ten-thirty, when Ellen buzzed me. (I know “buzzed” is no longer an accurate way to describe this function, but I like it.)

  “John,” Ellen said. “There’s a Sophie Holmes on the phone.”

  The name didn’t register at first. I hear what seems like thousands of names a week, some I recognize, some I don’t. And then the image of a young, laughing woman with long dark hair and half-dorky glasses popped into my head. Could it be?

  “Thanks, Ellen,” I said. “I’ll take it.”

  6

  Dear Answer Lady:

  I work in the produce department at this supermarket. The pay isn’t great but the hours are okay. Besides, I’m studying for my GED and until I get my high school diploma I don’t have much choice as far as jobs go. The thing is, almost everyone I work with in produce takes home fruit and vegetables. I mean, without actually paying for them. Not a lot, like maybe a couple of bananas or a head of lettuce at a time. They’ve been doing it for years. Until last week I refused to join in but then, one of the guys started ribbing me about being a wimp so I took home a bunch of grapes. Nobody found out and since then I’ve taken home more grapes and am thinking about going for a bag of tomatoes next. It’s not hurting anybody, right?

  Dear Thief:

  I’ve heard that you can study for the GED while serving time in prison. Hey, I bet it helps wile away the hours. Are you a religious person? If so you might remember the Commandment that forbids the act of stealing. Unless you have a starving wife and child at home and the grapes (and possibly tomatoes) are their only source of nutrition, stop STEALING from the business that employs you.

  SOPHIE

  John seemed genuinely pleased to hear from me. Eve—Eva—on the other hand, didn’t. But maybe I’d caught her at a bad time.

  Oh, well, I thought, what’s done is done. I was to meet Eve—Eva (that would take some getting used to)—for drinks. John was all booked up until the following week but promised to call then.

  Eva had asked me, well, in fact she’d told me, to meet her at Churchill on Tremont Street across from the Common. This, I read in the paper, was a popular new place with a “power clientele.” With these intimidating words in mind I ventured to my closet. It didn’t take long to realize that I had nothing appropriate to wear.

  Over the years I’d cared less and less about my appearance. I’d let the gray in my hair show through and as for clothes, well, though I wasn’t much heavier than I was in college, I’d taken to wearing clothes meant to deemphasize my figure. Loose tops and flowing skirts were comfortable and easy to care for, but now, about to meet someone I hadn’t seen in almost twenty years they seemed . . . dull.

  I closed the closet door and decided to treat myself to an afternoon of shopping at the Prudential Mall. I wasn’t at all sure what I was looking for but for the first time in years the notion of new clothes seemed exciting. New clothes, a new life, and renewed friendships. What could be bad?

  7

  For the select few, lying is more than just an occasional indulgence. It’s a way of life, constituting both a need and a desire. For such an individual born to live a life of deception—deception of others as well as of the self—it’s important that he believe the words he speaks. If the dedicated liar begins to doubt his own falsehoods, then what peace of mind can he ever know? And isn’t the natural-born liar as deserving of happiness as the truthful man?

  —It’s the Truth If You Believe It, or Life as a Sincere Liar

  EVA

  I was surprised to hear from Sophie Holmes. The last time I saw her was when her son, Jake, was a toddler, just before Sophie moved to the West Coast so that Brad could take an important job he’d been offered by one of the big studios. Her parents threw “the kids” a going-away party, and though it meant I had to take a night off my job as a waitress—one of several jobs I was working at to support my sister and me—I went.

  I didn’t have much to say to Sophie by then; our lives had taken such incredibly different directions. I vaguely remember us hugging awkwardly when I left to catch a train back into the city. I don’t remember Jake at all; maybe he was asleep somewhere. I do remember John sailing in with his latest girlfriend in tow; I’m not sure we said more than a word that evening. John had finished law school, Sophie was married and a mother. I was the only one not doing what I thought I would be doing at the age of twenty-four.

  For a while after Sophie moved to the West Coast we sent each other birthday and Christmas cards. Sometimes they included dashed-off notes about what was going on in our lives; Sophie often included wallet-sized department-store portraits or school photos of Jake. I have no idea where those photos are now. I suspect I tossed them at some point, probably after the cards stopped coming—or I stopped sending them. Who forgot a birthday first? Who was too exhausted from holiday shopping to send a Christmas card? I couldn’t remember.

  I also couldn’t remember much about our friendship during the four years of college. This wasn’t terribly surprising. I learned early on, right after my parents’ untimely deaths, that dwelling on the past is simply unproductive. And every moment of life should be productive. If the past has to be let go in order to ensure the future, then so be it. Repression or willed forgetfulness can be powerful tools on the road to success. Recovered memory? Not for me. What I’ve forgotten I believe I’ve forgotten for a very good reason: it was inconsequential.

  And yet, I found myself willing to meet Sophie for a drink. I wouldn’t commit to dinner; I wasn’t prepared to spend an entire evening with her. But I was willing to see how things would go, maybe out of simple curiosity. How had Sophie fared since I’d last seen her? Did she look older than her forty-two years, or younger? And how would I compare?

  Stranger still, I found myself wondering if whatever it was that had drawn us together in college, whatever it was that had made us friends, would be there again, after all this time.

  And if it was there, I wondered if I would care.

  8

  Dear Answer Lady:

  My wife just dyed her hair a shade of red I find repulsive. Should I tell her that every time she walks into a room I want to vomit?

  Dear Incredibly Stupid Husband:

  Keep your incredibly stupid mouth shut.

  JOHN

  I’d been thinking a lot about my personal relationships, even before Sophie’s call. And I’d come to the realization that other than my father and brothers-in-law, I didn’t have any male frie
nds—and I wasn’t sure I could properly call family members friends. Sure, there were a few colleagues with whom I occasionally had a drink or caught a ball game when someone scored free tickets. And although I work out almost every day at a local gym, I avoid getting into locker room conversations. I’m there to do a job—keep my body in some semblance of order—and once the job is done for the day, I’m gone.

  Maybe, I thought, having no guy friends wasn’t a problem.

  There is one guy at my office who deserves a mention in this context. His name is Gene Patton. He’s thirty-three and a rat of a guy, a real sleaze. He regularly cheats on his doting, stay-at-home wife, a sweet woman named Marie. I met her at last year’s company Christmas party, at which Gene completely ignored her, compelling me to spend an entire half hour chatting with her. She’s not a great conversationalist but short of dragging her bum of a husband to her side by his ear, I wasn’t going to let her stand there all alone in her not-so-fine finery, looking like a scared rabbit.

  I meet so many women in the course of my work who’ve wound up with such disgusting specimens of my sex and always I ask myself: How and why did this happen? There are all sorts of answers, of course, from the economic to the personal, from social strictures to family pressures. But even when I learn the specifics of a particular story I’m still left wondering. I still feel unsettled.