The Friends We Keep

by Holly Chamberlin

  The phone rang, mercifully interrupting these upsetting, revolutionary thoughts. I recognized the number as Sam’s cell.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Eva?”

  “Yes, Sam. Why are you calling?”

  Sam wanted to meet with me. He’d had a tough day at the office. It looked as if heads might roll, one of them being his. “I’m still at my desk,” he said. “Please. I really need to see you.”

  I hesitated. I’d ended things with Sam because of Jake. And now Jake and his unreasonable anger had tossed me into the depths of a bad mood. Too many disquieting thoughts were roiling around in my head.

  “Eva?”

  “Where?” I asked. “And when?”

  Sam and I had a round of rip-roaring sex. There is nothing quite as mind-numbing as rip-roaring sex.

  Afterward, I extricated myself from Sam’s reaching hands and took a cab home. As I settled in the lumpy backseat I felt strangely unhappy, even near tears. This disturbed me. Why should I feel unhappy? Why?

  And why, I wondered, should I be feeling anything at all? In the past weeks, things had gotten messy. People seemed to need things from me—things like conversation and commitment. In the past weeks, I’d found myself thinking far too much about things like trust, and truth, and, God help me, fidelity.

  And everything had started with that first call from Sophie. The call I’d taken by mistake.

  I gave the driver a lousy tip and went straight to bed.

  40

  Dear Answer Lady:

  My husband and I have been having this ongoing argument for the past month. Out of the blue he announced there should be full disclosure between a husband and a wife. I immediately suspected there was something he wanted to get off his chest, like maybe that he’d gotten in trouble at work. So I said, “Of course,” and asked him if he wanted to tell me anything. He said, no, what do you want to tell me? I honestly replied that I had no secrets from him. And he said, “I think that you do.” And since then he’s been on me like a crazy man to “confess” to some crime he thinks I committed. I got so frustrated that last night I demanded to know if he thought I’d had an affair. He gave me this weird look and said, “I don’t know, did you?” Is he cracking up? Should I try to get him to go to therapy? Really, I’m starting to be afraid in my own home. Can you help me?

  Dear Abused Wife:

  I’ll tell you what’s going on here. Your jackass of a husband had an affair and is too cowardly to deal with the guilt like a man (i.e., to keep his mouth shut) or to confess his crime and ask for forgiveness. He figures if he harasses you enough you’ll blurt, “Okay, fine, you think I had an affair, then I had an affair” just to shut him up. Then, he’ll admit to having had his own affair in retaliation for your having had an affair. At which point, you will cry out, “I lied! I didn’t have an affair!” To which he will reply, “But you just said that you did. I’m out of here. Expect divorce papers in the mail.” My advice? Beat the bum to the punch. Serve him divorce papers and claim ongoing emotional and psychological abuse. And when you’re free and clear of the imbecile, give me a call. I know a nice doctor, very successful and newly single.

  JOHN

  Why not? What harm could it do? I wasn’t asking the woman to marry me, just to meet for a drink after work. Catch up a bit more on life since college. See where the conversation would take us.

  Besides, the fridge was empty, I wasn’t due to receive any DVDs from Netflix for a day or two, and the book I was reading—a history of the Spanish Civil War—was boring the life out of me. (Not the topic, the writing.)

  Okay, sure, Eva had twice turned down invitations, once to dinner at my apartment with Sophie (who had come alone), and another time to a small wine-tasting party I co-hosted. But hey, maybe this time . . .

  I punched in the number from the business card she’d given me, expecting to reach an assistant or receptionist. Instead, Eva herself answered.

  “Eva Fitzpatrick.”

  “Oh, hi, Eva, this is John.”

  There was a moment of silence.

  “John Felitti.”

  “I know.”

  All right, I thought. What next?

  “I wasn’t expecting to get right through to you,” I said.

  “My assistant is out sick,” Eva said without a note of sympathy. “Third time this month. It’s getting old.”

  “Does she have something serious?” I asked, as a matter of course.

  “What? I don’t know. Can you get me the new layouts for the Penske account, please? I’ve asked you twice already this morning. I don’t want to have to ask again.”

  More silence.

  “Excuse me?” I asked. I could feel my face strained in an attitude that illustrated the slipping away of my patience.

  “They send me a temp who can’t follow the simplest orders. How do they expect me to work when I’m surrounded by incompetents?”

  Clearly, my silence spoke volumes.

  “What?” Eva demanded.

  “To tell you the truth,” I said, “I’m a little annoyed.”

  “Why?”

  I shook my head. This so-called conversation was a ridiculous waste of my time. “Nothing. Forget it.”

  Eva laughed. “Oh, I get it. Just because you have the time to talk doesn’t mean that I have the time to talk. God, John, you always were so self-focused.”

  “I just think you might be a little more pleasant,” I said with a real effort to remain calm. “Why pick up the phone in the first place if you’re going to be bothered by the interruption? Have your assistant take a message. Or,” I said, remembering the sick assistant and the incompetent (and no doubt frightened) temp, “if she’s not there, let the call go to voice mail.”

  “It could have been someone important,” Eva replied. “The caller ID function isn’t working.”

  Way to squelch a guy’s ego. I said nothing.

  Eva sighed as if dealing with a slow-witted child. “Look, John, I have to go. Oh. By the way, why did you call? Did you need something?”

  “Never mind,” I said. A bit disingenuously I added, “Have a nice day!”

  Eva’s reply was distracted, broken, something like: “Yeah, what? . . . okay . . .”

  I hung up.

  What happened to the person I’d known in college? That person—Eve, not Eva—was unfailingly polite and always had a sympathetic ear. She was the kind of girl who attracted the nerds and socially retarded types with her accepting manner; they trailed behind her like an entourage. I remembered Eve saying on more than one occasion that every person was interesting; you only had to pay attention to find out why.

  There came a knock, followed by Ellen’s appearance in my office. “Why the grumpy face?” she asked immediately.

  “Bad clams.”

  “Don’t want to talk about it, okay.”

  Ellen dropped something on my desk and turned to leave.

  “Ellen,” I said abruptly, “have you ever met someone you haven’t seen in a long time and realized that she’s nothing at all like how you remember her?”

  Ellen perched on the edge of my desk. “Sure,” she said. “Hasn’t everyone?”

  “I suppose. It’s a lousy feeling.”

  “So, what are you saying, your memory distorted the so-called truth about this person?”

  “I wish,” I said. “No, in this case time distorted the so-called truth. This woman is completely different from the way she was in college.”

  “Judging from the scowl on your face, this is not a good thing.”

  A scowl, really? So much for my professional poker face. “Not in my opinion,” I said. “I mean, she drove me nuts then and she drives me nuts now, but then, in college, I liked the way she got under my skin. Today, I just want to run.”

  Or ask her out for a drink.

  “So the big reunion experiment has gone bust.”

  “No, I wouldn’t say that. Not entirely bust. Sophie is pretty much who she was back in colle
ge. Likeable. Big-hearted. It’s just this other one.”

  Ellen raised an eyebrow at me. “Does this other one have a name?”

  “Get this. She changed her name from Eve to Eva. What is that about?”

  “She had an identity crisis?” Ellen suggested. “She wants to leave the past behind? She wants to re-create herself anew? It’s pretty obvious, don’t you think?”

  “I don’t know what to think,” I admitted.

  Ellen got to her feet. “Well, there’s nothing forcing you to be her friend now.”

  But what if I want to be her . . . friend? “Yeah, of course,” I said, and then, “Do you have the file on the Adams’s case?”

  Ellen pointed a long, manicured finger. “I put in on your desk when I came in.”

  “Oh. Right. Thanks, Ellen.”

  Ellen gave me a suspicious look. Rather, a look of suspicion.

  “Stay away from the clams,” she said.

  When she was gone I replied: “Noted.”

  41

  Just as capri pants are not for the overweight and spicy food not for the sensitive of stomach, so truth (the telling or hearing of) is not right for everyone. Honestly identify your strengths and weaknesses before deciding such questions as: Do I really want to know if my husband is cheating on me with my best friend? Or am I better equipped to live in ignorance?

  —The Truth: It’s Not for Everyone

  EVA

  “So, what’s been going on in your life?”

  I shrugged. “Nothing much.”

  Sophie laughed. “Oh, come on, Eva. Something must be going on.”

  “No,” I said. “Nothing.”

  John gave me a look of annoyance. What? Did these people have legal rights to the story of my life?

  And what a story it was. No, under no condition was John to know about my strictly sexual relationship with Sam. I still wished I hadn’t told Sophie; in spite of her protests I knew the information disturbed her.

  And neither of them could ever, ever learn of my affair with Jake. I wasn’t so morally bankrupt that I failed to realize Sophie and John would consider me a rat of a human being.

  The really annoying thing was that a month ago, it wouldn’t have bothered me to learn that someone thought badly of me. But a month ago I hadn’t had friends. And friends, I was realizing (or remembering) were like moral guideposts. They helped to keep you walking the straight and narrow. They might love you even if you did trip off the road (i.e., if you failed), but that very misstep (i.e., failure) would cause enough embarrassment to make you try very hard never again to stumble.

  All of which was a royal pain in the ass. Friends, I realized, were busybodies. Intruders. They weren’t guideposts, they were moral police. And I resented the fact that they made me think badly of myself. If my mood was less than sociable that night, then so be it.

  “Everything,” I said with a careless wave of my hand, “is status quo. I’m sorry if this disappoints you.”

  “Oh. I was hoping that maybe you’d met someone. Maybe gone on a date.”

  Poor Sophie. Always the romantic.

  “Yes,” John said. “I for one was just dying to hear of your romantic exploits.”

  Sophie looked curiously at John.

  “You men,” I observed casually. “All you’re interested in is sex.”

  “I said ‘romance.’ I said nothing about sex.”

  “But it’s what you were thinking,” I replied. Not that thinking about sex was wrong. I, myself, spent a fair amount of time thinking about sex. But I knew that John would never admit to such a preoccupation.

  John smiled to himself, as if finding the patience to address a quarrelsome child.

  “Let me go out on a limb here,” he said. “Men do care about more than just sex. There are exceptions to every rule, of course, but most men want far more than sex out of a relationship.”

  “How would you know?” I challenged. “You’re a ladies’ man, a stud, an eternally eligible bachelor. Obviously, all you care about is getting laid.”

  “I’m afraid,” he said, “that I’m going to have to destroy your negative perception of me. For the past weeks I’ve been dating with the intention—well, let’s say the hope—of meeting someone special. I finally came to the realization that I’m tired of being alone. I think that I would like to get married.”

  “John, that’s wonderful!” Sophie exclaimed. “I think you’ll make a fine husband.”

  “I don’t believe you,” I said. “I think you’re working an angle here. And don’t worry. I’ll figure it out.”

  John sighed and excused himself to the men’s room. I suspected the visit was less about the need to relieve himself and more about the need to get away from me for a moment.

  “Why are you always so hard on him?” Sophie asked when John was out of earshot. She seemed genuinely bothered.

  “I’m not hard on him,” I said. “Well, maybe just a little.”

  “You’re always insulting or contradicting him.”

  “He can take it.”

  “Shh, he’s coming back already.”

  “That’s one good thing about being a man, I suppose. All you have to do is whip it out and stuff it back in.”

  Sophie ignored my comment and smiled as John rejoined us.

  “So,” I said, “how’s the quest for the wifey coming along?”

  “Actually, and please note that I’m man enough to say this, things haven’t been going so well.”

  Sophie pat John’s arm. “Be patient. You can’t force love. You’ll meet someone special, I know you will.”

  And I just know that the new Miss Universe will be successful in her efforts to end world hunger.

  “Show them your financials right at the start,” I said. “You’re bound to convince someone to marry you.”

  John laughed. “I’m going to give you a free pass on that insult,” he said, “because there actually have been a few women who’ve come right out and asked about my portfolio. On the first date, mind you.”

  “That’s horrible,” Sophie said, her hand to her chest. “What did you do?”

  “I told them—nicely, of course—to mind their own business and then I claimed a headache and went home.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding,” I said. “A headache? How . . . feminine.”

  “What do I care what a gold digger thinks of me?”

  “It takes a real man,” Sophie said, “to admit a weakness.”

  “But his weakness,” I pointed out, “his headache, is a lie. Do real men lie?”

  “All men lie,” John replied. “And all women, too. It can’t be helped.”

  Sophie looked troubled. “I don’t lie. At least, I try not to. What a depressing thought, that everyone lies.”

  “I think it makes life interesting.” I shrugged elaborately, at which John scowled. “You never know what’s true and what’s not, what’s been embellished and what’s been left out. The uncertainty can be exhilarating.”

  “Yes,” John said carefully. “But once you realize that someone is an inveterate liar, she—or he—ceases to be regarded as charming and simply becomes a bore.”

  Sophie’s eyes darted between John and me.

  “Are you implying,” I asked calmly, “that I, perhaps, am a liar?”

  John smiled falsely. “I’ve already said that everyone lies. Some are just more experienced at it than others.”

  “I think I need a coffee,” Sophie said.

  John and I each looked to Sophie, whose voice had been unnaturally high. She smiled a bit tremblingly, hopeful, no doubt, that John would stop provoking me.

  “I’ll have one, too,” I said, though I don’t really enjoy coffee after my morning cup. It leaves an unpleasant taste in my mouth, even after brushing. But for a friend, of course I would make the sacrifice. (I don’t much care for sacrifice, either—I know I’ve mentioned this—but at rare times it is useful.)

  John’s expression, which had been hard and tense,
now relaxed into its usual handsome calm.

  “Coffee sounds good,” he said, with a smile for Sophie.

  Sophie gave him a grateful smile in turn. I’m sure she’d thought John and I would come to blows. Really, some people can be so dramatic.

  42

  Dear Answer Lady:

  Recently, my husband brought home a colleague for dinner. From the second he walked through the door, I thought, “Oh, my God, he’s so cute!” We had a very nice evening and since then have socialized a few times with him and his girlfriend. This man has never shown the least bit of interest in me in “that way” and yet I still have a bit of a crush on him. I would never act on it and I feel just terrible about finding a man other than my husband attractive. Should I confess to my husband? Do you think something’s wrong with me? Help!

  Dear Stupid:

  Crushes are normal and almost always passing. Keep your mouth shut. Get yourself a hobby, but stay away from sharp objects. (This means that needlepoint is out.) Someone as dopey as you are might also consider wearing a helmet when you leave the house. Sheesh.

  JOHN

  To hell with Eva. First she was rude on the phone; then she was a pill at dinner with Sophie.

  To hell with her.

  That’s what I was thinking when I decided to ask Jana to join me for dinner. Jana might not be Eva, but at least she wasn’t Eva.

  I’d met Jana months earlier at a party given by another partner in the firm. It was one of those command performance situations but it wasn’t too painful. Stuart’s wife goes all out with the food; her catering bill must be astronomical.

  Anyway, I was introduced to Jana shortly after I arrived. We talked for a while, mostly about work. She told me she was an independent florist with a business supplying corporate accounts. At the end of the conversation she gave me her business card. I didn’t promise to call. As a result I didn’t feel too badly about so much time having passed since the party. Of course, first I had to find her card, which I did, finally, at the back of the top drawer of my desk, stained with ink from a leaky pen.