Friends Like These(30)

“But, Jonathan, what is— ”

“Maeve, come on,” he pleaded.

I tried not to feel irritated. Jonathan was in a tough spot, caught between two friends. Still, if he knew something, he should be telling me.

“Please, Jonathan.”

He sighed. “Bates told me last week that he thought you weren’t always being yourself with him.”

“What does that mean?” I asked.

“I have no idea. I didn’t ask. The way he said it was just totally— abstract. Like he meant it on some kind of metaphysical level. Which is so Bates. Anyway, I told him he was being an idiot and was going to ruin a good thing.” When Jonathan turned to look at me, his eyes were soft, which made my own start to burn. “Come on, don’t get upset. The good news is that I think he actually heard me this time when I said he was the one with a problem.” Jonathan squeezed my arm. “He’ll come around. And if he doesn’t, then it’s definitely his loss.”

“Thank you, Jonathan,” I said, smiling at him, trying not to panic.

I took a deep breath and tried to collect myself as we reached the door. Okay. This was going to be okay. I eyed the bar window as Keith and Finch led the way inside. The big beefy backs of men were clustered around a dartboard that looked recklessly close to the front door. I could already hear “Sweet Caroline” playing inside. Of course it was.

“I’m sorry about before,” Derrick said from behind me.

“Oh?” I turned around. I had no idea what he was talking about.

“I mean back at the house,” Derrick went on, moving his hands around in his pockets like he was looking for loose change. “I feel like I made you uncomfortable.”

Except we’d barely spoken. But I didn’t want to hurt Derrick’s feelings by seeming oblivious. I knew he had romantic feelings for me— a crush based on some idea of me he had in his head. We’d never spoken about it, but ever since we’d gotten to Jonathan’s house, I’d had the sense that Derrick was finally— after all this time— working up the nerve to say something.

“That’s okay,” I said, looking him in the eye, hoping to head the discussion off at the pass. “Really.”

Derrick looked so genuinely relieved as he held open the door for me that it filled me with dread. He was going to try again. I could tell.

Inside, the smells were just as I had imagined them— beer and damp wood and a dash of cigarette smoke, mixed with the tang of sweat. It smells like men.

Alice had said that to me at our first dorm party freshman year, crinkling her perfect nose as she gripped a big red Solo cup. It smells like men in here. Not that Alice was nearly as delicate as she seemed. Despite her fancy upbringing and her tiny ballerina’s frame, she was surprisingly strong. Watching her rip across the floor in her pink satin toe shoes had always been like watching a spectacular act of violence.

Maybe standing up to her terrifying mother— once a principal dancer with the New York City Ballet— had toughened her. Alice didn’t think her mother was scary, though. She adored her. They were best friends, apparently. But their relationship had always seemed, to me, unnaturally close. Not that I was an expert in such things.

I followed Derrick through the crowd, squeezing past a small dance floor, where two couples were gripping each other and a dozen or so single women were now swaying to “American Pie” as men eyeballed them from the perimeter. Finally we reached a free table against the back wall, where there was a little more breathing room. Derrick and I each grabbed some empty chairs. Jonathan and Stephanie were still some distance behind, fighting their way through to join us. I didn’t see Keith and Finch anywhere, but then even with contacts, my eyesight is poor.

Derrick pressed his lips together and shook his head, staring across the room as he sat down. “Do you ever feel like you have no idea how you got somewhere?”

Oh, no, here he went again. I willed Stephanie and Jonathan to hurry up.

“Everybody feels that way sometimes,” I said casually. “I think they call it being an adult.”

Though, for my part, the honest answer was: No. I did not feel lost or disappointed or confused. I was where I’d always wanted to be. And I’d worked really hard to get here.

Derrick turned and looked at me, smiled. “Yeah. Maybe that’s it.”

I did feel sorry for Derrick. Things for him really hadn’t turned out the way they should have. His first book got some well-deserved attention. But then his second barely made it into bookstores. He finished his third book two years ago, but it was never published at all. I did believe things were turning around for him, though. He’d started work on a new book, and now all he needed was to leave Beth and find the right girl, a doting student perhaps. I’d have told him so if I wasn’t so afraid he might say I was that girl.

“Where did Finch and Keith go?” When I looked around, I clocked an unshaven man watching us. We’d drawn attention when we came in, of course we had— our clothes, our money. And there was nothing good about standing out.

“God only knows where they went,” Derrick said.

Finally, Stephanie and Jonathan were spit out of the crowd, looking put off.

“They don’t serve food here, of any kind,” Stephanie declared when they reached our table. “So if you’re keeping score, we just started off our intervention at a bar, on an empty stomach.”