“Promise?”

“Yes, Mom.”

After lighting cranberry-scented candles on the kitchen counter and in the living room, I put my iPod on shuffle and position it in its stereo dock. A beat kicks in and I twirl around the kitchen pretending Jim is swinging me as I retrieve wineglasses and a small dish with stem ornaments so people can use the same glass all night. I puree the soup in the food processor, return it to its pot, light a low fire, and sprinkle it with chopped basil. I set the table for the buffet with bowls next to the tomato basil soup.

Every year, after everything is arranged and I’m waiting for my friends to arrive, there’s a sense of agitated eagerness. I’m ready. The house waits for my guests with a potpourri of smells: cookies, soup, cranberry, and roses. The bed waits for the tumble of coats, scarves, and hats. My office has room for many bags inflated with cookies. The tree announces Christmas, gaiety, cheer. Outside, snow floats in thumb-size flakes.

The stage is set.

My friends will arrive one at a time and the nestled quiet will dissipate. Some arrive freshly dressed from home, some straight from work. Some will stop at a store to pick up appetizers or wine. A few will enter with the cookies and wine chilled from a day in the car. But each brings a flurry of expectation and enthusiasm. And ease, for we are ourselves with one another. We’ve known one another too long and have been through too much to maintain reserve or caution. We’ve watched our children grow, relationships dissolve and evolve into new configurations, job promotions and career changes, illnesses and surgeries, wrinkles and spreading tummies and breasts. We’ve dealt with betrayals and fights. Though this year there’s additional tension, and I’m not sure how Jeannie and Rosie will cope.

The shower stops and Charlene rustles in the bathroom, smoothing on body lotion, combing her hair, and then the blow dryer starts humming. She comes out a few minutes later wearing a black outfit and a leopard jacket. “You look great in spite of it.”

“Huh?”

“The bruise on your cheek.”

My hand flies to my face. “Thanks. So do you. In spite of it.”

She tilts her face and presses her lips together … a gesture that acknowledges the incredible in spite of it to which I refer.

I pour her a glass of wine and one for myself. I put a snowman ornament on the base of my glass. We sit on the sofa side by side, our feet propped on the coffee table. “To us,” I say. Disney jumps up beside me and eases his chin on my thigh. I stroke his soft ears.

“To friendship,” she adds. We clink our glasses together and drink.

ALMONDS