BooksBarbecue
Back When We Were Friends
Chapters (52)
  1. Cover
  2. Praise
  3. Dedication
  4. About the Author
  5. 31
  6. 14
  7. 31
  8. 14
  9. 31
  10. 14
  11. 31
  12. 14
  13. 31
  14. 15
  15. 31
  16. 16
  17. 32
  18. 16
  19. 32
  20. 17
  21. 32
  22. 17
  23. 32
  24. 17
  25. 32
  26. 17
  27. 32
  28. 18
  29. 32
  30. 18
  31. 32
  32. 18
  33. 32
  34. 18
  35. 32
  36. 18
  37. 32
  38. 18
  39. 32
  40. 18
  41. 32
  42. 18
  43. 32
  44. 18
  45. 32
  46. 32
  47. 33
  48. 33
  49. 33
  50. Acknowledgments
  51. Discussion Questions
  52. Booklist

The air softened, and I did too. We finished off a bottle of wine and started reminiscing about some of the private school girls we’d encountered at sixth-form college. The ones who turned up at the same parties as us—groomed like King Charles spaniels and telling us how working-class they actually were because their grandma had been an air stewardess in the fifties. “Sorry,” I said, as I ate the last Quorn cocktail sausage. “About the stripping thing. I didn’t mean to get so high-horsey.”

Jessica waved her hand up in the air. “No, I’m sorry. You’re always smarter than me about these things. And, look where taking Brendan to one got me. Maybe you’re right. Anyway, music, I need music. I want to dance like Tabitha is watching.” She found our vinyl collection, pulled out Tapestry, and demanded I put it on. We started dancing around to “I Feel The Earth Move,” the sort of dancing where you openly try to outdo the other in how bananas you look. We screamed along, grabbing one another’s hands and twirling and twirling.

“SHE JUST GETS WOMEN,” Jessica said. “SHE GETS THEM SO WELL.”

By the time, “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?” came on, we were floppy and practically nonresponsive on my sofa, our arms reaching down to our empty glasses, eyes fluttering shut. My flat was a tip. It stank of cocktail sausages, hummus with an orange glaze, the sweet stench of alcohol drying onto the sides of glasses. I drifted off, my head on a cushion, my limbs entwined with my old friend’s. I thought she was asleep, but...

“This song is the most true song that’s ever been written,” Jessica half whispered.

I hmmed and took in the lyrics again—about a night of lovemaking. The sort of vulnerable, soulful sex men were occasionally able to give you. The urgency in their eyes. The worship. How much they needed you. How moments like that were everything we anticipated, everything we worked toward, everything we strove for, and the sweet bliss of what it felt like when it had finally been reached. The ecstasy...

“I feel like that every time I’ve ever slept with a man,” Jessica told the dark.

Just as she said it, Carole King asked if he would still love her tomorrow.

The question. The question you’re never allowed to ask. Even though it plagues your head so rampantly that it’s hard to stay in moments where things are good.

“Really?” I asked. Shocked, but too sleepy to sit up. “I wouldn’t have known.”

“Does that make me, like, a pathetic person?” There was a wisp of tears in her voice—a childlike question, wanting a reassuring answer.

“No,” I said, in total honesty. “It makes you a woman.”

She reached out and squeezed my hand, and I squeezed it back.

16

october 2002