The Christmas Orphans Club(60)
The minute we opened the door we were assaulted by a blast of air-conditioning and the scent of stale beer. Michelle, our favorite bartender, looked up from where she was mixing a screwdriver for the lone patron at the end of the bar and said, “Oh hey, girlie! Long time no see. Where’s your other half?”
She meant Finn. I hadn’t been there since our fight. I gave her a shrug and hoped David interpreted her comment as referring to a nonexistent ex-boyfriend, not a very real ex–best friend.
It was inevitable that David would hear bits and pieces about Finn, him being so omnipresent in my memories, but I hadn’t exactly been forthright about our fight. I’d only started going number two at David’s apartment the previous week; it felt too soon to tell him I wasn’t speaking to my best friend. I feared it would make me look like an unfeeling monster.
I led David to one of the tall wooden booths and slid into one side of the banquette. When he settled into his side, he eyed me warily across the booth. “Should we go somewhere else? Schiller’s is right around here, isn’t it?”
“No!” I was crestfallen he’d written this place off. But I got it: Lucky’s didn’t look like much on the surface. The walls were plastered with signed headshots of famous patrons—exactly zero of whom we recognized; Finn was convinced it was a prank and they were photos of the owner’s friends—and the tables had a sticky patina that had become permanent. In the four months we’d been dating David had taken me on a tour of his personal landmarks in the city. Eating and drinking our way through “his spots.” This was the only place in the city I had the audacity to claim as mine. “This is our spot. Let’s at least have one drink.”
“Our spot?” he asked, confused, thinking I meant me and him.
“Me and Finn’s spot. We started coming here right after we moved to the city.”
“Ah, the infamous Finn,” he mused. “I feel like he’s your imaginary friend. When am I finally going to meet him?”
“Well . . . ,” I stumbled, wondering about the ethics of inventing a glamorous job abroad for Finn. Maybe he was in Barcelona, or better yet, Shanghai, where the time difference made FaceTiming difficult. But in the end, I opted for the truth. I didn’t want to lie to David. “We’re not exactly speaking right now.”
He drew his head back in shock, eyes wide, before he could school his expression into one of mild curiosity. “Why’s that?” he asked finally.
“What’s my girlie having today?” Michelle interrupted.
“Can you tell me what beers you have on draft?” I asked, grateful to draw out the distraction even though I knew I was getting a frozen margarita. The only good part about Finn not being there was that he couldn’t roll his eyes at my order and speculate about the last time they washed the margarita machine.
As Michelle ticked off the draft options, my shoulders inched down from my ears. When she left with our orders, I changed the subject to David’s softball league, giving him an opening to rattle off statistics about his teammates’ batting averages.
It feels inconceivable that Finn, my most important person, has never met David. Since then, information about Finn has been meted out in small doses. One Sunday in September, over bagels at David’s apartment, a crossword clue caused a chink in my armor. “What’s a nine-letter word for ‘Phantom’s love interest’?”
“Christine,” I answered without looking up from the book on my iPad, Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine.
“How did you know that?”
“Finn played Raoul in a production of Phantom our sophomore year. He wanted to play the Phantom, but he didn’t get it.” I went on to tell him about the costumes we wore on our first Christmas and the winter break of adventures that followed.
“I know you miss Finn, but you and I could go on adventures, you know?” he said shyly. It was sweet, so I kept it to myself that the Finn-sized hole in my heart was not one in want of filling. My love for David occupied a separate but equally important compartment, but they weren’t interchangeable, as much as some days I wished they were.
“I’d love that,” I told David, because it was still a sweet offer.
And David excelled at planning adventures. He sent me event listings from Time Out and write-ups of secret dumpling kiosks hidden in shopping malls in Queens with notes that said: This weekend? We went to Storm King and the Met Cloisters and a secret bar hidden behind a telephone booth in a hot dog restaurant. The adventures were a good distraction from missing Finn. So were the early days of falling in love.
* * *
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?After David leaves for Christmas Day at his parents’ house, I spend the morning scrolling Instagram in his bed, trying to distract myself from my anxiety over seeing Finn for the first time in a year. I show up at 2:05, as casually late as I can stand, to the address on Canal Street Priya gave us. She’s already here, dressed in a plum-colored coat that stands out against the gray stucco building behind her. The nondescript building gives zero clues about what she has planned for today.
When I’m in arm’s reach, she pulls me into a hug and squeezes me for a solid thirty seconds, even though we saw each other yesterday morning before I left for David’s and her for Ben’s. “Merry Christmas!” she squeals directly in my ear. Her excitement verges on manic, like if she’s done a good enough job planning, she might be able to repair the rift in our friend group, and I desperately hope she’s right.