I put down the Ben & Jerry’s and turned to give Bridget my best sincere look. “Okay, since we’re having a back-to-our-youth moment”—I put my hand over my heart—“as your token gay friend, it is my duty to say that you are a fierce, sickening, incredible woman and that when you find a man who deserves you, he’ll make you feel like a princess every day of your life in a way that somehow manages to avoid reinforcing problematic gender stereotypes. And if it turns out that Tom isn’t that guy, then that’s his loss, not yours. And you should have the wedding anyway just to celebrate how awesome you are.”
Bridget leaned across the sofa and hugged me. Since she hadn’t put down her ice cream, it was a mixed experience that I was pretty sure got H?agen-Dazs in my hair, but it was good to know I’d done friending right. “Thanks, Luc,” she said. And then, in a slightly smaller voice added, “Would you be okay to stay, if I can’t get in touch with Tom?”
“Of course. Oliver’ll understand.” He wouldn’t like understanding, but he’d understand.
Swivelling around, she lay down with her head on my lap. “I’m honestly sure you two are going to make it.”
“Even though I have terrible taste in men?”
“Because you have terrible taste in men. You spent so long refusing to go out with Oliver that he’s bound to be right for you.”
I wasn’t totally sure that tracked, but it was a comforting thought.
“Fine,” I conceded, “but in that case you have to accept that my letting Tom get away proves he’s a good guy too.” I paused. “Unless he isn’t, of course.”
Bridge managed half a laugh. “We’ll see. I don’t want to think about it anymore tonight.”
So we didn’t. We queued up Muriel’s Wedding into 27 Dresses and let ourselves stop thinking about anything at all.
In the break between movies, I slipped into the hall to ring Oliver and tell him the situation.
“I’m really sorry,” I said. “I don’t think I’m going to make it home tonight. Things are looking bad so I should probably stay with Bridge.”
Once more, I could hear Oliver breathing in that I-will-be-calm way that I hated. “Of course. I… That is, if you think it’s… Are you sure you’re helping?”
“What do you mean, am I sure I’m helping?” This wasn’t the tack I’d expected him to take.
“Just that, well, sometimes it’s best to let people stand on their own two feet.”
I got that I’d let him down. And I got that he was trying to be reasonable. But this was becoming the kind of reasonable that was worse than angry. “She thinks her fiancé might be cheating on her.
This isn’t an own-feet situation.”
“And you’re going to drop everything and run to her every time she and Tom are in trouble?”
“Yes. Because she’s my best friend and she’s always supported me and I’ll always support her.”
“There’s supporting”—Oliver’s tone was getting more restrained and less warm by the moment—“and there’s being codependent.”
“It’s not codependent to be there for your friends.”
“I just meant—”
“You just meant that you’re cross with me for bailing on you, which is fine. But you’re taking it out on Bridge, which is not. And also you’re doing it in a way that makes you sound weirdly like your dad.”
“I do not sound like my father. He’s never used the word ‘codependent’ in his life. He’d think it was psychobabble nonsense.”
This was beginning to feel nastily like a hole, and I should have stopped digging. “You know what I mean. All that ‘Let people stand on their own feet, stop mollycoddling’ stuff is pure David Blackwood.”
“I also never said ‘mollycoddling.’”
It was true. He hadn’t. And maybe I was just projecting. After I’d told the Blackwoods to go fuck themselves two years ago, we’d barely spoken, but occasionally Oliver would need to go do a family thing and then he’d come back and spend a couple of days being distant and irritable before we could get back to normal. “All right, perhaps that was unfair. But our mutual friend is really going through something right now, and you know being with her is the right thing to do. I’m sorry I let you down. I’m sorry I spoiled our evening, but I had to make a choice and I’m choosing to be a good friend instead of a good boyfriend.”