After leaving his office ten minutes later, I walked back to mine in a daze. The plan we had concocted was that I had a year. A year to keep doing what I was doing, but also to figure out what I wanted to be doing. To start writing. To experiment. And if I hadn’t figured it out at the end of that year—well, we would cross that bridge if and when we came to it. Martin was confident I would be back in his office in well under a year to tell him I had found my passion project. “And if it doesn’t pay the bills immediately,” he grinned, “I get the feeling you’re not exactly using a hundred percent of your brain writing press releases. You can moonlight.”
I was terrified. But maybe, just maybe, I hadn’t lost everything after all.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
I waited until lunchtime to go back to Caryn. I didn’t doubt that she was busy, but at least now, with my future at the foundation safe, I could offer to help lighten that load somewhat.
“You’re still here then?” she asked coolly when I came back to her office. She had a green smoothie with a straw in it on her desk, which I assumed was her lunch. Ever skinny, she looked positively gaunt now, which I knew was the product of hard work for her wedding, not my betrayal.
“I am. Can I sit?”
She glanced up at her clock. “I’ll give you five minutes.”
“I’m sorry.”
She looked at me blankly. “Great. Are you done?”
I looked back at her, the fringe of the Kewpie-doll eyelashes that she made me get dancing at the top of my vision. For a moment, I debated letting this one go. Caryn hadn’t been much of a friend this year, had she? I mean, it was ridiculous that I’d had to change my hair, my lashes, and my body shape for the sake of her pictures. Not to mention, I had spent more money on her wedding than the others combined, between the minimizing bra, Spanx, dress, shoes, eyelashes, keratin hair treatment, and the horror show of her shower and bachelorette party, and she showed no sign of even knowing that was a hardship for me.
And I didn’t know how to make her understand that I was happier just being who I was, metaphorical warts and all, because Caryn’s whole life was an exercise in image.
I pictured my someday wedding, ignoring the fact that the groom now looked like Alex instead of a faceless mannequin in a tuxedo. Who did I see there with me? Megan, Amy, Sharon, Becca, and Caryn, of course. Did I care that they were a mismatched bunch? Absolutely not. Did I even care if they wore matching dresses? Not in the slightest. But that didn’t mean I was right and Caryn was wrong, nor did it mean that Caryn was right and I was wrong. We just wanted different things.
“No,” I said. “I handled this badly.”
“That’s an understatement.”
“I should have said no earlier in the process.”
“No to what?” Caryn’s voice was defensive.
“To the things that made me feel like the blog was an appropriate response.” She started to cut me off, but I continued. “It wasn’t an appropriate response. The appropriate response would have been to say no when we went past my comfort level. I don’t want to wear a minimizing bra, or lose weight, or wear these things on my eyelashes, or have this blonde, straight hair.”
Caryn narrowed her eyes. “That’s the worst apology I’ve ever heard.”
“I don’t mean I should have said I wouldn’t do them. I mean I should have said I couldn’t be in your wedding.”
She rubbed her forehead angrily. “What are you trying to do to me right now? It’s too late to find someone who will fit into your dress, and my pictures will look off-balance if I don’t have an even number of bridesmaids and groomsmen.”
“I don’t mean right now. I’ll do whatever you want right now. I mean earlier, when there was time to figure it out. Caryn, I spent over three thousand dollars on your wedding alone, and I’m in four others. I don’t have that kind of money.”
“That’s just what weddings cost.”
“It’s not, actually. I mean, it might be for some people, but it isn’t in my world. And I should have told you I was in over my head before it got to the point where I started resenting you.”
Her lips had tightened into an almost invisible line, but she didn’t say anything, so I kept going.
“Look, I love you. I do. And I took the passive-aggressive route here, which was me being a horrible person and an even worse friend. And for that, I am very sorry. I’m even more sorry that I repeated things you said in confidence about the other bridesmaids, because that was worse than anything I said about you in the blog. I understand if you want nothing to do with me anymore for that. And like I said, I’ll do whatever you want me to about the wedding. If you want me there, I’ll be there in my minimizing bra, and I’ll wear my makeup however you tell me, and I’ll smile for pictures and keep my mouth shut. If you want me nowhere near it, I’ll respect that too.” I stopped talking.