Lost Along the Way (16 page)

“I never said that. Not once,” Meg said.

“You didn't have to. You never said otherwise, either.”

“Still waiting on that apology,” Cara said.

“What do you want me to say? Okay, Cara. I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I said you'd have looked better in a different style dress. Shoot me for disagreeing with your fashion sense. But you owe me an apology, too.”

“For what? I didn't do anything!”

“There was a time when we did everything together. Not a single day went by where we didn't talk multiple times a day, and then all of a sudden, you were too busy for me. You don't think you owe me an apology for that?”

“It's called growing up, Jane. Grown women don't sit around and gossip all day on e-mail. I'm sorry that I got married and had
a husband, and a life, and a job to tend to, and that I didn't have time to listen to you debate the merits of liquid over pencil eyeliner for hours on end. Your problem was that you never wanted to grow into an adult, and you didn't want anyone else to, either. You never loved anyone as much as you loved yourself. I'm sorry, I'm not sorry.”

“That's absurd! I loved you enough to get you out of that fucking house when I saw how you were being treated. I loved you enough to tell you that I knew it was a terrible idea before it happened, and you turned it around and made me out to be a jealous, petty person. This bitch was the one who convinced Meg to come look for you after you took off. You're right. I'm the worst friend in the world.”

“You were probably just worried about how you were going to get home.”

“I would've found a way. Or I would've just stayed here.”

“No, you wouldn't have,” Meg said. Jane realized that she had been very selective about when she spoke up during this entire argument. Cara had always been Meg's mouthpiece, fighting her battles for her whenever things got tough and poor little Meg couldn't muster the energy to defend herself.

“Gee, thanks,” Jane said, growing so tired of this argument.

“What do you guys want from me?” Meg asked, tears welling in her eyes. “I didn't ask for either of you to come here. I didn't ask for you to start fighting with each other, and I didn't ask either of you for help. I don't want it, and I don't need it.”

“Steve seems to think differently,” Jane said.

The mention of her husband made Meg stand perfectly straight. “Don't you dare say a word about Steve. You have no idea what's going on with us.”

“Whatever,” Jane said. “I don't care what's going on with you guys anymore. You want to blow up your marriage, go right ahead. Hey, maybe that will be the one thing the three of us still have in common. Maybe we can all use the same divorce lawyer, and get a group rate or something.”

“Screw you, Jane,” Cara said.

“Screw me? Screw you! I should have left you to deal with your abusive husband and your fucking guest bedroom and your fucking grocery receipts!” Before Jane knew what she was doing, she picked up her wineglass and whipped it at the fireplace. It exploded as it hit the mantel. What was left of her wine (which thankfully was white, so at least she didn't ruin the furniture) sprayed anything in reach with a grapey mist. Jane was stunned, not expecting her own reaction.

“I want you both to leave,” Meg said. Jane looked at Cara, who seemed equally surprised. They'd all had some wine. Forcing them to drive home drunk in the dark didn't seem like the responsible thing to do, regardless of how much they may have hated each other at the moment.

“Now?” Cara asked. Jane could tell she was trying to count the glasses of wine she'd had since before dinner to see if she was in any way fit to drive. Cara wouldn't get behind the wheel after a single drink, never mind three, so Jane knew she wasn't going anywhere.

“Tomorrow morning. I don't care where you go, I don't care what you do, and it hurts me to say that. It hurts even more to know that I mean it. We aren't the same people we used to be, and we never will be. The people we are now have no business hanging out with each other. This is my home and you're not welcome here. So I will say this once, and only once. I want you
both to go to bed, and in the morning, I want you to get the hell out of my house,” Meg said.

She turned and went upstairs, slamming a door behind her. Ten seconds later, Cara stomped upstairs after her, and Jane heard another door slam. Jane wasn't finished drinking yet, but she went into the bathroom on the main floor and slammed the door behind her so hard that one of the sailboat pictures on the wall fell off and the glass shattered on the floor. Jane slinked down the wall, pulled her knees to her chest, and once again started to cry.

T
wo hours later Meg still couldn't sleep. She was angry, and hurt, and tormented by the blowup earlier, but now something else was keeping her awake: the sound of bottles rattling downstairs. She got out of bed and tied her cashmere robe around her waist, then descended the stairs, oddly hoping that she was being robbed and that the source of the clamor wasn't what she thought it was. When she reached the bottom of the stairs, she found Jane sitting under a blanket on the couch, a glass in her hand so full of wine she could have drowned in it. Meg was still angry, and was planning on yelling at Jane to go back to bed, but the look in her eyes made her stop. Slowly, pity began to creep in and replace some of the anger. She sat down on the floor at the foot of the couch and watched her friend stare blankly at the
LIVE A GOOD LIFE
sign hanging on her wall.

“Why aren't you sleeping?” Meg asked. “It's almost one o'clock in the morning.”

“There was a time when one o'clock was early.”

“That was a long time ago. Now if I see the ten o'clock news it's a late night.”

“I guess we're getting old. I'm sorry about your wineglass. I shouldn't have done that,” Jane said, tipsy and groggy and so clearly lost.

“It doesn't matter, Jane. Just go to bed.”

“I tried, but I can't sleep. I'm too busy thinking about how much I suck at life.” Jane held her wineglass to her face and
peered through the pale yellow liquid at the fire on the other side. “I made a new fire. I hope that's okay.”

“It's fine,” Meg said, though she was less than thrilled at the thought of a drunk Jane literally playing with fire in her house.

“This looks so weird. I feel like I'm tripping.”

“You don't suck at life,” Meg said. Jane glanced over at her quickly, then decided to stare at the ceiling instead. “You just fell in love for the wrong reasons. You loved him for his money, and that's why you're in this mess.”

“I didn't just love him for his money. I loved him for his willingness to spend it on me. It's not the same. That's the thing, though. I thought it was
his
money. I didn't know I was hurting anyone. You believe me, right? I'd never steal from people. But I should've known something was wrong, and I didn't. I lived my entire adult life at two extremes. I spent most of it chasing the life I
thought
I wanted. Then once I got it, I spent all my time trying to figure out how to live in it and not lose my mind. I didn't realize that I didn't love him. I thought, ‘Well, Jane, you're not sixteen anymore, love isn't necessarily what you thought it was. Just because you don't hear “Dream Weaver” in your head every time he walks in the room doesn't mean you don't love him.' Do you believe that? I'm such a moron.”

“You're not a moron. And I repeat, you don't suck at life.”

“Who sucks at life?” a voice asked from behind Meg. It shouldn't have surprised her that Cara couldn't sleep, either. Meg was suddenly reminded of the slumber parties they used to have in junior high. She wondered how those little girls would feel knowing that the future versions of themselves would be reduced to strangers who had no problem tearing each other to shreds and then locking themselves in separate rooms, cursing each other in the silence.

Cara sat on the floor and crossed her legs under her. “You guys couldn't sleep either, huh?”

“I was trying. But Keith Richards over here felt like having a nightcap,” Meg said. “Now I'm trying to convince her she doesn't suck at life in the middle of the night, and honestly I am too old for all of this.” She turned her attention back to Jane, her wineglass empty already. How Jane managed to drink so much and still stay coherent was beyond her. If Meg had more than two glasses in the course of one night she felt unsteady on her feet and unable to control her chaotic emotions. It was one of the reasons she didn't drink a lot anymore. “Anyway, can we please go back to bed now?” she asked. A yawn began to rise up in her throat, escaping her mouth like a growl.

“I'm a horrible person. I am, and it's okay to say it,” Jane said, her eyes heavy with fatigue and alcohol. “The tabloids have all basically said it. My neighbors say it. My former
friends
think it. The coffee chick in Amagansett thinks it; I could tell by the way she was looking at me. She didn't even offer me a napkin when the tea spilled all over me. Did you notice that? She probably wanted me to burn. She was probably chanting ‘Burn, bitch, burn' in her head, because she thought that that's what I deserved. You guys don't need to feel bad saying it to my face. My husband stole from pension funds and retirement funds that good, honest people had worked their whole lives to build. He stole from them, and unapologetically spent their money on frivolous things that nobody needs—like these boobs. I was too damn stupid to put the puzzle pieces together. I suck at life bad.”

“I suck at life more,” Cara said.

“No, you don't. Why is everything always a competition with you?” Jane asked. “You can't even let me be the worst at something.”

“I'm just saying I'm no better than you are. Neither one of us picked the right guy. Neither one of us listened to ourselves when we knew something wasn't right. Now we're both hiding out in Meg's house and she doesn't like either of us. If you suck at life, then so do I.”

“That's not true,” Meg said. “I like you guys.”

“No, you love us. You don't like us. It's not the same thing,” Jane replied. “It's okay. I know, I deserve it. I've been a shitty friend to you guys. Did you hear that, Cara? That would be the sound of me apologizing.”

“Yes, I heard you. And I forgive you,” Cara said.

“Do you really? Do you mean that?” Jane asked. “Or are you just trying to placate me because I'm smashed and you want me to go to sleep?”

“I do. And I'm sorry that I said such nasty things to you. I guess I still harbor a lot of anger over losing you as a friend. I had to let the anger out before I could deal with any of my other emotions. I regretted the words as soon as I said them.”

“It's okay. I've been thinking a lot lately about what happened between us,” Jane said, the alcohol making her more honest than she'd ever have been without it. “I think it's time I come clean about a few things. If I'd done it years ago, maybe we'd all have very different lives.”

“We don't need to get into it all again now,” Cara said. “It's late.”

“No, I want to. I want to tell you guys something. I really have thought a lot about why I felt the way I did and when it all started, and as much as I hate to admit it, I think a lot of it began around the time that Meg got married.”

“What?” Meg said. “What did my getting married have to do
with anything? I had a wonderful time at my wedding. I thought you did, too.”

“I did. I swear, I really did. But still, it was hard for me, too. I'm not proud to admit that.”

“Hard how?” Cara asked.

“I think that after Meg's wedding I kind of started to gradually withdraw. I was foundering in the city by myself. I didn't have a boyfriend, or a job, or the grand life I'd imagined when we were younger, and I stupidly believed that I was going to make something of myself. I was barely getting by, and it was kind of hard to watch you pass by me in life, with a great guy and everything you'd ever wanted laid in front of you, while I struggled to hold myself together. I wasn't strong enough, I guess. When Cara got engaged it made everything worse. It sucked. It sucked really bad.”

“I never knew you felt that way,” Meg said. “I never felt like you were the third wheel. I wish you'd have said something to me. We could've talked about it.”

“I know. It's a hard thing to talk about. Especially when you're in your twenties and an insecure mess. I guess I didn't have the guts to talk about it, and I didn't want you to know that I was actually lonely.”

“I knew you were lonely,” Cara said. “We were young, and there were millions of other single people running around the city. We weren't racing each other. It wasn't a contest.”

“That's where you're wrong, though. It
was
a contest. In my mind, at least. It's hard responding to wedding invitations without a date. It's hard being at a couples dinner and having the reservation be for five people instead of six. I feel silly saying it, but it is. I felt like there was something wrong with me because you guys were able to find people who loved you and I couldn't. You
were checking all the items off life's to-do list without me: Get engaged, check. Get married, check. Leave the city and buy houses on Long Island, check. You guys were off in a whole new world that I couldn't be a part of, and I felt like I was stuck and going nowhere.”

“You took it personally?” Meg asked. “I guess I never thought about it that way. I was never alone after college. I never had to deal with that kind of pressure. It never occurred to me.”

“Exactly.”

“It doesn't mean I wouldn't have understood if you told me how you were feeling. The funny thing is, I understand it now. How's that for ironic.”

“You're married. And approaching forty. How could you possibly understand it now?”

“Just because we're older doesn't mean those things go away. New Year's Eve never used to bother me. Now I swear to God I want to go to sleep on the thirtieth of December and wake up on January second. It's torture not having someone to kiss at midnight or go to a party with. Starting off the year like a walking advertisement for loneliness isn't uplifting. I certainly don't think it's cause for celebration. This year I'm staying home alone.”

“Oh my God, exactly. That's exactly it. That's how I felt for the better part of a decade. Every holiday, every event—anytime something came in the mail with a response card. Every time you guys wanted to go to dinner or told me that the four of you were going to a movie or something. I felt like I was being punched every time. The happier you guys seemed in your marriages, the worse I felt about myself. I should've seen a shrink, but I didn't have the self-awareness at the time to realize I needed one.”

“Or the money to pay for one,” Cara added. She reached over and gently squeezed Jane's foot. The familiar gesture made Meg smile.

“Good point. Instead I decided to deal with it by pretending that I was too busy being fabulous to keep in touch, and fading away. Pretty stupid, huh?”

“Yeah. Pretty stupid,” Meg said. “But even dumber that I didn't think of that. I probably would've seen it if I'd stopped focusing on Steve and my marriage for two minutes and devoted any time to thinking about how you felt. I'm sorry I didn't try to understand where you were coming from. I'm sorry I ignored you. I didn't mean to.”

“Better you just ignored her than accused her of being jealous of you,” Cara admitted.

“I was jealous, though. There, I said it out loud. I hate myself,” Jane said.

“Don't say that,” Meg said. “Stop beating yourself up over everything.”

“You know, I thought I'd feel better getting the truth off my chest after all of these years, but saying it out loud hurt more than I expected. My self-loathing right now is epic.”

“Why is it so hard to talk about things like this?” Cara asked. “The pressure we women put on ourselves and each other to have everything together at all times is ridiculous. No one wants to admit when things go badly. Seriously, look at the three of us. We're all imploding and doing it silently. Until now, none of us has confided in
anyone
. We are making the same mistakes all over again. Why couldn't I tell anyone that my marriage was a disaster? Why do I continue to smile and show up at dinners and
parties and pretend like I'm happy to be there? I feel like I don't want to admit to anyone that I'm not good at it. Like being ‘good' at marriage is a skill you can improve.”

“It's not. Not if it's broken to begin with. Some things can't be fixed,” Meg replied.

“I don't want anyone to know my life is broken,” Cara said, the sadness in her voice so hard for Meg to hear.

“I know the feeling,” Meg said.

“Yeah, well, your broken lives aren't on the news. So you can feel good about that. And for once, I win! All of our marriages might be in disarray, but no one has it worse than me. Finally, I'm in first place. I thought it would feel different,” Jane joked, trying to add some levity to the conversation.

“If we had each other to talk to this entire time, maybe we would've made different decisions. Keeping everything quiet didn't do us any favors,” Cara said. “I wish I'd have reached out to you guys.”

“You can't think about things like that,” Meg said.

“What do you think about, then? When you look back on the choices you made that led you here?” Jane asked.

“I guess the best any of us can do is to make the decisions that make you happy when things are good so that you have nice memories to fall back on when times get hard. I think that's the end game for everyone,” Meg said. “I have some really great memories. They help. Not enough, but a little.”

“Are you happy being away from Steve and hunkered down in this admittedly adorable beach house alone? Is this the decision that makes you happy?” Jane asked.

Meg pushed herself up off the floor and teetered over to the small leather bar cart she had parked in the corner. The bar cart
had been her grandfather's, and her father's after that. Now it belonged to her. She traced the soft edge of the leather before she grabbed the wine bottle and filled her glass. She wondered how many of her ancestors had drunk away their problems with the help of this bar.

“Of course not. But it's for the best,” Meg said, hoping that they believed her, but knowing them both better.