In retrospect, and not just because of what happened later, I realized that it was also a time of uncertainty and anxiety. I was in love with Eric Washburn, and he said he was in love with me. I believed him, but I also knew that we were young, and that Eric was graduating soon, with plans to move to New York City and get a job in the financial sector. And my plan was to spend the following school year in London at the Faunce Institute of Art, studying conservation. Even though Eric and I would talk about our future, I told myself I knew that everything was going to change when he graduated.
I led two separate but compatible lives that year. From Sunday to Thursday I did all my reading and schoolwork. My roommates, the Three Winonas, played loud music and smoked nonstop cigarettes, but were surprisingly quiet, and relatively good-natured. I found I had a lot in common with Mermaids Winona, a bookworm who, like me, grew up idolizing Nancy Drew. On Thursday evening I would go to St. Dunstan’s Manor for the weekly party. I would bring my largest purse, packed with a change of clothes and a few of my toiletries, since I would always spend the night, and sometimes the weekend. From Friday morning until Sunday evening Eric and I were rarely apart, with the exception of classes, and Eric’s racquetball matches, or Ultimate Frisbee, or any of the numerous pickup games that it was important for him to win. We saw movies at the campus repertory theater, and would venture into New Chester to eat Italian food, and would sometimes go to parties not hosted by St. Dunstan’s or any of its members, but that was rare. We slid into a comfortable relationship filled with predictable routine, a day-to-day of inside jokes and what seemed to me to be some highly well-suited sex. We called one another Washburn and Kintner. We were blessedly free of the dramatics of disappointment or infidelity. I cherished what we had become but kept it to myself, telling Eric and no one else how strong my attachment was. He echoed my feelings, and sometimes talked of our future together after Mather.
Eric’s ex-girlfriend Faith was also a senior, and still a regular at Thursday night parties. She was now dating Matthew Ford, and because Faith and I were the respective girlfriends of the two most prominent members of St. Dun’s, Faith attached herself to me that year, even occasionally asking me questions about my relationship with Eric, although I never took the bait. I didn’t particularly like Faith, who was bubbly and devious and liked to be the center of attention, but I didn’t mind spending time with her. If Faith hadn’t been around at all, curiosity about the girl who had spent two years with Eric might have escalated into obsession. But she was around, and I got to know her, and, because of that, she had no place in my imagination.
I could see what had attracted Eric to Faith. She was round-faced and sexy, with short black hair. Her clothes were straight out of The Official Preppy Handbook but her sweaters were always a little too tight, and her skirts were always a little too short. When she talked, she came in close and made disarming eye contact, but she laughed often, and made funny jokes about herself. If we went anywhere together, Faith would push her arm through mine, and if she was standing behind me, she would run her fingers through my hair. Neither of my parents had been physically affectionate with me, so I found Faith’s touchiness often disturbing and occasionally reassuring. Once, when Faith was drunk, she told me she wanted to study the color of my eyes. She came in close, her own brown eyes huge in my vision.
“It’s like a tapestry in there,” Faith said, her breath warm against my cheek. “There are flecks of gray and yellow and blue and brown and pink.”
Eric rarely spoke of Faith, but one night as we lay in his bed, he asked if it bothered me that Faith was around so much.
“Not really,” I said. “She’s decided we’re best friends. Have you noticed that?”
“She’s best friends with everyone. No, delete that. I think she genuinely likes you and wants to be your friend, it’s just that . . .”
“Don’t worry. I know what you mean. I have no intention of becoming her best friend.