Here Lies Bridget

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“'K, so get started,” I said, and Jillian nodded. I was gratified by her consistent agreeability.

“Tomorrow you should get here early. We’ll have to set up. Plus I’ve got better makeup than you do. We’ll have to tell Michelle to come early also. She wears stuff from, like, the drugstore.” I made a blech sound.

Jillian was already on her phone texting out invites.

She, Michelle and I were up until two in the morning setting up for the party. I’d inform Meredith of my plans the next day. Not that it mattered anyway, because she would be flying to Florida that afternoon.

And with that parent- and guardian-less freedom, I decided that Michelle’s twenty-two-year-old brother was going to have to do something more useful than sitting around playing video games.

THE NEXT DAY, JILLIAN, Michelle and I were sitting at my kitchen table eating breakfast.

Well, mostly I was.

I was scarfing down sugary cereal. Jillian was reading the nutritional facts, eating a banana and telling me all of the reasons why I shouldn’t be eating “that bowl of sugar.” Michelle wasn’t eating anything.

“Michelle, eat something.” I glared at her.

“I’m not hungry, it’s fine.”

“Michelle.”

“Seriously, Bridget.”

I considered her for a moment.

“What, do you not like what I have to eat or something?”

I narrowed my eyes at her as she exhaled edgily.

“I’m just not hungry, okay?”

My phone vibrated on the table. I silenced it, not interested in reading yet another excited text from someone I didn’t care about saying something about C ya tonite! or Thanks for the invite!

We’d invited everyone we knew. And it felt like all of them were texting me. Which was all well and good—maybe people hadn’t been doing what I told them to lately, but I seriously doubted that everyone would stop being this eager to be my friend any time soon.

“Fine,” I said, as I took another bite from my cereal.

“As long as you’re not just overreacting to Jillian’s little health freak-out over there. It’s not like she even knows what she’s talking about.”

She didn’t say anything, and just as I was about to grill her some more, Meredith came quietly into the kitchen. She was rubbing her lips together and closing a lipstick.

“Oh, good morning, girls!” She smiled.

I sneered. I didn’t know why, but as soon as she walked into the room, I felt like she’d been offensive somehow.

“I’m having a party tonight,” I said, giving her no greeting whatsoever.

“Are you?”

“Yes.” I looked challengingly at her. Then I spotted her purse and suitcase by the front door. “I thought your flight wasn’t until four. Are you leaving now?”

It would be exactly like her to leave so ridiculously early for a flight. Even that conscientiousness of hers bothered me.

“Oh, well.” She pulled a to-go coffee mug from the cabinet and turned around to get the milk from the fridge.

“I’m meeting somebody beforehand and I’ll have about an hour and a half before the shuttle picks me up after that. I just want to be ready to go in case the meeting runs long.”

“Meeting with who?” I asked.

She turned back to me and looked into my eyes warily. It had something to do with me, I knew it.

“Who?” I demanded.

She sighed. “John Ezhno.”

Of course she couldn’t bring herself to lie, and save me the embarrassment she was now inflicting on me.

“Really.” I stared at her.

“Yes, does that surprise you?”

“Um, yes.” It did. I could not believe this was still going on. “Does that surprise you?“

She set down the skim milk, and looked at me.

“Bridget, stop it.”

“You stop it.” She was the one going around having secret meetings. About me, for God’s sake.

“Bridget, I mean it! You know, I wouldn’t have to keep seeing him if you or your father would just—” She stopped.

If Meredith started defying me, I’d start a damn war with her. I didn’t have anything to lose in this relationship.

“Would just what?”

She dropped her head, clearly holding back more tears. Taking a deep breath, she stood up straight, secured the lid on her mug and walked out the door. I felt a small wave of guilt wash over me. I hated when other people took the high road in an argument. It made me look foolish.

When I turned back to my cereal, I felt two pairs of eyes on me. I looked up to see Jillian’s and Michelle’s mouths hanging open.

“Wha …?” I said with my mouth full.

The two of them exchanged an uncomfortable look.

“Nothing,” Jillian said, turning her face back to the nutritional facts. Her eyebrows were still raised.

“Look, I can’t help what she’s doing. You guys aren’t going to tell anybody, right? Jillian?”

“Of course not. Did you know this has partially hydrogenated oils in it? That is so bad for you. Oh!” She stopped to answer her phone, which had just started emitting a tinny version of “Respect.”

After talking for a minute, she hung up and announced that she had to go. Her brother had knocked his front tooth out, and she needed to take him to the dentist.

Michelle stuck around, which was weird, because usually she left earlier than Jillian. It was always strange when it was just the two of us. It always felt a little naked without someone else around as a buffer.

After closing the door on Jillian and reminding her to come back ASAP so I could fix her face with my makeup, I walked into the living room, where Michelle was sitting, and turned on the TV.

“Bridget?” she said.

“Can we talk for a second?”

“Sure,” I said, flipping through the channels. She looked at the TV, and then at me.

“Like, without the TV on?”

I exhaled noisily and turned it off. She took a deep breath before speaking.

“It’s kind of … embarrassing to talk about. I just think … that you kind of … make me feel bad about myself sometimes.” She said the last part of her sentence so fast I barely understood the words.

I scoffed and raised my eyebrows at her.

“I what?”

“It’s just … I’m sensitive about my weight and—”

She couldn’t be serious.

“Oh, shut up, Michelle.”

“No, Bridget, I won’t shut up!” She stood up. “You say things all the time that make me feel really bad about myself, and it’s just not okay!”

I sat there on the couch, looking up at her skinny body and bony cheekbones. I was shocked. I had hardly ever seen her mad about anything, and here she was, flipping out about something stupid.

In retrospect, I realize I should have taken her seriously, if only just because she was my friend and I owed her that.

Instead, I was embarrassed by what she’d said. I took it as an attack on me and stood up, too.

“Like what?”

“Oh, my God, Bridget, you really don’t know?”

I suddenly felt defensive. What could I have ever said to make her feel insecure about her weight?

“No, I really don’t know,” I said, saying her words with a nasty tone. “Are you seriously telling me you feel fat?”

“Yes!”

“Oh, puh-leeze. You’re deluded. You’re crazy! And I’m not going to listen to crazy talk.” Not anymore, anyway. I’d had enough of that lately.

Plus, Michelle was super skinny. She was like five foot eight and a hundred and fifteen pounds. She was the kind of pretty that made you want to just eat vegetables and fruit and sacrifice all the fat/delicious in your diet. She had always been gorgeous. The only reason she wasn’t the queen of the school was because she was too shy, not good with makeup or hair or clothes, and wasn’t willing to claw her way to the top of the social ladder. And because I wouldn’t let it happen.

But even though the situation warranted me saying something reassuring like that, I just kept shouting at her.

“I didn’t say you’re fat, Michelle. I wouldn’t say anything like that. But if you feel fat, eat a salad or something, I don’t know. It’s all in your head. Just don’t blame your insecurities on me!”

She was so obviously thin that this conversation seemed ridiculous, and I didn’t want to waste time catering to Michelle’s compliment fishing.

“It’s not my insecurities only, Bridget, you’re always making comments about what I should do to look prettier and telling me my clothes are all wrong, and I just can’t—”

“I’m your friend, Michelle, it’s called advice?” Then something occurred to me. I hushed my tone in disbelief at what this whole thing might be about.

“Is this about the gym shorts? They’re from freshman year. And they just don’t fit you anymore!” And there’s nothing wrong with that, I should have said.

Instead, I shushed her when she tried to talk, and turned the TV back on. We spent the next hour in awkward silence, each with our faces pointed in the direction of the TV show neither of us were interested in, pretending that the argument hadn’t happened.

A FEW HOURS LATER, I wondered if what I’d said to Michelle was too harsh. I was considering dialing her number on the phone in my hand when I heard a car door slam in the driveway.

I raced down the stairs so that when Meredith opened the front door, I was standing on the bottom step with my arms crossed and my lips pursed.

She looked at me and sighed.

She was impatient with me?

“Listen, Bridget—”

“What did you guys talk about? Did you swap stories about how awful I am?”

“Bridget, please,” she pleaded, quietly.

I closed my mouth only because I was desperate to hear what had happened.

She walked into the sitting room off the foyer and sat on the love seat.