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Title: Bittersweet
Summary: This is about realizing who your real friends are. It takes place during the trip from my senior post-prom to a post-prom party.
Rating: PG-13
Genre: Memoir
Rain had been escaping from the clouds all evening. Flashes of lightning had subsided by the time Jackie, Ian, and I meandered from the North Dakota State University Memorial Union to Jackie’s vehicle, the Jimmy, parked in K Lot. Small, round droplets dripped from the tips of leaves, collecting in small pools on the sidewalk, dampening our hair.
Showers in late April often cooled the air considerably, and that early morning was no different. It couldn’t have been any warmer than sixty degrees. After being stuck in the overly warm Union, and the sweat-while-you-stand-still heat of the Fargo South High School Prom, the cool, sweet air and silky raindrops were quite a blessing.
Climbing into the Jimmy was tricky, but after riding in it countless times, I had become something of an expert. If there were an Olympic sport known as textbook dodging, I could win the gold; I could climb in and out of the Jimmy without hurling books everywhere (or hurting myself, for that matter). It wasn’t that Jackie was unorganized or messy; she simply didn’t have the space for all of the many books that she owned.
It was something of a tradition for Jackie and me to take turns choosing the music. She had chosen to play AFI on the way to Post-Prom, so our musical enjoyment for the trip to breakfast was my choice. After flipping through her CD collection, passing by AFI, Carbon Leaf, and a few mix CDs, I chose While the City Sleeps, We Rule the Streets, by Cobra Starship; that CD had a song on it that Jackie and I had decided Ian must hear. I put the disk in the Jimmy’s somewhat temperamental stereo, and turned up the volume.
“Ian, I want you to listen very carefully to this song.” Jackie searched through the tracks of the CD as she spoke, taking full advantage of the red light glowing in front of us. “Sadly, it could be about our friends.”
The light flicked to a bright green, and the Jimmy jumped forward. We turned onto 12th Avenue North, and headed west. As we crossed the bridge, Ian began to understand what Jackie had said about the song.
...We’re gonna pretend/That we’re making everything ok/They don’t know about us/Everyone’s asleep when we play/Yeah the kids are all f---ed up...
I stared out the window at the sleeping city, images from earlier that night mingling from my memory into my mind’s eye; Adam leading Courtney on, Erik and Kelly abandoning their respective prom dates, Christa and Mason, to go “get physical” with each other, Kristine and Nick ignoring it all, acting like nothing was wrong. All six of them continuously wandered away from Jackie, Ian, and me, so eventually, we just simply gave up and left the dance floor to talk to other people Jackie and I knew, introducing them to Ian, my boyfriend from West Fargo. I suppose we could have tried a bit harder to express our concern about our friends’ actions, but what was the point? They had been deaf to our words for at least seven months already, pretending that everything was okay, that nothing they did was f---ed up, thinking that no one knew what was really going on. Erik and Kelly would constantly make-out in the most random (and awkward) places, regardless of whether they were dating each other, other people, or no one at all. Adam and Courtney had been best friends for so long that it was rather saddening to see Adam lead Courtney on, sending mixed signals while she sat confused, her unrequited love becoming more and more painful. Normally, Nick and Kristine were okay, but they never admitted that anything was going wrong with their friends. Sometimes I thought that there were things going wrong in their relationship that none of us knew about, but they never said a word. It was not uncommon for these people to simply “forget” to invite certain people to parties, complaining whenever those uninvited souls requested to know why they had been left out; however, if the six in question weren’t invited, it was a national tragedy. I sighed heavily, momentarily fogging up my window, obstructing my view of the world outside as the music drifted into my ears.
“Wow. That’s almost creepy.” Ian commented, once the song had ended.
“Why do we hang out with them, again?” I was starting to seriously question my choice of associations. My inquiry hung silently in the air, awaiting an answer no one wanted to hear.
“I suppose,” began Jackie, “that we hang out with them because they all come as a unit.”
“Yeah. If we want to hang out with one of them, we end up having to hang out with all of them.” Ian finished Jackie’s thought without missing a beat.
“I really don’t think they actually care about us. Or each other, for that matter. They just want to have their little inclusive group. They’re afraid to be alone.” My observation resonated in the early morning air, tinged with annoyance and hurt. Four in the morning is both the best and the worst time to think; your thoughts are clear, but your emotions are much more sensitive.
“Yeah. I’m afraid you’re right,” Jackie sighed. “Sh--.”
“Our friends suck.” I returned.
Jackie nodded, gripping the steering wheel so tightly, I expected there to be indents in the leather once she removed her hands. “Yeah. Yeah, they suck quite a lot.”
“So.” I could almost feel the sarcasm worming its way into my words. “It’s a good thing we’re on our way to hang out with them.”
We were about to arrive at Sunmart; we had been elected to get some groceries for the breakfast that Big Eric, our friend in culinary school, had offered to make for all of us. Our friends may not have the common sense or consideration that a Venus Flytrap has, but they weren’t completely lost; they did realize that the three of us were the more responsible people in the group.
We picked up the bacon, eggs, and coffee required of us, and hopped back into the Jimmy, ready to head to the Bunker, the basement level apartment that Nick and Big Eric called home. Although we had just been discussing all the many downfalls of our friends and how little they cared for us, I felt pretty dang good. All I really needed was in that car with me. Why should I put up with people insulting me and ignoring me. Why should I put up with the double standards so many of them set? I no longer cared if the others actually liked me or not; I had no reason to desire their approval. The bittersweet reality is, if I no longer had any of those people, and only had Jackie and Ian, I would be quite happy.
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