Excerpt 7

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Your Ghastly Valentine, R

P.S. My killer is Loretta and she lives across the street.

Of course, I told M about the letter and she immediately wanted to see him. Me, not so much. But for her sake, I went along and painted by the numbers. This was my former best friend we were talking about, so I felt some sort of weird obligation to see him. We met for drinks and chatted. R was very apologetic. I did my best to seem magnanimous. He left for New York and periodically kept in touch with M. Eventually, that led to him calling me every week or so.

Admittedly, the anger slowly ebbed and I was fine with him being in my life again, especially at a distance. Soon, M and I were married and living with Remington and Steven. R would come to visit every now and again. Shortly after Remington and Steven moved out, R came to visit and brought one of his New York roommates with him. They were staying for a few weeks this time, so we made plans to drive down to San Diego together to see Remington and Steven.

This roommate, who shall remain nameless, was a nightmare of selfishness. She actually made M look like Mother Teresa. As much as she drove everyone crazy, R seemed just fine with her, even kowtowing to her every whim. We all thought this was strange, but we figured New York had just changed R a bit.

The vacation was over, and R was returning to New York with his roommate. A few hours after he’d left, M received a phone call. He was not okay with her and he wasn’t returning to New York. He was finished with being R in a sea of R’s. He asked if he could crash with us. M said yes without consulting me.

So, he crashed with us. Eventually, he just moved in for good. Things were never quite right in our house. He was rarely there. And when he was, you could tell he didn’t want to be there. He was uncomfortable with a lot of things, I think. He didn’t want to be around Sebastian, and he seemed put off by M’s neediness. And as for me, well, I just got the impression he didn’t really like me anymore. Like he was still holding something against me. It was that way for a couple of years, until this February. I had just lost my job and R decided that he was moving out.

It was a perfect opportunity, you see. There wasn’t much I could do. He was gone within a week, although it took another month for him to move half his stuff out. The other half was left for me to remove when M left me two months later and he decided he didn’t care about his stuff anymore.

The night M left, I called him. He spent the entire 15 minute conversation trying to get me to call someone else. He didn’t want to talk to me. Not only did he leave when I needed his help, he wasn’t there when things got even worse. Best friends don’t do that to each other.

Later, an accident involving a mutual acquaintance brought us together on the phone. I was in the desert at the time, devastated by what I’d learned. He was, too. He promised that we’d get together soon and reconnect. This was months ago.

That’s where we are right now. I’m still in his “top friends” on MySpace for some mysterious reason. I’ve been seriously considering dropping him and never answering his calls or messages again. You know, in two years when he decides he’s been an asshole?

So, I don’t think so much that it’s me mentally dropping R from my list of friends. It seems to me like he dropped out himself a long time ago.