Джули Салливан - Friends and Strangers

Elisabeth assumed Sam, like the rest of them, had gone home by now. She couldn’t believe there had been no goodbye.

All day yesterday, she’d half expected her to show up.

The party had not gone as planned. When they woke, the sky was dark and heavy with rain. Elisabeth tried not to care. There was nothing she could do about the weather.

Even as she told herself this, she said to Andrew, “Today is going to be a disaster, I can tell. Yesterday was perfect. Why didn’t we do this yesterday?”

“Because it wasn’t Gil’s birthday yesterday,” he said.

“We should have canceled,” she said. “Done something just the three of us.”

“It’s going to be fine,” he said.

Nomi’s train was due to arrive at eleven. She was coming on her own and staying with them for two nights. Elisabeth had imagined her best friend looking on, admiringly, as she hosted a large, joyous affair. The kind of thing you could only do when you had a house and a big backyard.

Elisabeth had had until a few days ago to change the order with the caterers. She waited because she thought there was a chance she and Sam would reconcile. Before she knew it, a man with one hundred and twenty shrimp puffs was asking if she preferred silver or Lucite trays for passing.

There was enough food to feed Sam’s giant family and all her friends, when the only people coming were Andrew’s parents and a couple of his coworkers and whichever neighbors chose to attend.

As Andrew was leaving to get Nomi at the station, a UPS guy delivered a giant blue-wrapped gift box. Elisabeth opened it. A present from her mother. The box contained expensive baby clothes, the kind that were gorgeous and that no baby would ever have a reason to wear.

The card read Love, Gigi.

“When did we decide that would be her grandma name?” Andrew said.

“She decided, I guess.”

Elisabeth smiled, in spite of herself.

Andrew kissed her goodbye.

Soon after he left, three guys with scraggly beards and straw hats arrived. One dragged an upright bass; another had a drum in his arms.

“It feels like rain, doesn’t it?” Elisabeth said to them. “Should we be putting you inside, do you think, or would that be too loud?”

They shrugged, indifferent.

“Maybe start in the yard and we’ll play it by ear,” she said.

The men from the balloon company were setting up out front when Nomi got there forty minutes later.

She pushed past them, looking exasperated, and found Elisabeth in the hall.

“I’m so sorry,” Nomi said. “I planned to bring wine. I thought we could stop somewhere on the way from the train. I had no idea there were still places where liquor stores are closed on Sunday. Are women allowed to vote in this town yet?”

“Ha ha,” Elisabeth said. “Hi!”

When they embraced, she willed Nomi to look around, to say something nice about the house.

“Your living room is a re-creation of the one in Brooklyn,” Nomi said. “That’s hilarious.”

The balloon men needed a signature and her credit card. Elisabeth went to find her purse.

Within five minutes of the men’s departure, two separate couples walked in without knocking, assuming a balloon archway signified an open house.

“Where are we?” Nomi said. “Do you not have locks?”

Elisabeth offered the band members fifty bucks to drag the archway out back, where nobody would see it, other than people they’d invited.

By noon, everyone had arrived. There were twice as many cater-waiters as there were guests. They circled the yard, trying to look busy. The Laurels had all come and were downing flutes of champagne, standing in the corner, whispering.

“Terrible women,” Nomi said, watching them from across the yard. “You can tell by looking. Who makes that dress the chunky blonde is wearing? Peg Bundy for Spandex?”

Elisabeth had dreamed of this—having her best friend by her side to make fun of the Laurels with her. So why did she wish Nomi could try to blend in, and keep some thoughts to herself?

In a way, she thought there was something to appreciate about how the Laurels always showed up for one another. And now, it seemed, for her as well. They could have easily skipped this party, but they were here, and making the best of it.

The goth couple they had seen get married in the fall sat at the picnic table, holding hands. Elisabeth could not remember their names. The day of their wedding, Andrew got mad at her for making fun of them, for suggesting that they’d be divorced soon. It was kind of awful of her, now that she thought of it. Elisabeth gave them a wave. Maybe they had as good a shot as anyone.

Still, she wondered if their weird energy was keeping people away from the food—right in front of them were platters heaped with charcuterie and crudités, sandwiches cut into triangles, bowls of fresh salad. In the middle of it all, a tower assembled from thirty blue-frosted cupcakes.

On her way to get more to drink, Debbie from across the street commended Elisabeth on the dessert choice and said it was all the rage at kids’ parties this year. Elisabeth told her the truth—the cupcake tower had been the caterer’s idea.

When Debbie walked away, Nomi said, “Brooklyn moved on from that particular trend five summers ago.”

Elisabeth wondered if this was what she sounded like. It bothered her, even though she had been thinking the same thing. She wondered if this tendency toward snobbery would ever leave her, or if living in the city had ruined her for life.

She kept glancing at the sky.

“Looks like rain, doesn’t it?” she whispered to Nomi.

Nomi shushed her. “Don’t conjure it!”

“I don’t think that’s how rain works,” Elisabeth said, feeling injured, wishing she hadn’t said anything.

Wind whipped through the yard. The balloon arch swayed.

Elisabeth looked at Gil, happily crawling in the grass, chasing Debbie’s two kids. She took in a deep breath. He was having fun. That was all that mattered. So the first party they threw in this house was an odd one. So what.

From her spot in the yard, she heard the home phone ring.

Her father-in-law must have answered it, because a moment later, he called out the open door, “Lizzy! It’s for you.”

Her first thought was that maybe it was Sam. Maybe George had talked to her, and she would be here with them soon.

Elisabeth dashed inside.

“Your dad,” George whispered. He handed her the phone.

“Calling to wish my grandson a happy birthday,” he said. “Put him on, will you. I want to talk to him.”

Elisabeth was tempted to point out that Gil couldn’t speak yet, but instead she said, “Why don’t we call you back in a bit? We’re having that party now. Remember? I invited you and Gloria to come.”

“Yes, yes,” he said. “You go enjoy.”

He hadn’t bothered to come up with a reason why they couldn’t make it, nor had her mother. Neither of them RSVP’d one way or the other. Elisabeth supposed that for her parents, a one-year-old’s backyard birthday celebration didn’t rise to the level of things important enough to acknowledge, let alone consider attending.

She hadn’t invited her sister. She was still too angry. She put Charlotte’s email address on the list for the Evite, then erased it, then added it again, then erased it and left it at that.

Charlotte sent a toy fire truck via Amazon. After that disastrous Christmas, Elisabeth figured they would now go back to being this kind of family. The kind who sent gifts in lieu of ever spending time together. She was fine with that.

“My accountant sent the birthday boy a little something for college a few months ago,” her father said.

“Yes, I know,” she said.