When she got breathy and excited about someone new, they al mental y prepared themselves to meet a guy with a creepy carnival mustache and a mean case of dandruff. Even in first grade, when the only acceptable boys to like were Jon Armstrong and Chris Angelo, El en announced that she liked scabby Matthew Handler. It was just who she was. El en dated ugly boys.
It was surprising, mostly because El en was pretty—and not just your average, wel -groomed and wel -dressed kind of pretty. She was the kind of pretty that people noticed, the kind of pretty that made people watch her walk by. She had long eyelashes and skin that didn’t seem to have any pores. There was a glow about her, something that always drew boys to her side. If she’d been anyone else, Lauren might have been too jealous to be her friend. But it never mattered, because El en would look at al of her admirers gathered round, and point to Mr. Fatty and say, “I choose you.”
Lauren got to keep the rest of them.
Some friends are gossips and some are sloppy drunks. If you like them wel enough, you ignore this trait and continue to be their friend. And that’s what they did with El en—they tolerated her taste in men.
Once, in col ege, El en kissed a guy who lived down the hal from them. They cal ed him the Wildebeest because he was portly with wild curly hair and he snorted when he laughed. He was the guy who got drunk at parties, stripped naked, and did the worm on the floor in a pool of keg beer.
They al knew him. They al liked him wel enough. And they were al shocked when El en announced that she’d kissed him the night before when he’d walked her to her door.
“Hold on,” Isabel a said. “Please back up. You made out with the Wildebeest?”
El en shrugged. “I didn’t plan it,” she said. “He offered to walk me home and he’s so funny.”
“Of course he’s funny,” Lauren said. “He’s a Wildebeest. Wildebeests are supposed to be funny. But Wildebeests are not for making out with.”
El en was unashamed. She just smiled and shrugged and went back to her room. Al the girls stared at each other and shook their heads.
“Making out with a Wildebeest,” they whispered to one another. “What wil be next?”
For the most part, El en’s boys were harmless. That’s not to say that they al had sparkling personalities or quick wit to make up for their appearance. No, some of them were truly blessed with nothing. But stil , the girls never real y objected to El en’s choices. “Different strokes for different folks,” their friend Mary always said whenever El en brought home another one. And they al laughed and let her be. “What harm could it do?” they asked each other. And so they let El en have her ugly little fun.
But then she met Louis. And Louis was awful.
Louis weighed about ninety pounds, had soft, wispy blond hair, and wore the same pair of rust-colored corduroys their entire junior year. He was pretentious and social y awkward and El en was crazy about him. Louis sat in their apartment and chain-smoked cigarettes while he ignored al of them. Once, when Lauren asked El en for an opinion on which shirt she should wear out that night, Louis weighed in. “It can be dangerous to care too much about clothes. It makes you shal ow,” he said. Then he reached into his pants pocket, took out a paperback copy of
“I hate that guy,” Lauren said later that night. “He’s such a dick.”
“Relax,” Isabel a said. “It won’t last. They never do.”
The first time Louis dumped El en, they silently cheered. But a week later, the couple was back together, and Louis showed up again in their apartment, smoking cigarettes and making comments about how sil y girls were in general. Louis broke up with El en over and over again, and she kept going back to him. None of them understood it.
“He looks like Ichabod Crane,” Lauren said once. “I mean, what I think Ichabod Crane would look like if he wore the same pants for a year, you know?”
“I just don’t understand when he has time to wash those pants,” Mary said. “He wears them every day. That’s just so gross.” They al agreed.
After graduation, Louis broke up with El en again. He told her that he couldn’t be tied down, that he was going to travel through Europe alone and needed his freedom. “Please let this one stick,” they said to one another. Sure, El en was devastated now, but she’d meet someone else, someone who would make her happier. They were sure of that. It was al for the best.
They al spent a year after graduation living with their parents in their respective suburbs, saving money and looking for jobs. It was miserable, sleeping in twin beds in their childhood rooms, sending out mil ions of resumes, and trying not to get annoyed when their parents said things like
“What time wil you be home?” and “No drinks upstairs.”
Lauren, El en, and their friend Shannon al moved to Chicago that summer. El en had gotten a job offer in Boston but had turned it down, claiming that she had always wanted to live in Chicago. “It’s such a fun city,” she said. “The lake is so great.” Lauren and Shannon rol ed their eyes at each other. They knew she was lying about the lake. Louis was from Chicago and El en was just hoping he’d come back there soon. It was sad, real y.
Even a little pathetic, they thought.
But they didn’t real y care that much. One year after graduating, they were final y on their own. They rented an apartment on Armitage with two and a half bedrooms, one tiny bathroom, no air-conditioning, and a giant deck. It was almost like col ege, except they had to get up and go to work every morning.
It was so hot that summer that no one could stay inside. They tried (for the sake of being grown-ups) not to go out every night. They sat on the deck in ponytails and shorts, reading magazines and painting their nails, trying to imagine a breeze from Lake Michigan. Eventual y, someone would suggest having a beer or a glass of wine. They’d sit awhile, and someone would suggest going to the bar below them, just for one drink, just to sit in air-conditioning for a while. And before they knew it, it was two in the morning and they were listening to Karen, the crazy
