MWF Seeking BFF (39 page)

I made my first attempts a few months ago. I went to the boutique ready to make a move, but each time I tried Celia was either not working or was there with another salesgirl. It seemed wrong to ask her on a friend-date while another perfectly nice, friendable person stood watching. I didn’t want to leave anyone out.

But today I’m feeling lucky, high off my earlier triumph, and when I walk in the door I quickly see that Celia’s the only employee on duty. Can I just cut to the chase? Shouldn’t I at least pretend to be shopping? I mean, there
is
a sale going on. And I could certainly use a new dress. It only seems right to try on a few options.

“I’m looking for something to wear to a rehearsal dinner,” I tell Celia. “Nothing too fancy, but with sleeves for winter.”

She offers a few options and I settle on a black number with short sleeves and a ruffle down the side.

As I hand over my credit card, it’s time. “I’ve been meaning to ask you for while, would you maybe want to get lunch one day?”

“I’d love to! I really would.” Celia sounds genuinely excited by my invitation. “You know, I meet great people here all the time, but it’s so hard to ask anyone to hang out.”

“Yeah, believe me, I know what you mean.”

“Especially since I work here. I don’t want customers being like ‘Why is the salesgirl asking me to lunch?’ It would be unprofessional.”

In all the time I’ve thought about asking Celia out, it never occurred to me that maybe she wanted to be my friend, too, that perhaps something was holding her back. Celia’s approximately
seven feet tall and impossibly thin and pretty. Almost intimidatingly so. And she has an impeccable fashion sense. For whatever reason, this combo told me she was probably pretty well-stocked in the friends department.

I never would have thought of it on my own, but Celia’s hesitancy to personally befriend customers makes perfect sense. Of course she can’t risk potential business by asking customers to drinks. What if she asked me and I got weirded out and never returned? Or worse, I complained to her boss?

It’s another reminder of why, when I meet someone who could make a great best friend, I should just go for it. I’ll never know the other person’s story. She could be a store manager anxious for new friends but reluctant to look unprofessional. Or she could be a waitress even newer in town than I.

In the last twenty-four hours I’ve successfully tried to befriend two women, and the takeaway? You’ll never know what she’s thinking until you ask.

Well, that and a little black dress.

FRIEND-DATE 45.
Jordan’s friend Hallie joins us for dance class almost every Saturday. Today the three of us go for our usual post-cardio brunch, but Jordan, still hurting in the aftermath of a late Friday night, bails mid-meal. Hallie and I finish lunch—including Jordan’s leftover hash browns—and decide to do some early holiday shopping. It’s our first time hanging out just the two of us. This is my favorite kind of friend-date—the impromptu, we’re-just-gals-doing-our-thing-on-a-Saturday-afternoon outing. It’s exactly what I was missing at this time last year, the void that inspired me to start this search in the first place. There’s a quiet feeling of victory surrounding this date.

My brother and Jaime are hosting our family for a welcome-to-the-neighborhood dinner party tonight. Alex has finally settled into his Chicago life—a new job, some furniture, a working knowledge of the city’s grid layout—and we’ve spent a Saturday or two sitting around in his apartment, watching TV and not-talking like only siblings can. Witnessing his new beginning has been a bit like peering into Dumbledore’s Pensieve, giving me an opportunity to look back in time at my own Chicago start from a third-person perspective.

Alex is me three years ago. He has plenty of family in Chicago, and is acquainted enough with Jaime’s friends and their significant others, but he doesn’t have many—or, maybe, any—of his own local friends. Yet. He left a tight-knit group of buddies behind in New York, moved here for love, and is currently too busy enjoying the spoils of sharing a hometown with his girlfriend to be upset about a lack of male bonding time. And when Sunday football rolls around he watches with Matt. He’s taken care of.

For now, Alex is totally satisfied. He’s happy and fulfilled, and if you ask him about his friends—or lack thereof—he’ll say, “I’m fine with it. I’m doing great.” And he means it.

My brother might change his mind one day and launch a (more low-key, less obsessive) BFF search of his own. Or he won’t. At the moment, I feel worse about his social circumstances than he does—due in equal parts to my new hyper-sensitivity to relationships and the fact that I’m a girl—so I’m keeping my mouth shut.

Taking stock of Alex’s situation has shed light on how far I’ve come. On quiet Friday nights I’ll get a text from him that
says “What are you up to tonight?” and I’ll almost always have plans, usually with a friend I’ve made this year. I feel guilty that I can’t be there for him the way I wish someone had been there for me, but I know he’s happy for me. Not too long ago I was the one on the couch figuring out who I could call. Now I’ve got the packed social calendar.

“How’s the quest going?” Jaime asks me over dinner.

“Really well,” I say. “I’ve definitely made some new friends, if not a very best one.” I’m excited to tell her about my recent conquests and my dates on the books with Maritza and Celia.

“It’s amazing the way you find these people,” she says. “The new friends I’ve made in Chicago have always been through my existing friends. I’ll go to one girl’s bachelorette party, where I’ll meet some of her other friends, and then we’ll exchange numbers and start hanging out on our own.”

“That’s a pretty ideal way to meet people,” I say. “The problem for me was that when I moved here I didn’t have that base level to get the ball rolling. I couldn’t meet friends of friends because I didn’t have enough friends in the first place.”

If I haven’t found one single best friend forever this year, maybe I’ve done one better. I’ve planted the seeds for a future in Chicago. I’ve built a life here, and established the first layer of connections that Jaime is talking about—the people through which, in time, I will make even more friends. Jaime’s method of meeting people is probably the most organic—her BFFs “just happened,” as everyone thinks friend-making should—but it’s impossible without some first-degree companions to kick-start the process.

This project started in January, and now, in early November, I finally have enough new friends to meet people the way Jaime
has, the way we all want to. I found Alexis through Hannah, Hallie through Jordan.

The “just happening” is finally happening, it simply took a year of work to get there.

FRIEND-DATE 46.
Maritza waves at me from a table in the corner. Considering she commented on how little we talked at dinner, I wasn’t sure she’d recognize me.

“I had to Facebook you to figure out who the note was from,” she says. “You know what’s so funny? I actually got two notes that night, and they were both from girls.”

“
Two
notes? Does that happen a lot? I thought I was so crazy.” The big stink I made about leaving my little message seems a tad melodramatic now.

“It’s not so uncommon, but they’re usually from guys. The night you were there I served a big group of girls at another table and they left a note saying ‘When will we see you again?’ I must have been really on my game.”

I thought I’d noticed something under the surface with Maritza, a spark that spoke to me as her BFF-to-be, but apparently she’s just charming. Still, two notes in one night? Both from friend wannabes? What are the chances?

“I think you were my server last time,” Maritza tells our waitress when we start to order.

“Yeah, I probably was. I basically live here.”

They get into a long conversation about the restaurant business. Our waitress is in fashion school and debating a move to New York to follow her dream.

“She’s from New York!” Maritza says about me.

“It’s true,” I say.

“Oh really? I’ll totally need to pick your brain. How do you guys know each other?”

“She picked me up when I was her server,” Maritza tells her. “Watch out, we might recruit you.”

I can see now why Maritza would get two notes in a night. She’s clever, friendly, funny. She’s magnetic. The kind of girl that everyone wants to be friends with.

Over the next hour I learn that Maritza is from Austin, she was once an aspiring actress though now she likes working in the restaurant biz, she’s a big-time indie music lover, and she found the
Flashdance
-esque T-shirt she’s wearing—with a picture of Madonna on the front—at a local thrift shop.

Oh, and she was on
Road Rules.

“Like on MTV?” I ask.

“Yup. I was almost cast for
Real World Las Vegas
, but I was only 19 at the time. Really dodged a bullet with that one.” She wipes her brow in mock relief. You might remember Vegas as the season that kicked off the whole
Real-World
-as-soft-porn thing.

I didn’t watch her
Road Rules
season, but this news solidifies what I’ve been starting to realize about my current girl-date: She’s totally too cool for me.

“What do you mean too cool?” Jenny’s laughing as I recap my lunch date over the phone.

“For starters, she basically travels the country going to music festivals. Very cool. She was on
Road Rules
, which I know is a bit suspect, but mostly makes her pretty badass. And she says that at 26 she’s too old for MTV and rejects all requests to go back for any Challenges. Meaning, she’s smart. Also her boyfriend is a server at Topolobampo, Rick Bayless’s restaurant, and his sister lives on Bayless’s property. So cool! And also so delicious. I’ve got to get in on that.” (Rick Bayless is one of Chicago’s most famous chefs. His Mexican feast earned him the inaugural
Top Chef Masters
title.)

“But you’re cool,” Jenny says.

“Jenny, I’m as cool as the next guy, I guess. I can talk pop culture and play beer pong. She’s like, actually, legitimately, cool. So obviously I adored her and have a total girl-crush. And I think she liked me—she kind of made me nervous, but she laughed a lot at my one-liners and texted me as soon as she got in a cab to say she wanted to invite Matt and me to a dinner party. So we’ll see.”

“I wish you could hear yourself. You’re hysterical.”

I am a bit over the moon about this one. I’ve got friendship butterflies.

The StoryStudio is a Chicago writing center that Kelly the author told me about over dinner, and tonight I’m checking it out for the first time. I signed up for The Write-In, a writing marathon and pizza party in honor of National Novel Writing Month. I’m not actually writing a novel, but I figure no one will check the text on my computer as long as I look busy. I’m not actually here to write, anyway. I mean, I
could
write, if I have to, but I’m here to—what else?—pick up some women.

Writing may be a solitary enterprise but pizza party sounded social enough to me. Not so much. There’s pizza and soda, but party there is not. Just a handful of people spread out in the studio lobby, typing away on their would-be masterpieces. I try to make eye contact with a few fellow writers, maybe flash them a smile, but no matter how intensely I stare I can’t get anyone to lift her head or glance in my direction.

That’s okay. This feels like being in a library and is certainly a more calming environment than my home—with washing
machines humming and football announcers yelling in the background—so I plug in my laptop and get to work.

Nothing changes as the night progresses. I trade some pleasantries with the studio owner but that’s about it. I don’t mind, though. I’m enjoying the quiet.

As I explore the studio, I’m reminded of all the activities I’ve tried out by myself this year. A flyer with next month’s schedule has me wondering if I should sign up for a class. And then I have an epiphany. This year hasn’t just made me more social, it’s made me more independent. I’m at once better at making friends and better at being alone. And not merely because I have less time to myself and thus appreciate the time I do have more, though that’s certainly part of it. It’s because in order to meet new friends I’ve had no choice but to go on some solo adventures—meetups and volunteer outings and religious groups, oh my. A year ago I would have thought, “That write-in sounds cool, I wish I had a friend to go with me.” But my internal dialogue has shifted. Now I think, “That write-in sounds cool, maybe I’ll meet a friend there.”