Friends Like Us

Zusatztext 77508886 Informationen zum Autor Lauren Fox Klappentext For Willa Jacobs, looking at her best friend Jane is like looking in a mirror on a really good day. Strangers assume they are sisters, and they share everything: an apartment, clothing, and groceries, and the challenge of making rent on part-time jobs. Together they are a fortress of private jokes and shared opinions, with a friendship so close there's hardly room for anyone else. But when Ben, Willa's oldest friend, reappears and falls in love with Jane, Willa wonders: Can she let her two best friends find happiness with each other if it means they leave her behind? CHAPTER ONE Jane sweeps a scattering of crumbs into a neat little pile. “You are quite a slob,” she says as she pushes the broom across the floor with a rhythmic swish-­swish . “And so lucky to have me to clean up your messes!” “I know,” I say, watching an ant crawl across the windowsill. “But if I weren’t so messy, you wouldn’t get the satisfaction of cleaning the apartment. I do it for you. For your OCD.” “Thank you, sweetie,” she says. She props the broom against the wall and drops to her hands and knees, sponging up invisible spills, scrubbing our crummy kitchen linoleum into gleaming submission. “Don’t get me wrong,” I continue, lifting my feet so Jane can clean under them. “I appreciate it. But it’s not a favor if you can’t not do it.” “I can stop anytime I want to!” “You missed a spot,” I say, pointing with my left big toe to a nonexistent smudge on the floor; in response, she squeezes a dribble from the wet sponge over my bare foot. “I do appreciate your attention to detail,” she says, dabbing my foot. “Well, here’s how you can repay me,” I say as Jane squirts a viscous blob of liquid cleanser onto the sponge. “You can come with me tonight.” “And you know, my pretty, that there is no chance of that.” “Why not? A, you don’t have to talk to anyone if you don’t want to, and B, if you do, people will find you charming and interesting.” Sometimes I think it’s helpful to speak in outline form. “Willa,” Jane says, attacking the tabletop. “I will not go to your high school reunion. A, I’m not your boyfriend, and B, I didn’t go to high school with you.” Excitement is the cousin of dread. Three weeks ago I agreed to attend my eight-­year high school reunion. Eight-­year reunion, yes: there it was, in my in-­box, an Evite to a list of two hundred twenty-­eight vaguely familiar names from one vaguely familiar name: Shelby Stigmeyer, who, the invitation explained, was supposed to get married tonight, but her fiancé called off the engagement, and Shelby couldn’t get the deposit back on the room. Aw, I thought. Awwww . And in this fleeting, unfortunate moment of sympathy, I added my name to the “yes” column. I’ve spent the last twenty-­one days regretting it. The only thing I liked about high school was leaving it—­that and my best friend, Ben Kern, nickname “Pop,” but he’s just another reason I should have declined that invitation. I don’t want to go tonight, and I desperately don’t want to go alone. Jane is, in fact, the closest thing I have to a boyfriend, and with her, what promises to be an excruciating rerun of four years of shyness could be, instead, a party. But I know her well enough to know that she’s easily moved, right up until the moment she’s not. “Fine,” I say, defeated. I deliberately let a shower of crumbs from my granola bar fall onto the table. She reaches around me with her sponge, unimpressed, then kisses me on the head. “It will be fine. It’s only one night. You can leave early.” She dabs at the last of the crumbs, her thin arm close to my face, her skin warm and bleachy. “Take good notes. I’ll wait up.” The trip that should take twenty minutes takes me a good forty, as I deliberately navigate the side streets...

Dettagli sul prodotto

• Autori: Lauren Fox
• Editore: Vintage USA
• Lingue: Inglese
• Formato: Tascabile
• Pubblicazione: 04.09.2012
• EAN: 9780307388254
• ISBN: 978-0-307-38825-4
• Pagine: 288
• Dimensioni: 133 mm x 202 mm x 18 mm
• Serie: Vintage Contemporaries; Vintage Contemporaries
• Categoria: Narrativa > Romanzi