Page 2 of The Friend Game

“Well, another time, this guy got fired from the circus,” Jill adds. “ He almost killed a lion. And you know, nothing is more precious than life. Not even wedding photos.” She eyes her own wedding photo displayed prominently on the wall. I don’t miss the hint of doubt in her tone.

“He almost killed a lion?” I ask dubiously. “Who was this guy?”

“Uh, I doubt you’ve heard of him.” She takes a hurried sip of coffee before continuing. “His name is, uh, Cliff. Cliff something-or-other.” Jill coughs, then sets her mug on the coffee table. “Anyway, thepoint is that, as I said, he ended up with a great job that he was perfectly suited for. And if it can happen for Cliff it can happen for you.”

“Cliff something-or-other?” Brooke echos, raising one perfectly manicured brow. “You know, I actually think I’ve heard of this guy. Liam mentioned him to me.”

“Oh yes,” Jill shoots Brooke an annoyed look, “I was so inspired by his story that I mentioned it at the dinner table the other day. Liam really resonated with it too.”

“Really?” I say again in surprise. Liam is Jill’s 6-year-old. I love the kid, but I didn’t think he resonated with anything beyond Spider-Man and Buzz Lightyear.

“Well, he liked the ending because of the job Cliff ended up choosing.” Jill explains.

“And what job did Cliff end up choosing?” I lean forward in spite of myself, feeling that familiar flurry of hope in my stomach. Hope that maybe this job idea will be the one. The job that finally sounds right. The job that excites me.

“Police do—” she cuts herself off, “man. Police man.”

“Police dog?” I narrow my eyes at her. “Did you just almost say police dog?”

“What? No,” Jill laughs shrilly, shifting suspiciously in her seat. Brooke’s lips are pursed together, and now I’m the police, cracking the caseof who exactly Cliff something-or-other actually is. Liam. Cliff. Police dog.

“Oh my word, Jill!” I exclaim. “You’re trying to give me advice based on the life of Clifford the Big Red Dog!”

“What?” Jill assumes her best Jill Bernard, media consultant face. Incidentally, it’s the same one she uses with her two kids,“No, I did not put vegetables in those muffins, Ellie. Those green specks are just bits of fairy dust.”

“I absolutely was not trying to give you advice based on Clifford the Big Red Dog! I was trying to make you feel like you weren’t the only one out there who has struggled with finding the career they're best suited to.” The woman knows how to spin. She’s basically Rumplestiltskin with a bob.

“That’s right,” Brooke chimes in. “She wasn’t giving you advice based on the life of Clifford, she was just comparing your life to Clifford’s life.” Once again she can’t control her laughter.

“Brooklyn Natasha Garza,” Jill rises to her full seated height, “stop undermining my pep talk!”

“Sorry,” Brooke says, sounding anything but. “You know pep talks aren’t my forte.” This is true. Brooke is a straight shooter. On the plus side this means if she tells you your new haircut looks stunning, it does. On the not so plus side, if she tells you your new perm makes you look like the blondebefore version of Anne Hathaway’s character inPrincess Diaries, it does.

Actually, that might also be why I didn’t make the cheerleading team in ninth grade. Curls are not my friend.

Jill’s doorbell rings, interrupting our conversation, and she stands to go answer it. “Don’t worry, Han,” she says as she heads out, “you’ll be back on your feet in no time. And in the meantime you know Max and I love having you in our guest house.”

She disappears through the doorway, and I stare after her with a weird mixture of gratitude and jealousy. My beautiful, successful, older sister has the life of her dreams. An exciting career working with her senator husband, two adorable kids, a golden retriever that just got featured on the cover of the August/September issue ofDogMania, and this gorgeous six bedroom home that comes complete with a guest house in the backyard. The guest house that Holly and I have been occupying for the last seven months while I, as Jill continues to insist on calling it, get back on my feet. Sadly this phrase only serves to make me feel like I’ve sat down in a poorly stuffed bean bag chair and sunk so far into the floor I can’t get back up. I’m going to need some major intervention to make it happen. Please somebody grab my elbows and just yank.

Still, I can put up with Jill’s word choice if it means living rent free in an 800-square-foot house that overlooks a sparkling in-ground pool. Not to mention the free dog poop removal it comes with because, that’s right everyone, Jill and Max Bernard are wealthy enough to pay someone else to pick up their dog’s poop. The American Dream. Or at least an offshoot of it.

I’m guessing that’s who’s at the door now, since I saw the truck parked outside on the curb when I walked over this morning. They must’ve finished.

“So what career are you going to try next?” Brooke asks, picking up her jumbo-sized water bottle and taking a long sip. Looks like she’s behind this morning on her 'drink a million ounces of water per day' goal. She hasn’t even hit the first of the eight motivational sayings lining the bottle. You know, things like, “Chug it!” and, “You’ve almost reached camel status now, girlfriend!” Or something to that effect. The point is, usually by this hour she’d have hit motivational statement three, two at the very least. Guess I’m not the only slacker in the family.

My triumph is short-lived though as she finishes drinking, and stares at me expectantly. With resentment I notice she’s now past motivational statement one, “Don’t think, just drink!”

Well,” she prompts in response to my silence, “what’s it going to be? You’ve done the graphic design thing, you had that brief stint as my interior designer, worked at the history museum, you were a photographer’s assistant—what fabulous job do you have in mind next, my lovely art major sister?”

“I’m not sure yet,” I say into my lap. The thing is Brooke isn’t making fun of me, she really does want to know. And usually I’d be excited and ready to share my next career goal with my family. Two days after the T-Rex incident I sat on this very couch and showed Brooke and Jill Hugo’s advertisement looking for a photography assistant, telling them how I was certain this was it, the career of my dreams. I was going to be a photographer and take the wedding circuit by storm.

And the time before that, mere hours after I finished redecorating Brooke’s office at her piano bar and dance studio, I explained to them that I’d discovered I didn’t care much for looking at paint colors and flooring samples after all. Instead I was going to use my art degree at a museum, starting as a guide and hopefully working my way up to being a curator. I had it all figured out.

Each time, l’d had it all figured out.

This time, though, everything feels different. Maybe it’s because this time, my career change came at the expense of a couple’s important memories. Yes, there’s definitely that fact weighingme down, but there’s something else too. I’m starting to think that there may be no right job for me, that maybe I’ll just mess up any job I have. Maybe I’ll have to live in Jill’s guest house forever, sinking lower and lower into the beanbag chair of my life until I’m lying flat on the floor, dead.

Not to be dramatic or anything.

---