The F word

Last night, a splatter of rain drops began to hit my office window just before six. I grabbed my massive company logo-ed golf umbrella on my way out the door. A fortunate thing as the rain was torrential on Friday night. I arrived at the botanical gardens just before seven with thermosed hot chocolate and biscotti. I spotted gorgeous in her gum boots by the gate. She folded up her umbrella and we walked into the nearly empty gardens under mine. My jeans were already soaked from my soft leather boots to my knees.

Blushing with small talk, we followed the lanterned path until we met the "lagoon". It was good and felt natural. The conversation flowed in rivulets until we paused next to the Friendship Pavilion facing the Stone Mountain. As I watched the lit boats sway in the water, I sensed a slight shift in gorgeous's position to mine. Sure enough, the dreaded words soon followed.

"Rachel, I need to tell you something ..." Perhaps inspired by the heavens opening up above us, a sordid tale of lesbian drama flowed from gorgeous's lips, a tale which it is not my place to repeat here. However, I will recommend to all of you, if you live with your partner, it's a good idea to have separate user accounts on your home computer. If you don't have those and you break up with said partner, it's a good idea to change your password on any and all internet accounts you may have. Never, ever cache those passwords. When you change those passwords, try not to make the new passwords guessable, for example "{her name}b1tch" is not a good choice.

And so I listened and empathized and outside of a few "hmmms" heard in silence while a part of me wondered what the hell I was doing in soaked pants and the driving rain listening and empathizing when I could be at home in front of my fireplace with a hot drink. Sadder still, I knew where the conversation was flowing to. No one ever says, "Can I talk to you?" or "I need to tell you something" when what they have to tell you is something you may want to hear. No, those phrases are always a precursor to getting fired or dumped. Last night, lucky me, it was neither. Instead I was offered the F word. Yes, the dreaded F word. No, not f**k or fudge or even evil facebook but friend. Friend. Platonic pal (argh).

A few years ago, I might have responded with "I have quite a few friends already, thank you." And I do. I love people and I have many friends but lately they have all been coupling up or having babies. Sometimes, even, both things have happened to the same friend. So ... yeah, I guess I could try my hand at being gorgeous's friend. Why not? She's hot. Surely she has hot friends.

Rachel **