“Yeah,” she said, with another shrug. “But it’s getting to be a pain, you know? I have to get up at seven every morning now, to make the bus. And I’ve taken on all those extra shifts at Lambell too, now that I’m paying rent.” Lambell was an upmarket steakhouse where Candela waitressed.
“Why don’t you just move back home for a while? You’ve made your point.”
“No way,” said Candela. “I’d rather die than give my mother the satisfaction of seeing me come back.”
“Seriously, your mum isn’t that bad. I have to live with mine, and she’s a million times worse.”
Candela knew what my mother was like, so she didn’t have a good enough comeback.
“Why are you doing this, Candela? I thought you wanted to go to college and do an arts degree or something.”
She was quiet for a few moments, and then her face began to crumple.
“Candela,” I said, putting my arm around her. “What’s wrong?”
“I just can’t do it anymore,” she said, tears rolling down her cheeks.
“Do what?” I said, feeling my stomach clench. I’ve known Candela my entire life, and I had seen her cry only a handful of times.
“I can’t walk through those school halls or run the track or sneak a cigarette behind the bike sheds without seeing Ana’s face. I can’t keep pretending that everything is normal, not while I’m still there.” She was sobbing now, and I tried my best to comfort her, the way she always did for me. “I’m trying to be strong about it, Audrey—I really am,” she gulped. “But I let Ana down. She was like a sister to me. I just—I can’t be there anymore.” She shook her head, wiping her tears with the back of her hand.
“Candela,” I said, as a fresh new wave of guilt washed over me. “I don’t want you messing up your future because of what happened to Ana. It’s not fair.”
She sighed deeply and was quiet for a while. “I don’t care about my fucking future.”
“Don’t say that.”
She shrugged. “Anyway, I don’t want to talk about it anymore.”
“Maybe you should see someone about Ana.”
“I don’t want to. Besides, I can’t afford a shrink, and there’s no way I’m asking Mum.”
“Do you have to quit right now? Why don’t you think it over for a couple of weeks?”
“Stop fretting about me, Audrey. I’ll be fine, honestly. I know what I’m doing.”
“I don’t know if you do,” I said, still unconvinced.
“Anyway, let’s face it,” she said with a smirk. “I’m not as brainy as you and Lucy. I was never going to ace my exams.”
“You don’t know that.”
She gave me her best “don’t-bullshit-me-Audrey” look. I opened my mouth to protest but closed it again. I knew my friend. I could talk until I was blue in the face, and it wouldn’t make an iota of difference. It was clear that Candela had made up her mind.
“So how is the boy?” asked Ida, an unlit cigarette dangling between her brightly painted nails.
We were in the middle of our third session together. It was a particularly warm day, and the fan was whirring noisily above us. The lazy drone of a plane flying overhead made me feel suddenly sleepy.
“We’re not in touch anymore.”
“Oh? What happened?”
“It was a mutual thing,” I shrugged. “I suppose it was getting kind of messy. We thought it was best we keep our distance for now.”
“That’s very mature of you both.”
“It is?”
She nodded.
I leaned back into my chair and stared up at the ceiling, mesmerized by the hypnotic spin of the blades.
“How do you feel about your decision to end the friendship with Rad?”
I thought about it for a minute.
“Lonely,” I said finally. “It’s a lot harder than I thought it would be. I mean, it’s not like anything romantic happened between us. But I miss talking to him. Every time I come across something I think he’d like, I just wish I could call him up or send him a text. Like the other day, I saw this movie, Coherence. It was about parallel universes, and I just know he’d love it. That’s the thing; he’s the only person I know who would appreciate it the same way I do. And I wish I could watch it with him and talk to him about it. Why is that so important to me? I don’t get it. I didn’t even think about all this before I knew him.”
“It’s human nature, I suppose. To have another person validate your own unique view of the world.”
“I can’t even talk about it, which makes me think about it more.”
Ida nodded. “Things tend to grow bigger in your mind if you let them sit there. It’s always better to get it off your chest. That’s why I’m here.”
We were quiet for a few minutes.
“My friend Candela just quit school.”
“Really? In her final term?”
“Yeah. It almost feels like she’s on this self-destructive path. I think Ana’s death has been really difficult on her.”
I told Ida about the time Rad and I went to the cemetery and found Candela’s picture in Ana’s locket.
“I don’t know exactly what their relationship was, but it obviously went deeper than I thought. Whenever I try to talk to Candela about it, she clams up. And then just like that, she switches to her old happy-go-lucky self, and I think I’m just imagining it all. It makes me uneasy. I’m worried sick about her, but I feel so helpless.”
“I know the feeling, sweetheart. But it’s up to Candela to sort her own life out. All you can do is be a friend to her. Keep a line of communication open.”
“I know,” I said quietly. “It feels almost like she’s a different person now. She moved away from home a few weeks ago, and she’s hanging out with a weird crowd. I met them at her housewarming, and I didn’t feel comfortable around them.” I shrugged. “But maybe it’s just me.”
“It’s good to trust your instincts; they’re usually right.” Ida reached for a lighter and finally sparked up her cigarette. She took a long drag and looked at me. “How about your mother?”
“She’s driving me insane. I’ve stopped seeing Rad, but she’s still not happy. I don’t know what the hell she wants from me.”
“I see,” she said and let me continue.
“She’s just so—I don’t know . . . miserable. I can’t seem to do anything right. There’s always a problem. It’s like walking on eggshells. When it’s just Dad and me, things are easy. I just want her to not be so crazy all the time.”
“Have you spoken to her about how you feel?”
“I’ve tried, but there’s no point. It’s like a monologue with her. Lucy talks to her mother all the time. It’s a two-way street with them. They’re, like, best of friends. I don’t know why mine has to be so difficult.”
“Relationships are complex things. On the surface it should be simple. But it’s like an onion. So many layers there. The mother-daughter relationship seems to be a particularly tough one. But they tend to work themselves out as you get older.”
“I don’t know,” I said, unconvinced. “It seems to get progressively worse every year.”
She gave me a sympathetic look. “Is the rubber band still working?”