You Deserve to Know

Chapter 3

3

THE BEGINNING OF LAST SUMMER

Lisa took one look at this new Gwen woman and realized in her gut that things were about to change, and not for the better.

For the past two years it had been just Lisa and Marcus, Aimee and Scott—#SLAM. As in, Let’s have some SLAM time this weekend . Or in the captions beneath the many posts on Instagram and Facebook, #SLAM #SlammingGoodTime.

She and Marcus had moved into the East Bethesda neighborhood toward the end of the pandemic. She had wanted to do it sooner, but Marcus was reluctant to leave their row house on Capitol Hill, so close to where he worked as a lobbyist on K Street, and a short drive from where his mom still lived in Calvert Hills. But for Lisa, living in those cramped quarters had become unbearable, no matter how cute the nineteenth-century molding was. The combination office-slash-living room-slash-family room just wasn’t working. During the pandemic, when Kai was home trying to attend first-grade class online and Marcus was taking calls, Lisa found it increasingly difficult to run her life-coaching business in the crowded house. The spirit of her coaching business was summed up in her motto, written across the top of her website in pink script: I am allowed to do what’s best for me, even if it upsets others.

So, she took her own advice and insisted they decamp for the suburbs. Bethesda offered the promise of a backyard for Kai to play in and what seemed like an endless number of rooms to hide out in, and all within walking distance of downtown Bethesda and the metro. Even if the commute was farther for Marcus, the public schools were great. Meeting Aimee and Scott had validated that this was the right move. Not only would Kai flourish, but Lisa could also start over socially. She had few friends on the Hill, and she felt lucky to have hit it off with Aimee.

But now the delicate ecology of the cul-de-sac was being threatened. She could see it in Aimee’s face, the way it lit up when Gwen waltzed through the gate with her two little boys in tow. Lisa had to stifle a snort. Gwen with her blond hair in a low bun, in white linen pants and a linen tank that showed off her tan. What kind of woman wore white linen to a backyard barbecue? What mom of twins even owned white linen? And the two boys in their matching clothes. It was all so desperate, so inauthentic. As if she were the star of her own reality TV show.

Aimee, who ran her own landscaping business and, as hard as she tried, never seemed able to scrub all the dirt from her hands, would see right through this woman’s phoniness, wouldn’t she?

Aimee was her best friend. Her FP—favorite person. After years of struggling to befriend women, Lisa finally had found someone worthy of her intense loyalty. Aimee was good . And she had never felt so secure in a friendship before. Ever since college—even before that, if she was being honest with herself—female friendship had eluded her. She knew how to attract guys. That started early. By seventh grade she had a full C cup and her first boyfriend. Yet connecting with girls her age did not come naturally. She might make a friend, but then there would be some blowup that left her baffled and hurt and alone. Her freshman roommate, Ruth, was the most extreme example of this, but there had been other, less-dramatic incidents.

But Aimee was different. Aimee didn’t just like Lisa, Aimee needed her. A bit frazzled and overwhelmed by work and kids, Aimee valued loyalty and reliability above all else, above cleverness, or wit, or a fancy wardrobe. And Lisa could provide that reliability. She made sure of that. She loved to be there to scoop the kids up from school if Aimee was delayed at work, or to offer to grab something at Whole Foods while she was shopping. She had made herself indispensable to Aimee, and in return Aimee had offered a kind of automated friendship. They sat next to each other at school events, they trick-or-treated together. She would never be alone again, thanks to Aimee.

But on this Friday night, prime #SLAM time was being interrupted by this Gwen woman and her twin boys, who just showed up in Aimee’s backyard.

The way Aimee beamed at the woman, Lisa knew she was fucked.

“Gwen! I’m so glad you could come.” Aimee took the bowl Gwen was carrying and put it on the table. “This looks amazing!”

Lisa peered inside the bowl. A caprese salad, the kind a child could throw together with a basket of cherry tomatoes and a container of mozzarella balls. “And you must be Anton!” Lisa looked up to see an unsmiling man with a salt-and-pepper goatee standing there holding a four-pack of beer in one hand while his other was jammed into his pocket. Aimee turned to Lisa. “Anton and Gwen, this is my friend Lisa. She lives two houses down, the one with the orange door. And that’s Marcus, her husband, next to Scott over there.”

Friend? Not best friend. Not even dear or close. Just friend. Lisa seethed. She held out her hand. “So exciting.”

“They have twins also! The same year as Benji and Max.” Aimee gestured toward her two boys huddled over some rocks at the edge of the yard.

“Isn’t that just nuts!” Gwen said and held out her hand. Lisa took it. How could she not?

Anton put down the four-pack of craft beer. Scott came over and started oohing and ahhing, and soon Marcus joined them, the three of them back-slapping and debating the merits of different types of IPAs. Such simpletons. All it took was good beer.

Lisa turned her attention to Gwen and Aimee. It was like watching the scene in a movie when the main characters meet and fall in love. They were standing a foot apart, beaming at each other and going on about their twins. Twins, twins, twins. As if giving birth to twins gave them some magical connection. Lisa kept her smile pinned to her face, watching in real time as she shrank smaller and smaller in Aimee’s universe.

An anguish bloomed within her—she was being replaced. Aimee would leave her. Fade her out. She was already nervous that Kai starting middle school this fall would weaken one of the bonds between her and Aimee. When the kids were little, the two-year difference, and the fact that Noa was a girl and Kai a boy, hadn’t mattered at all. They were happy to hang out together and go to the zoo or the park, or watch animated movies. But that had changed last year. Kai had started making comments and pushing back when asked to socialize with Noa. It would only get worse once he was in middle school. Would Aimee pivot away from her?

No. She wouldn’t do that to Lisa. And Lisa wouldn’t allow it to happen, not again. She wouldn’t make the same mistakes of her freshman year all over again. She had learned a lot since then.

Now, she knew that fighting too hard for a friendship could actually cause you to lose it. It was like that book Of Mice and Men , the way that big guy petted the puppy too hard and killed it accidentally. She had held on to Ruth’s friendship too tightly and squeezed it to death. She had learned that you had to be subtle. Work back channels. Not be obvious. Lisa plastered a huge smile on her face.

“Well, welcome to the neighborhood,” Lisa said. “You’re going to love it here.”