He Said He Was My Friend
This is a story about a man, his wife, his life-long best friend, and betrayal.
It is about knowing when to walk away and when to lean on others.
There is no explicit sex in this story.
+++ +++ +++
I met David Jones on the first day of fourth grade. My name's Henry Johnson and Miss Jenkins assigned our seats alphabetically, so he sat behind me in the middle row. I was ten and naturally suspicious of anything or anyone new and since David was the new kid in school sitting right behind me, I was very suspicious.
I wasn't the big kid in the class. In fact, I was a bit small for my age and only caught up with the other kids when my growth spurt hit a few years later. David was a bit bigger than me and that added to my mistrust.
We got off to a bad start that first day of fourth grade when I felt a tap on my back. I turned around and the new kid asked me if he could borrow a pencil. What kind of kid comes to school without a pencil? I search my desk for a spare and that's when Miss Jenkins stopped the class to ask me why I wasn't paying attention.
"Well, give him a pencil and stop goofing off!"
Chewed out on the first day... The new kid was not off to a good start as far as I was concerned.
Over the next few days we talked a bit, mostly in a group with some of the other better students, and I was starting to think that the new kid might be okay.
All the while, Billy Baron was reestablishing his importance on the playground. Billy Baron, or Big Billy as he liked to be called, was the class bully. There were even some fifth graders he bullied when he got the chance. Let's just say he was a first-class jerk, and he was confident in his physical superiority. Big Billy didn't waste a lot of time, and on the fourth day of the first week of school he cornered me on the playground when the teachers were distracted. Billy was intent on reminding me of my place in the pecking order when all of a sudden David flew in, seemingly from nowhere, body checked Big Billy on his shoulders and head knocking Billy off his feet and driving him to the ground. Not waiting for Billy to regain his wits, David sat on his chest and threw four solid roundhouse blows to Big Billy's face and then jumped to his feet and stepped back. We both expected that our lives were over at that point, but Billy surprised us and cried like a baby. There must have been a commotion because two teachers were there before anyone could get away. We got detention for a week, but it was going to take more than that to wipe the smiles off my and David's faces. Sitting outside the principal's office I thanked him for coming to my rescue. "What are friends for?" was all he said.
From that day on David and I were true friends. By Christmas we were best friends and by summer we were like brothers. I would tutor David in his classes, and he would teach me to defend myself. We got to work bridging one another's shortcomings. Miss Jenkins must have been sharper than I thought because by Thanksgiving she had recognized the signs of dyslexia in David. With the support of his parents and a good therapist, he began to excel in school as I began to stand up to the bullies.
You want to hear something I would never have expected? By summer, Billy was friends with both David and me. It turned out that Billy was also dyslexic, although his was worse than David's, and his inability to learn was the source of his bullying. Once he got the help he needed, he became a new man (well, a new boy, anyway). Under that mantle of anger and frustration there was a really decent guy. More than once he saved us from the older kids and I began to think that half the world must be dyslexic.
As we grew older and started high school, Big Billy as he was still known started playing football in the fall and baseball in the spring and he quickly became the big man in high school. Despite that, he never lost his genuine good nature and warm heart. He joined up when we graduated and was killed in Iraq a year later. He was as much loved and respected by his fellow soldiers as he was by us, and the saddest day in my life was the day we laid our friend William Baron to rest.
Make that the second saddest day. The saddest day came seven years later.
+++ +++ +++
David and I went to separate colleges, but we stayed in touch. We got together over holidays and during the summers and each time it was like no time had passed. We instantly picked up where we left off, finishing the stories we started before returning to school, chasing the girls, and generally trying to have a good time while not getting into too much trouble.
In my junior year I met Ariel and fell hopelessly in love. She was warm and funny, bright and mischievous, and she kept me on my toes. It's true, she made me work for it. She flirted and encouraged me in every way a woman can, but she took it slow and I decided I would wait forever if that was what it took. It didn't. It took six months and then she was in my bed never to leave, or so I thought.
Summer came and my parents were anxious to meet her, and quietly pass judgement on this young woman who had captured my heart, so she spent two weeks staying with us as I stayed with her family as well. By the end of summer, both sets of parents decided they approved. We each got a gentle lecture about waiting until marriage, but I think they all knew that wasn't happening. Ariel got a quiet reminder from her mother to be smart, take precautions, and not get pregnant until she was married. My father gave me much the same lecture and said, "If you have to, for god's sake don't be stupid and wear a condom." I nodded and smiled. Ariel was already on the pill.
Ariel met David while she visited me that summer and they quickly became surprisingly close. I would leave them alone for a few minutes for whatever reason and return to find them laughing together. She would give him a nudge with her shoulder, and he would give her a hug. It was as if they had known each other as long as David and I had known one other and I confess I had my first pangs of jealousy. However, I told myself that I was being foolish, that these were the two people closest to me in all the world, and if I couldn't trust them then I couldn't trust anyone.
In the fall we went back to school for our senior year. Ariel would, from time to time, ask about David and how he was doing. I told myself that was normal since they had become friends, but I confess that it sometimes wore on my mind. It was never much, and she never would go on about him, but I sometimes felt like boundaries were being crossed. I told myself I needed to grow up and should set aside any concerns I had about them, and for the most part I did exactly that.
Graduation came and I popped the question. Ariel accepted and all the world seemed right. We both got jobs in Hartford Connecticut, found an apartment, and moved in together.
Now years before when attending a wedding of my cousin, I told my parents, "I'm never going to do all this! I'll find a girl who wants a simple wedding and then a party and it's done."
When my parents stopped laughing, my father said, "When you find the right girl, if you find the right girl, you will do what she wants, smile, and act like you like it." The smile on my mother's face told me he was right, and I retained the lesson. When the time came, I helped Ariel find a hall, hire a florist, choose the cake, select the menu, and address the invitations. I wore the tux she approved of, practiced my vows, and I did as I was told. Snicker at me all you want; you guys did the same thing, and you know it.
David flew into town to be my best man. The wedding went off without a hitch and I settled into a happily married life with my love. Six months went by and David moved to Hartford. Life was getting better every day.
I had long gotten over those pangs of jealousy I once felt and trusted each of them completely. I would later come to wonder how my trust had been misplaced.
+++ +++ +++
We all three had good jobs and were doing well. Life was good. We each moved out of our entry level positions and started taking on real responsibility. David had an apartment across town from us, but Hartford is a small town and we got together regularly. In fact, it wasn't unusual for me to come home and find Ariel and David sitting at the kitchen table, each with a beer, laughing over some shared joke.
It was a Friday evening and I walked through the door. "Look at him, dragging his sorry ass home like some old man."
Ariel was giggling at this. "What's the matter, babe, have a hard day?"
I dropped my case on the sofa. "There are some days when it seems all I do is fill out forms, write reports, and get not one damn thing of any importance done."
David sat up straight and said, "Not important?! What kind of paper pushing bureaucrat are you? Don't you know that the paperwork is all that matters? If the papers are in order, then everything has to be right!"
That's what passes for engineering humor. "Yeah, right! The paperwork was all in order, but NASA still drove a spacecraft into Mars."
"You have to admit, it made a big hole!" David was laughing now, and Ariel was smiling.
By then I'd found a beer and raised it in a toast. "Never do anything in a small way!"
"To paperwork!" and we each took a drink.
That night we grilled some burgers, baked some potatoes, and Ariel made a salad. David slept over and we all went out to breakfast the next morning. In other words, it was the start of a fairly typical weekend. David claimed to have a date Saturday night and a few errands to run first, so we didn't see him the rest of the weekend. That was fine with me since I wanted some private time with the lady of the house (although it was really just an apartment).
Like I said, life was good. In fact, it was so good that I didn't notice when our life together started to change. It was probably a year and a half into our marriage when Ariel started working late more often. She also started dressing better for work. It wasn't sudden and it wasn't excessive, so when I finally noticed the pattern, I wrote it off as being no more than a motivated young woman taking on her professional responsibilities. We were making more money by that time and I understood that she wanted to dress better. We were still getting together with David regularly and many times he was still waiting for me when I got home on Friday evenings. The problem was that increasingly he was waiting alone.
"The ball and chain working late again?"
"Apparently."
"She's been doing that a lot lately."
