With #8 out of town, and a bit of acting out around the house, I called P_ and asked if he’d like to get together. “Come over for dinner,” he said. Great, a fabulous meal with a fabulous friend, thank you Oh Mighty Isis for taking me away from it all. Well, he made an amazing dinner: a soup of beans, nettles, and artichokes; roasted chicken served over oak-leaf-lettuce; and a ricotta cheesecake and cherries for dessert. I shouldn’t say that the dinner was amazing, it was a work of culinary and visual art, one of the most memorable meals of my life, the evening itself to unfold in cinematic dimensions.
We watched Two for the Road, which he thought that I had recommended to him at some point, which I don’t remember, but we agreed on the lack of compelling dialogue and a mutual aversion to Albert Finney’s character–but Audrey’s clothes! Worth the ride. After the movie, and during dessert, he came over to my side of the table and kissed me, just a little peck, but with something behind it that hadn’t been yet expressed, well, besides in a jokey or teasing context, but there it was, this delicate little tap. And the walls came tumbling down. I was alternately incredibly excited and intensely scared–this guy’s one of my best friends–is this going to ruin the intimacy that we already share? Is it just an extension of it that I shouldn’t be so anxious about? What about bachelors number 8 through 10? He knows too much! While trying to read the confusing messages ping-ponging across my brain, D called. I was late coming home and he was worried. Did anyone see Love, Actually? Remember the Laura Linney character with the mentally ill brother? Bingo. P_ made me pull my socks on and go home.
Now, it’s that time in the movie when everything would seem to be in falling into place. Our hero has perused a healthy cross section of eligible San Francisco inamorati… and bam! the best friend, the one that the audience has been rooting for all along, the one slinking in the shadows but always available, always sympathetic, the one with the most in common, suddenly grabs our hero and plants one on him. Curtains close, The End, don’t forget your umbrella.