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<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica"><b>I'm
sitting with Amanda in the coffee shop and she's going
on about her most recent failed relationship. We're
having a free therapy session, really. I listen, she
talks. Mostly she talks about him.</b></font>
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<p><img src="stuff/burnt.gif" alt="{ burnt popcorn }" width="329" height="66" border="0">
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<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">It's
been a month and she's already burned all of the things
he gave her (except the ring, the T-shirts and the Star
Wars original-from-the-seventies pillowcase: they are
too valuable).</font>
<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">There's
one moment when we both stop talking to watch the guy
at the microwave, who is not paying attention to his
popcorn, but having a conversation with someone getting
cream and sugar for their coffee. The popcorn is just
starting to burn. We can both smell it.</font>
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<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">A crash
of thunder stops the conversation again. We watch the
rain in silence.</font>
<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">"So
what you're saying is you want him to be miserable and
full of regret?" I ask.</font>
<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">"I was
the best fucking thing that happened to him," she says.</font>
<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">I nod
wisely, absently, my eyes on the black mound of burnt
microwave popcorn the guy two tables away is starting
to eat. The smell alone is enough to make any sane
person sick.</font>
<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">He's
wearing a string tie, though, which explains a lot.</font>
<p>Amanda keeps on talking, but I'm really
thinking about books and the evil curse of wonderful
memories; like my best friend who is now just one of
those wonderful memories.</font>
<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">Is it
my fault he stopped speaking to me?</font>
<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">Maybe.</font>
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<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">I have
this copy of Fellowship of the Ring. It's so old it
might as well have been Tolkien's. The pages are smooth
and careworn. The cover fell off once and is held on
now with a wide swatch of black tape. It smells old. My
best friend gave it to me back when we were both in the
loop – back when he called me brother and the
summer nights seemed endless.</font>
<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">The
last time I moved and had to pack all of my junk away
into boxes, I took his book down from the shelf just
like all of the others, but as soon as I touched it I
had a memory. We were in the park and fighting. It was
my fault, a crappy end to an otherwise wonderful
afternoon. I remember it was my fault. I remember that
it had rained earlier in the afternoon, so the grass
was still wet. I remember it was very hot and by the
time we started to fight the sidewalks were just
starting to dry, a scattering of large light-colored
patches on the concrete. I can't remember why we were
fighting – I've tried, but I just can't remember
– but it was my fault, I'm sure of that.</font>
<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">He
started to walk away. I got hysterical. I begged,
pleaded with him to stay. He couldn't walk away, not
now, not after he knew everything about me. Not after
we'd confessed secrets and dreams. Not after I'd
finally invested and risked myself. I got so scared
when I realized I might loose the one thing I valued
most. I never knew friendship was so important. I
started to shake just a little and my breath came in
tiny ragged gasps.</font>
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<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">Amanda
starts to eat my fries. I get her the ketchup. Outside
the rain has stopped.</font>
<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">He
didn't walk away that day. We made up, somehow and
everything went back to normal. I had a best friend
again – someone who would listen to my secrets and
tell me his. It was such a simple wonderful thing that
I was amazed every day that it was there at all.</font>
<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">Later
that summer, all of a sudden, it wasn't there anymore.
He refused to speak with me. Even his girlfriend hung
up on me when I called her to ask what was going on.</font>
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<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">The popcorn
man has resorted to a knife and fork to carve up his
steaming charcoal lump. He gets ten points for effort,
but minus five hundred points for trying to eat the
smelly mess. It's really amazing what a microwave can
do.</font>
<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">My
insides felt black and burnt when I called him and he
wouldn't talk to me. Amanda is bitter but recovering
after just one month of forced closure. After a year I
was still up in the middle of the night asking why. Is
it my fault he stopped speaking to me?</font>
<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">No.</font>
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<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">Amanda
asks for the salt. My fries are mostly a memory now. I
give her the salt.</font>
<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">It's
been a few years since that last summer. I no longer
lie awake at night asking why. I'm on the way to
getting over him. I have other good friends and a score
of acquaintances. I write my secrets down because I
have no one to tell them to. When I sit at my desk in
my new apartment I can see the bookcase and Tolkien
sitting there, holding my memories and the slim chance
that maybe, one day out of the blue he'll call me and I
won't hang up and everything will be just like it was.</font>
<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">Until
then I have only my thoughts and an inscription that
reads, in his usual sloppy green scrawl that I remember
so well: "To my friend. For real." Surely that must
count for something.</font>
<p><font size="3" face="arial,helvetica">Amanda
grabs my wrist to look at my watch. "It's time to go,"
she says. We leave the coffee shop by the back entrance
– the smell of burnt popcorn still strong in the
air, but already starting to fade.</font>
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