The After Party by Anton DiSclafani Page B

child. “Two weeks,” I said. I stood there with my hand on my hip, and I was aware of the ridiculousness of my pose, as if I were a schoolteacher and Joan was my bad pupil. I sat down across from her.
    â€œShould I make us tea?” I asked, and sighed.
    Joan shook her head. It occurred to me that Joan didn’t really want to be here at all. It was starting to seem like that, more and more as we sat there.
    â€œI was with an old friend,” she said finally. “From my Hollywood days.”
    I felt my cheeks turn hot, my palms dampen. I took a deep breath before I spoke.
    â€œI didn’t know you had friends from your Hollywood days.”
    Joan lit a cigarette in a single, practiced motion. She looked like Kim Novak when she smoked.
    â€œI don’t have many. But I have some.”
    She turned her head away as she said this last part; she didn’t want to make eye contact. It wasn’t like Joan, to provide explanations, to account for herself. My instinct had been correct: this man meant something to her.
    â€œSo this is something serious.”
    â€œDid I say it was serious? He’s an old friend. Just an old, old friend.”
    â€œSo that’s where you’ve been. With your old friend,” I said, surprised by my own sarcasm. I’d been worrying about the wrong thing: a stranger, not someone with whom she had some mysterious history. Though a stranger might have been preferable; it would have been temporary.
    She gave a hard, short laugh. A peculiar laugh. Everything about this moment was bizarre. There was no warmth between us, no understanding.
    â€œYes, with an old friend, but not like that.” She tapped her cigarette against the rim of Ray’s ashtray. I felt shaky, panicked. Joan was lying, keeping a secret from me again.
    â€œBut not like what?” I persisted. “What are you doing with him?”
    â€œDo I have to spell it out? We aren’t fucking, Cee.” She turned and looked outside. The rain had stopped, and you could see by the soft glow of the clouds that the Houston sun would be out again before you knew it. A moody morning, a bright afternoon. In Houston, anything could be erased.
    â€œHe’s an old friend, that’s all. I ran into him at the Cork Club. He was here for business and we got to talking about times gone by.” She stood, stubbing her cigarette in the ashtray, drawing out her slim cigarette case to retrieve and light another. “He’s gone now. He won’t be back.”
    I almost laughed. Did she really think I would believe they weren’t, as she put it, fucking? I knew all of Joan’s habits. Men she wasn’t fucking held no interest for her.
    Hollywood was a wound. We never spoke of her year away. She’d left me. She’d never apologized, never offered any good explanation for why she’d not let me in on her plans. And now
old friends
were appearing? I went to light Joan’s new cigarette; my hand shook. Joan looked at it, then up at me. But he was gone, I reminded myself. He was no longer someone I needed to worry about.
    â€œWhy’d you tell me, then?”
    That got her attention. “What do you mean?” She fiddled with the diamond bracelet on her slender wrist.
    â€œI mean, why bother coming over and telling me if you’re not going to tell me the real reason he was here?”
    Joan studied me, as if she’d forgotten, and then remembered, who I was.
I’m your friend
, I wanted to say, though “friend” was a flimsy word for it.
    For an instant I thought she might confess. For an instant I thought she might tell me everything. But then she smiled, and the old Joan returned. She leaned over the table and kissed my cheek.
    Just then Tommy peeked around the corner of the kitchen door. “Go see Maria,” I said, and then I checked my voice—this encounter with Joan had rattled me—“or you can come see Miss Joan. Would