AN EASY
GUIDE TO MAKING FREINDS
SARA WOLTZ
want another?
I look up from my phone to look at him, this man who is speaking to me. A smutty fanfiction is
open on my phone, detailing the way Iron Man is getting spit roasted, and I was so invested in
the sordid details that I barely even heard him speaking.
what?
your drink! He laughs a little and I can’t tell if he’s making fun of me or not. I can never tell
when I’m making things weird, or when I’m being annoying, or when I’m talking too much or
too little. do you want another one?
I didn’t really want to come to the party; I don’t know anyone here, except for my friend who is
hosting and therefore too busy for me, and I’m no good with strangers. Someone once told me it
took them six months to get over all my weird little ticks enough to like me. They’d laughed a
little, so I had too, but I didn’t think it was all that funny. I’d been calling them my friend for
over a year.
I have not answered. He is still looking at me. It must be getting weird now. Probably? His smile
gets more strained.
sure. I hold my cup out.
come with me.
I have been sitting on the couch for two hours. It always makes me feel awkward because sitting
on the couch alone and only standing up for refills makes it incredibly obvious to everyone
around you that you are alone. Best case, it makes them just ignore you entirely. You turn into a
piece of decor, something for their eyes to skim over. Worst case, they try to come talk to you.
They make small talk for a few minutes, a painfully awkward exchange, before they leave to find
their real friends. You’re left to overthink the experience while they carefully avoid eye contact
for the rest of the night.
But I have little to no spatial awareness, and this experience is still far superior to constantly
having to move out of people’s way.
rum? He holds up the bottle, the dark liquid sloshing. I shake my head.
vodka. My friend had bought regular but a few other guests had arrived with a variety of fruit
flavors. I clumsily grab the handle of the strawberry kind and pour it into my pink cup. My wrist
shakes and a little dribbles over the sides. I fill it about halfway.
Once I realized I was going to have very little success making a friend here - something that took
approximately twenty seven minutes of inserting myself into other people’s conversations and
being met with polite confusion - I began the process of getting hammered.
It’s easier to be lonely when you’re drunk. Except when it’s not and then it’s really bad. Those
times I have to step outside; I’m a loud, ugly crier and people always try to intervene. I hate it
but I also love it. I know I’m an attentionwhore, even though I’ve spent my life trying to deny or
fix this about me.
My friend, the host, laughs so loudly it echoes throughout the room. They jump up and down a
few times, a friend's hand grasped tightly in theirs, and I wish so desperately I could walk over
there. We are not close, and I don't necessarily want to be, but I want them to notice me. I want
them to invite me over because I am something they think of as worthy of introducing.
i’m doing pepsi but i don’t think that’s gonna mix well with yours.
I shrug. i think they ran out of the juice. i might just do water.
water? He laughs but I’m dead serious.
i always have liquid iv on me so i just mix up a packet and use that.
okay fuck yeah. I suddenly realize he’s also plastered. He laughs again and the sound charms me.
It reminds me of a little kid almost, the way his chin tilts up and his top lip rolls back so much I
can see his gumline.
He has good teeth. I almost reach a hand out to stroke them but realize how weird that would
seem. I drink a good amount from my cup before I remember it’s straight vodka.
The world is spinning a little. It reminds me of a disco. I want to reach my hands up and dance,
to touch the badly taped green streamers hanging from the ceiling.
let’s get you some water. He takes my hand and I follow him easily. He grabs a cup down, fills it
from the sink. I empty the packet into the water, mesmerized by the way the blue powder sinks to
the bottom.
blue raspberry?
I shake my head, so fast it makes my hair smack against his face. blue cotton candy. I stick my
finger in the water to stir it but he plucks a plastic spoon in instead.
I turn and he is looking at me. He is smiling and I hope he is endeared by me. I’ve always
wanted to be endearing; to be the kind of person who charms, who attracts, who people want to
be friends with. I want to be smart and funny and kind but, more then anything, I want to be
thought of as those things. I’ve always been ashamed of this - my desire to be liked, to be adored,
to be loved. There are more important things, I know. I’m just not sure what they are.
Maybe he wants to be my friend. If not for a long time, then at least for the party. Maybe he can
introduce me to his friends, and then they’ll be my friends, and I can have people.
hey. He puts a hand on my waist. my car is parked outside.
oh they tow. did they not tell you? they’re gonna tow your car. My voice is slurred, I think. I
press myself into the kitchen counter, trying to steady myself. Bubblegum pop is blasting
throughout the house and it’s starting to hurt my head.
i don’t think they will. do you wanna go outside with me?
I stare at him.
I’m bad with social cues. I’m bad with people. I’m almost one hundred percent sure it took five
years into my ten year friendship with my best friend to make them like me at all. But, despite all
of that, I know when someone wants to fuck me.
Sometimes, it seems like it’s all anyone wants to do.
no. I go back to stirring my water.
no? He sounds angry but I always think men sound angry. I have this theory that it's their
perpetual state.
no i’m okay. i’m gonna finish this and then call my ride.
It is quiet and I am suddenly hit with this fear he’s going to whack me over the head with a
candlestick or something. I fantasize a lot about someone murdering me and they all sound like
Clue plots but I really can’t help it. I’m fucking great at that game.
I turn to look at him and he is still staring at me but indignantly. I think the look he was giving
me might have been closer to hunger than affection earlier; it often is, especially with drunk men.
If I wasn’t so drunk myself I probably would have realized it.
Oops.
fucking bitch.
He storms away from me. We all had to take our shoes off when we came into the house so the
stomping doesn’t really have any effect; it makes me giggle, actually, watching him walk away
from me in his Captain America socks.
I walk back to the couch, being careful not to spill my slightly too full drink. I take my seat, gulp
down half the cup, and open up my Safari tab.
The host twirls past me, a line of other dancing English majors following closely behind. I think
of getting up to join them, of twirling in the skirt I bought just for this party. Maybe someone
would grab my hand. Maybe they’d pull me outside and we could smoke a joint together - a
cigarette, even, I’d break my no smoking rule for good enough company - and we could grab
coffee next week.
I swallow the rest of my drink. I didn’t do a good enough job stirring it and the overwhelming
taste of flavored salt almost makes me gag. I open my texts and the words blur as I write them.
will you come get me? i’m done.