Intimacy on top: "My Good Friend" by Juliana Leite (O.Henry Anthology)

One of the most-read posts I've ever written was the one about whether the relationship between Frodo and Sam Gamgee included homoerotic elements. My conclusion was that the most interesting reading of their story is that in their extraordinary intimacy, trust, and love for one another, they do erase somewhat the border between friendship and romantic love, but that ultimately, their love isn't best understood as a lasting romantic one. 

The two unnamed characters in Juliana Leite's "My Good Friend" share a similarly hard-to-pin-down relationship, much to the consternation of the children of the narrator's good friend. (From here on, I will use "N" for narrator and "GF" for her good friend, as both are unnamed throughout the story.) The children whisper among themselves about the true nature of the relationship between their father and N, whose friendship predates their own existence, or even the marriage of their parents. N insists they have it wrong, and they are ingrates for thinking what they think and putting the word "friendship" in air quotes, but is she herself wrong or in denial about what her relationship to GF really is? Do the children see what she refuses to see?

There is no denying that N and GF share an exceptional level of intimacy. N comes to GF's house often for dinner, where they talk about loneliness and living without their deceased spouses. N is careful to wear perfume when she arrives and bring a carefully though-out desert; GF, in turn, shows how much he cares by cleaning his house with Pine Sol and making food she likes. 

N and GF's friendship continued on through their marriages to other people. N apparently adored GF's wife, Suzy, and Suzy seems to have returned at least some of the affection, possibly because it is impossible not to be charmed by someone who looks up to you so much: "Suzy bought (a tablecloth) and I copied her and bought another just like it but a little smaller. Suzy knew how to take care of a home, and when she was with me she would often slow down, so I could imitate her without rushing." Suzy interpreted N's imitation as flattery. 

N's imitation of Suzy didn't end with buying the same housewares. Because they got married within a few months of one another, they actually shared a wedding dress, Suzy wearing it first and N a few months later, with only a change of ribbon to make it somewhat her own. N even grew out her hair before her wedding because Suzy recommended it, and N trusted Suzy's sense of style: "I went along with my friend, because Suzy knew how to primp and preen like a lady, how to make those magnificent curls, wear perfumed handkerchiefs, etc." On the day of the story, N is still meticulous about applying perfume to her scarf before visiting GF. 

N describes her close relationship to GF as "sultry and velvety at times, but...also dull and tightly drawn, like a chicken wire fence." The children notice more of the "sultry and velvety" aspect of their relationship. Moreover, the children have picked up on how the relationship between N and GF has always, in N's words managed to "pour out of everything and embraced all the people we chose along the way." That is, their bond is so profound, it spills over to everyone else in their lives, much the way a loving couple's love spills over into their children. By the end of Suzy's life, Suzy is so close to both GF and N that they are jointly caring for her in her dying days. They bathe her together, because Suzy wants it that way, and N thinks it natural because they have both "known her naked body for a long time," both "seen that beloved body in all its phases." 

In the most striking image of the story, N describes herself and GF in a three-way union with Suzy as she lays dying: "My good friend and I would spoon Suzy, with her in the middle. We held hands, the three of us, and then we went to sleep. The children would tiptoe into the bedroom to take a closer look at those intertwined fingers, at our three hands joined at Suzy's hip. They suspected that there, hidden between our fingers, were all sorts of old things, things they'd only now realized and that would become too visible if they didn't do something to stop it." N believes that the children dislike seeing GF and N's "intimacy on top of her," but because their intimacy has a way of spilling out on top of everything, it can't help but do this.  

The children apparently believe that either their father and N always were in love with each other behind their backs, or that there was some type of swinging arrangement between their parents and their neighbors, N and her unnamed husband. Is there any chance that N is an unreliable narrator and the kids might be on to something? 

Do the kids know something about N that she doesn't want to admit to herself?

N's narrative style

Asking if N is an unreliable narrator raises a question: just what kind of narration are we reading? It's fairly similar to a diary or journal format. It's full of minor details of things, like which pastry shop she went to before her meeting with GF, how that shop differs from others, and the fact that she seems to have shrunk based on her difficulty reaching things on the shelf there. There are frequent digressions into her feelings on matters both great and small, much as one would do if the writing were only for one's own benefit. Twice, N refers to something she wrote earlier that isn't in the story we have in front of us, perhaps indicating that we are only reading a portion of her diary, the one for the day she goes to see GF for the first time after his injury. We know N keeps a diary, because she tells us that Raul once read nearly all of hers. Is that what we're reading?

If so, there are passages that complicate this possibility. Very early on she says there is "nothing new to report" about her roof tiles, the delivery of which have been delayed. If this were a diary, to whom would she be reporting? This might be simply dismissed as an idiosyncrasy of style in which she is reporting to her future self going back and reading her diary, but there are other passages that complicate this reading. At one point, when she is explaining how she views her relationship with GF, she says that "you would be wrong to imagine that" her conversations with GF were sad or melancholy. It's hard to argue that N would have addressed herself as "you" and then also instructed herself on how not to be mistaken in interpreting her own thoughts. The story seems to have an intended audience, and I don't think the "you" is the "royal you" of an author directly addressing us, the readers of the story in a literary journal or anthology. 

We already know that Raul read her diary. When he did, he complained to N that it was too full of her "innermost thoughts" and he asked her to put some action in it. We also know that N feels some animosity toward GF's children for the way they suspect her, although she assures them that she "loves them as always." Raul seems to get an especially large amount of her disdain. He ruined GF's morning ritual of reading the newspaper by telling him all the news before he got to it. Raul seems to be especially unaware of a rule N lives by, which is that some things are too precious to ruin by talking about them too directly. It's one reason GF remains unnamed throughout; he's too precious to her to name. Is it possible that what we are reading is N's diary, but her diary with the expectation that Raul will read it? That he will read it and share its contents with his siblings? Is it possible that this story is her "accidentally" shared narrative that will explain her relationship with GF to his children? After all, N confessed to a similar feeling with a book she was reading as Raul has with her diary--that it was too slow. Maybe she's decided to really give them something to talk about. 

Remains of the Day or something else?

There's one problem with trying to read the narrative as an accidentally-on-purpose shared diary entry: when the moment comes for GF to ask N to live with her, she says no, meaning there may not be anything for her to explain to the children. When GF asks her to move in, N feels like he has somehow violated the terms of their relationship. It isn't that he's looking at her as a replacement for Suzy. N is certain that this is the first day since his accident when his head has been clear enough he isn't confusing her for Suzy. When he asks her to move in, he first looks at a photo of his wife, and then he looks at her, indicating he knows the difference. She doesn't need to feel guilty that she's taking advantage of his senility to move in, but she still says no. Why?

Is this a Remains of the Day scenario, where she is missing out on a last chance for love? Is she denying that what she feels for GF might also encompass romantic love? Or is she right to try to keep their relationship where it has always been?

In spite of her initial rejection of the proposal, there's a hint that the relationship might be about to take on another element, although N needs a minute to warm to the idea. She looks at the photo of Suzy, and she thinks that "between the three of us there was a feeling of shared love, and not that same far-off love, our usual one." 

One of the kids interrupts this thought by calling GF, and the moment is lost, at least for that day. However, the story ends, as it began, by N talking about her long-delayed roof tiles. At the beginning, the clerk told her "all things in good time," and he was talking about his mother finding a late-life romance, but he also was referring to the roof tiles. The roof tiles are full of double meanings, then, and so they are at the story's end, too. At the end of the story, N intends to call back to find out about her tiles. She makes a special note about how long she's been waiting for the tiles, because she tends to forget for long she's been waiting for something after a good night's sleep. The double meaning, of course, is that she's been waiting on both tiles and for her relationship with GF to become something more, even if the something more isn't exactly romance and isn't something she can name. Or even wants to name.

When she calls the clerk, she intends to both find out about the tiles and also what movie the clerk's mother went with her boyfriend to see. Her interest in the woman's winter romance strongly suggests that she is also thinking about a change in her relationship with GF. 

"My Good Friend" is about how deep and meaningful and intimate and beautiful a relationship can sometimes become when nobody is concerned about what to call it. N's free-flowing narrative style reveals her free-flowing philosophy of life, where she takes what comes and rolls with it, without feeling the need to push things in certain ways according to her preconceived notions. The only word N uses to describe her feeling is love, but of course, love can encompass a lot of things. We love our kids, our pets, our spouses, our parents, our friends, our country, and Diet Pepsi, all in different ways. That means calling it "love" doesn't really pin it down to any one thing. The love between N and GF always included more than one kind of love, and if it is changing at story's end, it's only a continuation of the love they have always shared, a love so full it overflowed and included those around them. It will continue to not be named, though, because things that N values are not for naming.