Friendship Revisited

Dear mouse,
I am way behind updating my blog. Blame the holiday. My phone kept on ringing. From friends who found time to beat the time zones.

One was a lady friend who was able to get my number from a common friend.

It was two years already that I have not heard from her. She was glad to hear me, she said. Likewise?

She started talking about the past which I like to forget. So I just said aha, aha, aha, and then said no.

She was trying to reconnect me to the friend who was the cause of my termination from my previous job. She said she likes us to put a closure in our rift. To be friends again. We never had confrontation. I simply walked away.

I asked her how.

To confront her that I knew that day when she gave me that smoothie after our boss and she met with her close friend to talk about my replacement? She even smiled and winked.
It‘s good that she did not kiss me like Judas.

Was it her conscience stricken with guilt trying to explain what she had done behind my back? Was it because I kept my silence even though I wanted to tell her, how could you?

It was her friend whom she also hired in her previous employer but was left behind when she moved. It was her friend who she always complained because she had no initiative.

It was her friend who wanted to leave that job but as always she could not find one without anyone recommending her.

After a few days, when the VP who approved of my work was away, the immediate boss gave me the pink slip. No valid reason.

The friend in the other line reminded me that she asked for an apology. Yes, but she never admitted what she had done. She kept it all secret until the day I found out.

The friend met an accident on the way home from the office where I previously worked.
Another common friend told me the story. She even stressed that “yong pumalit saiyo doon sa…

What about if she apologizes again?

What kind of apology? Another insincere one?

Another “the-reason-why-I did-it –is-because-I-am-made-to-choose-between-two-friends-kind of apology ?”

OR “if-I-will-not-do-it-I-might-lose-her-friendship-and-i-know-you-can-
understand-it-better-than-her kind of apology?”

One thing I hate is when people give conditions to friendship. Me, I simply walk away. I do not waste my time. It is not because I wanted it but because, I feel that it is more matured way of dealing with this kind of conflict. I am good in bottling up my feelings which when released could hurt people’s feelings. Anyway, I have always believed in karma.

She had already made her choice. So why should I insist my friendship.

I have forgiven them, her, my former boss and the friend. They lost their jobs too from that company. One by one, they left. They could not take the heat from the VP reminding them how inefficient they were. The three of them.

The trying-to-mediate-friend- said that if I just feel talking to her again, she would give her the news.

I said thank you but I am not ready yet. The best way to heal is to avoid being wounded again. I am trying to heal. Maybe time will come when all but the scars are left as reminder.

Then the reason why she was insistent to act as mediator came into light. She was planning to come to the East Coast particularly in my place to see the autumn and other tourist destinations. She used to come to my place in SF with her friends. They saved on hotel accommodations. I welcome them in my simple abode. When I went to her place, she did not offer the same favor. There was no room for me. It was okay with me.

So when she repeated she might be coming with her sister, I told her it was not my own place. It’s my brother’s. It seemed she did not hear that. She said baka next year pa naman.

I rolled my eyes and I wanted to bang the phone. Some people are just “makapal”.

Not being plastic, I said, let’s cross the bridge when we get there. I am not planning to take her calls anymore. Bad me? Yep. I filled three bottles with pent–up feeling of anger after the call. I did not like it. It is negative. So I slept it off for the next two days and wrote this piece when I was ready not to say!@#$%^&*. Friendship. My foot. Oops.

The Ca t