Page 64 - Philly Girl

48 Janice Shapiro

What neither of us could have predicted was that my ex-
boyfriend, Ronnie, would continue to drop in, invite himself
to dinners with the roommates, and proceed to fall in love
with Bonnie. I didn’t mind, but I also felt protective. I knew
how Ronnie could be a con artist and manipulator. I knew
how he could lie. But I also knew that when I loved him, no
one could make me see reason. “Maybe he will be different
with my Bonnie,” I thought. He had a pattern with women:
after nine months, his roving eye kicked in. With Bonnie,
the relationship lasted twice as long as his average relation-
ship. But, it still came to the same hurtful, dastardly end-
ing. Bonnie and I became even closer through our mutual
commiseration.
For a few years, we lived in New York City at the same
time. She showed up at my Brooklyn Heights apartment
(shared with Dennis) one day—with vomit all over her. She
had gotten sick to her stomach in the subway. I put on my
“nurse hat” and my latex gloves and examined her. “Bon-
nie,” I said, “did you know that you are pregnant?” She had
suspected it, and nine months later, she was one of the first
of my friends to have a child.
After I moved to San Francisco, I returned to Philadel-
phia every three or four months to visit my mother, first in
her home, then in an assistant living apartment, and finally
in a series of nursing homes. The nursing homes were near my
older sister—30 to 40 miles away from where Bonnie lived,
but she always met me somewhere close. We found great
restaurants, splurged on extravagant meals, always including
a fabulous dessert. We were so happy to be together and we
sat for hours over our meals, talking about husbands, sons,
previous lovers, work, therapy, books, politics, gossip, hair
color—everything. These visits were a boon to my sanity on
those four-day weekends visiting my mother, time I spent
out of both love and duty. Bonnie helped me find the humor