My Friends

Twenty-five years later, in the present, Louisa tells Ted that she likes Ali. Ted isn’t surprised because he thinks Louisa and Ali have a lot in common, and Louisa also reminds him of Joar. Ted leaves to go to the bathroom again and comes back with a newspaper and Coca-Cola. Louisa is surprised that you can buy soda on a train, and she’s annoyed he didn’t buy her any, so she takes his.

A tattooed conductor interrupts Ted and Louisa to check their tickets, since the train just went through a new station. Louisa tries to convince Ted to get the conductor’s phone number and asks him more about his type. But before he can stop Louisa, Louisa goes over to the conductor and tells him that she and Ted are celebrating because Ted just got out of prison. This just seems to scare the conductor. Louisa comes back and says Ted should thank her for making him sound dangerous.

Louisa abruptly asks Ted if Ali was ever raped. Parts of Ted’s story, including Ali’s reluctance to trust people remind Louisa of Fish, who was also raped. Ted says Ali always liked spending time with his mom, who was poor but could provide food like lasagna. One time, when his older brother suddenly came home, Ali reached by instinct for a knife.

Over time, Ted learned the story about how Ali’s dad used to drink a lot. He never wanted her to call him “Dad,” instead preferring “Buddy” because he didn’t want to sound old. Her parents would have parties full of people drinking and smoking where young Ali always felt out of place. At one of these parties, the soda tasted funny to Ali, and she woke up in a daze the next morning with a naked man on top of her. The man had scratch marks on him, and she realized she’d made them in self-defense. She jumped out the window and sprained her ankle, and stayed away for 24 hours. But her dad never even noticed, and she never told him what happened. From then on, Ali slept with a knife under her pillow, but Ted again leaves this detail out when he tells Louisa.

Louisa thinks Fish and Ali would’ve gotten along. She asks now where C. Jat got his signature idea to draw skulls. Ted says there was a janitor who inspired him. When Louisa asks more details, Ted struggles to explain the story—he hasn’t told her several important details, like how C. Jat painted The One of the Sea for a competition for young artists that Joar found. Louisa hesitates, unsure if she really wants to hear the backstory of her favorite painting, but at last she asks Ted to tell her everything.