resigning and non-solicit

I recently found a position at a new company that I am really excited about. Today I resigned.

But I think I did a dumb thing.

I resigned and I lied about where I was going. Well I'm not even sure I lied. I didn't give a company name. I felt coerced by HR into revealing my next job. He bascially said yes "you have been recruited and I want to know by who". I felt backed into a corner.

My employer has a 1 year non-solicit clause. I am going to work with a previous colleague and I don't want him to get in trouble. I don't think he will because I approached him about a job not the other way around. But he left less than a year ago. He was not the hiring manager either. I am working for someone else at the company.

When HR asked me where I was going I panicked. I tried to stick to my guns and say nothing, but he wouldn't have it. I didn't say the name of the company, but he came up with a name of a different person that used to work with us and asked if that was where I was going. I didn't disagree.

Then the HR guy said, oh that's fine, she left more than a year ago. I feel like I lied.

I told my manager I was going off to explore some contract opportunities on my own and didn't really give a clear answer to him. But he didn't press.

I'm so mad at myself. I feel totally uneasy about this. I feel like I lied to HR. Can anyone offer advice on anything I can do at this point? Should I leave it that way with HR?

I'm also nervous about the non-solicit. I don't want my friend to get in trouble, though as I said, he did not recruit me, I approached him. I am at a very large company and this new firm is very small. How enforceable are the non-solicit agreements? What kind of evidence does there have to be for this to be enforceable?