Authors: Liz Fenton
“Don’t you have your high school reunion tonight?” Audrey, my sixteen-year-old, asks at breakfast.
“You must feel so old!” My fourteen-year-old, Sophie, chimes in.
“God. I can’t even imagine!” Audrey rolls her eyes and fake gags.
“Can’t imagine what?” John rushes into the kitchen and takes a swig from my coffee cup.
“What it’s going to feel like to be twenty years older.”
“It feels old.” John laughs, looking in my direction. “Gotta go,” he says, kissing the baby, then the girls, but not me. I run my finger over a crack in the granite countertop and add it to my mental to-do list, right below the leaky faucet in the girls’ shared bathroom, the loose floorboard in the entryway, and the temperamental water heater that needs to be replaced. We’ve definitely outgrown our once-cozy Spanish-style house nestled on the corner of a cul-de-sac in Culver City—the closest neighborhood to John’s pharmaceutical sales territory in Santa Monica we could afford when we bought it over a decade ago. But even though he had long since been promoted to regional sales manager and was no longer pounding the pavement with the latest and greatest antibiotic or asthma inhaler, we were still here.
“I’m out of here too.” Audrey grabs her car keys off the counter. I still can’t wrap my head around the fact she’s driving. Wasn’t she just a gap-toothed seven-year-old? And now she’s taller than I am with legs for days—legs that cause John to get a frightened look in his eyes whenever he takes notice of them.
Her hair falls down her back in long, loose natural curls and her eyes are a piercing blue, like John’s.
“Ready?” she asks Sophie.
And she’s driving my fourteen-year-old, who looks almost older than Audrey, her beautiful long hair recently chopped off, without my consent, to resemble her favorite singer. Her green eyes—that match mine—are rimmed with too much eyeliner, her lips obliterated by dark lipstick. I sigh, too tired to battle it out with her this morning.
“Bye, Mom,” they say in unison.
“Be safe,” I say, to the already-closed door. I pull the tie of my robe tighter and begin to feed our baby, Charlotte, wondering if any of my former classmates are unemployed, sitting in a kitchen with walls desperately in need of a new coat of paint, trying to coax a bite of banana into a fussy baby’s mouth.
When I told John I was pregnant, he thought I was joking. When I kept insisting it was true, he’d asked for the proof. Together we’d dug through the bathroom trash can until finally, I’d found it. As I held the white stick with the word
yes
illuminated in pink high in the air like an Olympic torch, we burst into a nervous fit of uncontrollable laughter, finding it much easier to laugh than talk about how this baby was going to change things.
We parked ourselves on the bathroom floor and struggled with the math until we figured out that we conceived Charlotte the night of our anniversary dinner. We were drunk before our entrées arrived. Something came over me at the table. Maybe it was the second bottle of wine or the fact that I’d splurged to get my hair and makeup done and felt uncharacteristically sexy. But I’d reached under the table and grabbed him, and suggested
he meet me in the bathroom. Of course the last thing we were thinking about was birth control; neither of us could remember the last time we’d even had sex, let alone hot sex.
The second person I told about the baby was my best friend, Casey. She looked at me blankly, waiting for the punch line.
I told her the part about seducing him and doing it in the bathroom but left out the part about how long it had been since I’d seen him with his pants down. I always left that kind of thing out of our conversations. Casey is happily single, goes to Hollywood parties, and regularly has sex with smoking-hot twenty-year-olds. The last thing I wanted her to know was that I could barely get laid by my own husband. Or worse, how I barely
wanted
to get laid by him. Something about not saying it out loud made it easier to justify and deny my part in it. I wish I still had the urge to have rip-roaring sex with John, or better yet, I wish we still laughed together, like the teenagers we once were, like my mom and dad still do, and they’ve been married for fifty years last summer.
Charlotte drops her sippy cup on the floor and giggles. Of course I can’t imagine my life without her. But my life in general is not at all how I thought it would be. When I’m asked about it tonight, I won’t be able to explain why I’m not in broadcasting, like Casey. None of them want to hear how, against everyone’s advice, I dropped out of college when I got pregnant with Audrey. Something about my due date and graduation date being the same day threw me off. I always planned to go back and finish, but the timing was never right. And then somewhere along the way, I lost interest, or desire. Or maybe a little bit of both. Hopefully, tonight, everyone will be focused on Casey and will not even ask.
Ten hours later, John and I ride the elevator in silence as it ascends to the floor where our reunion is being held. I look down at my dress, hoping my Spanx are doing their job. As the doors open, John reaches for my hand and we walk in together, smiling. It’s
funny how quickly we can transform into the people we ought to be.
CHAPTER 3
casey
Sidling up to the still-empty bar, I order a double Belvedere and soda. A very young bartender gives me a conspiratorial wink as he sets my drink in front of me, like my boozing is going to be our little secret. I knock it back, and he swiftly replaces it with another. As I give him a flirtatious smile, I hear Destiny’s words ringing in my ears:
Flirt with someone your own age!
I ignore them. “How are you?” I ask as I take my hand and pin a strand of my golden hair behind my ear.
“I’m great. These are my favorite events.”
“Why? Do drunken has-beens from high school tend to tip well?” I quip, sounding a little more jaded than I intend to.
“Actually, no. You’d be surprised how regret and bitterness inspires cheapness in people,” he says as he wipes the zinc bar with a towel and nods at a man dressed in an expensive charcoal suit who sits three bar stools over. I recognize him as Patrick Sanders, former science club geek who earned a full scholarship to MIT, and then went on to start his own biotech
company. I smile and give a small wave before looking away, not wanting him to take it as an invitation to join me. I wasn’t ready to explain why I was one of the few unmarried, childless people here. I drain the rest of my vodka and soda and swish the ice cubes around. I could use about ten more of these.
Patrick orders a Jack and Coke and I watch him sip it greedily. Maybe he’s as nervous as I am. I watch him glance around the crowd, tugging at the knot of his silk tie, a distant look in his eyes. Could his past be gnawing at him as much as mine?
When I received the invitation to the reunion, I’d immediately tossed it into the trash. But then Rachel had called—talking a mile a minute. What was I going to wear? Who was I nervous to see? Wouldn’t it be fun to be there together? When I didn’t respond, I could hear her inhale deeply. And then in a voice that didn’t even sound like hers, she’d said that
everythin
g wasn’t always about me. I was surprised not only by her attack—which came out of nowhere—but by how much the words had stung. Still sting.
I thought about what going would mean, the unhappy memories that would try to surface, the emotions I’d have to fend off. In my day-to-day life it was easy not to think about my lack of a family, but being in a room full of people I’d known twenty years ago—people who had other halves and cars with more than two seats—would force me to focus on it. But then I thought about Rachel and all of our shared memories. Even though it was the last place on Earth I wanted to be, I told her I’d RSVP yes. She’s my best friend and that’s what we do; she would’ve done the same for me. At least I hope so.
“Ready for another?” The bartender nods toward my empty glass and I can’t help but stare a beat too long at his deep brown
eyes, sun-kissed skin, and sandy blond hair. If I didn’t know any better, I’d think there was a surfboard behind the bar.
“Only if you tell me your name. And the real reason why you love these events,” I say playfully. Patrick hears me and gives me a sideways glance, probably wondering why I’m hitting on a guy half my age, even though he looks like the type who takes out girls so young it prompts people to wonder
Is that his date or his daughter?
The bartender begins a long pour of the Belvedere. “My name is Brian,” he says as he slides the cocktail across the bar expertly. “And I love these events because it brings out the best
and worst
in people. Want to truly see inside someone? Shadow them at their high school reunion.”
I take a long sip of my drink. “Do you really believe that?”
He leans in close. “See that guy over there?” he whispers, bobbing his head in the direction of Patrick. “He has everything. Multimillionaire, private airplane, trophy wife. He runs a Fortune 500 company. He could buy and sell every person here.”
“So?” I whisper back.
“So, he’s downing his drink like it’s water because he’s worried about what you and everyone else he went to high school with will think. That he’s still the nerd that the head cheerleader rejected, the guy the football players bullied.”
“Are you sure you just haven’t been watching too many reruns of
Gossip Girl
?” I snort and cover my mouth quickly, hoping no one else heard. “Besides, how would you get all that from serving him one drink?”
“You’d be surprised what I know,” he says seductively.
I’m about to ask him what he knows about me when a couple walks up, the man impatiently waving a twenty at Brian.
They survey the bar quickly and begin to whisper.
Are they talking about me?
Not wanting to know the answer, I turn my back to them and scan the room, taking in my classmates. Some look exactly the same. Others, much older. I shudder at the thought that someone in this room could be judging me and my choice to wear a cranberry red minidress, instead of a nondescript pantsuit, like most of the women here.
The room buzzes with conversation, of which I hear snippets. “I have two kids . . .” “Then we moved to Grand Rapids . . .” “So what do you do?” And I wonder again what it would be like to be able to say I’ve been married for five years, have two kids, live in the suburbs.
I know I should mingle, especially because people will notice if I don’t. But I hesitate. Just signing in and getting my name tag was enough to send me straight to the bar.
Yes,
I’ve met Jennifer Aniston.
No,
I don’t know if she hates Angelina Jolie.
Yes,
I’m pretty much resigned to answering questions like this all night. But part of me is relieved. The more they ask about the latest celebrity gossip, the less they’ll ask about me.
Rachel texts me that she and John are on their way up and I’m glad when I see them walk in, hand in hand. Rachel smiles apprehensively as she makes her way toward me. I take in her simple black dress and diamond earrings, the ones John gave her for their ten-year anniversary. Her shoulder-length chocolate brown hair flows freely and I can see from here that she spent considerable time perfecting her makeup, making her green eyes sparkle. She looks beautiful.
I wave them over and watch the envious glances as they walk my way, one of very few high school sweetheart couples from our class that passed the test of time. Back when I was
still wondering which bar was hosting Ladies Night on Wednesday, Rachel and John were getting ready for their first baby. I’d begged her not to drop out of college when she discovered she was pregnant. She was so close to graduation. But no, she’d said, this is my life now.
I signal to Brian the bartender for two more drinks as Rachel and John approach. “Here’s to officially being old,” I call out as I hand one to each of them. John brings me in for a small side hug as he takes a large gulp.
“What’s up, Little C?” he says, using the nickname he gave me in high school. I’d met John my freshman year when I sat next to him in Mr. Roberts’s biology class. He was a total jock who’d transferred from out of state, and I‘d harbored a small crush on him at first. But he was literally speechless when I introduced him to Rachel for the first time at the water tower where we used to sneak to drink wine coolers with the upper classmen. And from that point on, they were an item and I was their third wheel. But I didn’t mind. John always looked out for me like a big brother and some of my best memories were of the three of us together.
I reach over and poke Rachel in the arm. “You look nice.”
She touches her simple black dress self-consciously. “Thanks. You sure it’s okay? I don’t look old?”
“You are the one person who doesn’t have to worry about that. You look exactly the same!”
“What do you mean?” Her tone lets me know this wasn’t the right thing to say. But it’s true. Rachel could throw on her old cheerleading uniform and blend right in, her dark hair still worn in the same style, and not a single crease in her un-Botoxed forehead. Meanwhile, I hadn’t been able to lift my eyebrows properly in years.
John steps in before I can answer. “She means it as a compliment.”
She shoots him a death stare. “Stay out of it.”
John turns to me. “She’s upset about the ballot.”
“The ballot?” I ask.
“You know when you checked in downstairs and they gave you a name tag? They also handed out a ballot. We’re supposed to vote—”
Rachel cuts him off. “We’re supposed to vote on things like who traveled the farthest . . .”
“Well, I can see how that would be incredibly upsetting,” I say, laughing.
“Let me finish. There’s also other awards like most successful and least successful.”
“Least successful? Are you kidding me?” Brian was right. These things really do bring out the worst in people.
“No. There’s not a least successful award. That’s just what Rachel thinks it is.” John rolls his eyes like she’s not standing there. “It’s called
Least Changed
.”