So guys, I was talking to a friend the other day and I had this idea. What will it be like at my 20th high school reunion? This is the result.
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"Are you ready?" I call up the stairs.
"Relax." my husband says, walking down as he buttons his Kelly green shirt. His white tie hangs around his shoulders. His black slacks are pressed and clean, and his socks slip on the hardwood floor.
"I know, but I think I have a right to be a little nervous, Bryan."
"You'll be fine." he says, then pecks me on the lips.
The phone rings.
"I got it." He checks the caller ID then chuckles, "Courtney."
"Answer, tell her I'm leaving now, and I'll call back on my cell in 10?20? Minutes."
There's a dull thumping coming from upstairs, I start up. My tan tights slip until I reach the carpeted stairs.
"Alex?" I ask, going to the blue door. As I open the door a hockey stick clatters to the ground in front of me. My daughter's bright red hair spills over the edge of her bed. She's bouncing a basketball against her wall.
"Alexis Rose Bethovan!"
She stops when she sees me scowling. She knows what she is supposed to be doing, and she also knows that she is never supposed to bounce the ball in the house. Let alone against her wall while we're trying to get out the door.
"Young lady," I prepare to give a rant, but I'm distracted by her clothes on the floor.
Alex is still in her outer space PJ's and her black tee with the fish on it is crumpled in the center of her sea life rug, and her royal blue leggings are hanging off a handle of her wardrobe. She stops thumping the ball and grabs the clothes.
"Make sure you have a play bag packed." I say, closing the door behind me.
I walk down the hall to the green door with pink flowers on it.
"Kateri, are you ready, sweetheart?"
I open the door to see Alex's twin sitting at her vanity, putting a fifth pastel barrette in her light brown hair.
"Almost Mommy!"
She finishes with a sixth barrette, then runs over for inspection. She wears a pastel striped polo dress with white tights. My six year old has a better sense of style then I ever did, with the exception of the hair she looks totally perfect.
"Good job, Kat. Make sure you have a play bag packed."
"Can I bring Madame Roxy?"
"Of course."
"Thanks Mommy!"
She grabs her stuffed fox and starts packing the rest of her quiet toys in a pastel green tote bag.I close the door and head down to the basement. I open the door to my home office and I grab my cell off the charger. I stop for a second and look around. All my diplomas hang on the wall. Including my High School one. Dated 20 years ago, today. Oh how times have changed. I moved away, granted only a couple hours, but still away. I'm married with six-year-old twins, that are going to start First Grade in September. I have lived in Europe for eight years. I home schooled my girls. I took off my job as an attorney for New York State. And now I'm going back to the place where I spent four years of my life.
I head back upstairs and find the girls arguing over the usual family road-trip issue: where are we going?
"We're goin' to see Auntie Aya!" Kat pounds her foot on the ground.
"Na-uh!" Alex shakes her head so hard that her half-brushed hair whips both sides of her face.
"Yes we are!"
"No we're not!"
"Mommy! Tell Alex I'm right, we're goin' to Auntie Aya's house and you have a meeting!"
"Mommy will agree with me. We're going to go to a fun place with Tally and Sofie and Devon and Jimmy and Kyle and Pat and Angie!"
"You forgot Danielle." Kat sneers.
"Stop it, girls. Neither of you are correct. We are going to a reunion. Daddy and I will drop you off and Grandma and Grandpa Brown's and then we'll be going to a grown up event."
"But I thought we were going to Auntie Aya's." Kat looks at me with sad, downcast eyes.
"That's next week, darling. And we're going with Tally and her family next month. So you were both close."
As if on cue, Tally and her eleven year old son Devon walk in. Tally lives next door now, and her kids are practically my kids. And she feels the same way about my girls. We always do things together. And today is no exception.
"Our lot is almost ready." she says.
"Same here."
"Are we all taking the bus, or are we taking separate vans?"
I take a quick look at the girls, and at Devon, who is probably the only one of Tally's kids that is actually ready.
"We can take the bus." I say, grabbing my black high heels off the shoe rack in the hall.
"I'll tell Jimmy to load 'em up!"
"Grab Brian, too. I think I sent him to pack up the van."
"Sure."
"Girls, let me see your bags." Kat comes up first, her stuffed fox dressed in a pink tie dye sun dress and white bejeweled sandals is tucked under her arm. Kat also packed her tablet, a white sweater, and a smaller bag for Madame Roxy.
"good job. And Alex?" I turn to find Alex holding her stuffed penguin: Skippy Puff. The plush is dressed in a black tank that reads 'Rock!!!' and a red lace skirt, no shoes for the little bird's feet. Alex has a blue backpack that hold her tablet and three packs of gum in various flavors, plus her lucky sea shell on a black leather string.
"Does Skippy want to wear the shell today?"
"Yes, but I'm not going to put it on until we get to Grandma's house."
"OK, sweety."
"Everyone ready?" Bryna calls in.
"Looks like it." I say, getting the girls' shoes: white sandals for Kat and black flats for Alex.
The four of us file out to find Tally's husband in the driver's seat of the re purposed Shaffer bus we use for family vacations together. Tally holds her sleeping newborn daughter, Angie.
"Am I on baby duty, or rodeo?" Bryan asks, as I buckle the girls into their seats. Kat on the interior of one side, Alex on the exterior across the aisle, Madame Roxy (the stuffed Fox) is buckled next to Kat and Skippy Puff shares a seat with Alex.
"Rodeo." Tally sighs, sitting in the front seat as Angie starts to wake up.
Three minutes later, Tally's kids start coming out. All of them have jet black hair, just like Tally And Jimmy, but they all have different types of hair and eyes. Devon, the oldest, has straight hair and droopy brown eyes. He sits behind his father, directly across from Tally. Then come Kyle and Danielle, eight and ten respectively. Both have curly black hair. But Kyle has striking green eyes and Danielle has sparkling blue. Sofie bounces on, her hair is both curly and straight and wavy. Just a hot mess.
That's what we always say. Sofie, little six-year-old Sofie, is just one jumble of features. the most obvious are her eyes: one is hazel, the other is such a pale blue that it almost looks white. She also has a birthmark on her arm that looks, vaguely, like a dragon. She wears a yellow tank with a matching tutu, yellow-and-purple stripped socks, and yellow lady bug rain boots. She carries a yellow dragon, Lady Bye-Bye Gone the Zippy, to be exact.
"Sofie, sit next to me!" Alex tries to jump up, but is held down by her seat belt. Sofie and Bye-Bye share the window seat next to Alex. They start discussing what school will be like in September. They fantasize about large hallways and classrooms full of kids their own age.
finally Brian comes back out, pushing Pat in his wheelchair. The casts on his arm and leg glow neon green in the overcast light, the remnants of the skiing accident.
"Everyone ready?" Brian asks, getting four-year-old Pat situated in one of the beds in the back of the bus.
Devon nods. Sofie and Alex have a contest of who-can-shout-ready-louder. Danielle mumbles and answer, and texts rapidly. Pat squeaks "ready!" and pulls out his tablet to play a video game. Kyle says ready and pulls out his summer math assignment on a table next to Pat's bed. Angie cries, and Tally gets ready to nurse her.
"Ready when you are." Jimmy calls from the front seat, giving us the thumbs up. Brian sits next to Devon, and we pull out of the driveway.
I settle into a seat in the back, and pull out my phone. I call back my assistant, Courtney.
About three hours later we pull up to my parents' house in Yaturkville, New York.
"Grandma! Grandpa!" Alex and Kat jump off the bus and sprint into my parents' outstretched arms.
"We'll see you tomorrow after dinner!" Tally calls as she drives away.
"Kat, Alex, Mommy and I will be back after bed time."
The girls don't even care. They run into the house, my parents' right behind them. My Mom pokes her head and arm back out to throw me the keys to the jeep. Brian and I hop in and drive the remaining twenty minutes to my Alma mater: Magnus Catholic Central High School.
We arrive in time to check in with my former Senior Class Secretary. She used to be a cheerleader and a really popular girl. Now she's thin, but obviously diets, a lot. She organized this whole event. The Class Treasurer guides Brian and I to our table in the cafeteria. Brian and I are the first to fill the eight empty seats at the table. But three minutes later i recognize a face.
"Fiona?"
"Yeah..." she reads my name tag, "Ashley, we were in home room together Senior year, right?"
"Exactly. And, Oh my God! You married Liam?"
"Hey, Ashley!" He raises his arm. He wears a navy blue Air Force blazer, with a silver insignia on the sleeve, and medals pinned to his chest.
"Wow. how have you guys been?"
"Great. We have a son now, Skye. He's two." Fiona says, sitting at the table. "and it looks like we've missed a lot from you." she nods at Brian.
"This is my husband, Brian. We have twin six-year-old girls, Kateri and Alexis."
We pull out pictures of our kids, and more people come to the table. Next, the remaining four people get to our table together. Katelyn, who married our Valedictorian Michael. And Rachel, who married a journalist from Rome.
"Katelyn!" Fiona jumps up and hugs her friend, while Michael shakes Liam's hand.
"Rach Face! You're preggers!" I can't help myself. I've seen Rachel a few times since high school. We stayed in touch throughout college, but when I had the girls I lost touch with most of my old friends. Rach and I would still touch base occasionally, but she was always travelling.
"Ash!" Her baby bump presses in my abdomen as we hug.
"Well don't crush him." I say pulling away and checking out the bump, "Boy or girl?"
"We want it to be a surprise." Katelyn and Fiona each hug Rachel, then we all sit down. Our husbands awkwardly exchange hand shakes and start their own conversations.
The women exchange picture of our kids. Fiona shows pictures of Skye in the plane with Liam, and talks about how they're hoping Skye will have a little brother or sister soon. Katelyn talks about her kids, three of them. And Rachel shares about her older daughter, Cosette, a Haitian orphan she adopted two years ago. Then our old class President gets up at the podium at the front of the room. His thick Nigerian accent seems stronger now than it was when we were in high school.
I look around the room and realize that most people haven't changed too much. All of the kids that were in New Visions are successful doctors, just like they wanted. There are a smattering of old faces that stand out. Jenna, her black skin looking dull stretched over obvious plastic surgery, is wearing a dress that looks more like a lime green tube top stretched over her butt. Christa is at the door. I recognize her only from the few times I've been on twitter recently. She has tattoos up and down her arms, but she looks nice in a sequence off the shoulder top and a black skirt.
"You can't come in." the squeaky voice of our former vice principal says, grabbing Christy's arm.
"Why not?" She is less defiant now, more of a genuine question.
"You were banned from school activities!"
"That was twenty years ago!"
I stop paying attention after Christa's brother stumbles in and screams drunken slurs at half the audience. Christa picks up whats left of her dignity and storms out, dragging her brother out like a man predicting the Apocalypse on a city corner.
I decide to check the old stage. It probably hasn't changed too much, but I have to see it. Some of my fondest memories are on that stage. Opening night of every performance, getting my diploma, Brian and I sneaking away for a secret kiss during Post Prom Party. Not to mention all of the singing. All the chorus trips i took for competition. All those memories are on this stage. I walk into the gym and up the five stairs to the stage. It feels only right to walk through the center of the curtains. I grab a bit of the purple crushed velvet with each hand, and pull back.
It doesn't completely surprise me, but I am a little shocked to see all the old "theater kids" gathered on the stage. Nadine, who went to the same college I did, and now works for the EPA. Rachel, who is sitting criss-cross on the floor staring at the place where we all signed our names. Jake stands by the loading door. He smokes a cigarette, something I never would have thought he'd do; but he also has a hand on a man's waist. I vaguely recognize him. His name was Kyle Gibson. He never went to our school, but I met him when I ran into Jake at a meeting in New York.
I take in the surrounding, then music starts playing in the band room. We open the doors and see Vince on the piano.
"Manche!" he exclaims when he sees me. The he shouts greetings to the rest as we all file in. After a few moments of murmuring to each other, Vince plays again. It's a song we all knew. I feel like we knew it a little too well. But all eight of us start singing. Vince remembers the music after so many years. his white spidery hands dance on the keys and none of us can stop singing.
Once the song ends and we all catch our breaths, we laugh. We laugh and cry and talk. Pretty soon our spouses find us. I find out that Jake really was gay the whole time we were in high school together, including the time I had to play his wife. I learn more about my friends now than i ever did. But at the end, we all leave. We exchange numbers, knowing full well that we will never use them.
But that's what a reunion is for. You can relive those sweetest of memories and then forget them all over again. You can move on with life, knowing that you moved past high school. A reunion is a time for you to realize that, yeah everyone didn't end up exactly where they wanted to be. maybe some people did better than others, and maybe you found out that you didn't amount to a total loser. A reunion is that time you spend every few decades reminding yourself that 'hey, least I'm not as bad as so-and-so.'
So have fun in high school, but remember that it is no more than a chapter in your life. A crazy chapter, but not the most important. And certainly not the climax, or even a major plot point, in the large book that is your life.
Ciao!
