I dabbed my mouth with a napkin – another poor excuse to buy time, in case you haven’t picked up on that.
“I’m embarrassed,” I said.
“Well, you should be,” said Claire. “You acted like a real jerk at The Paperback Café.”
“I wasn’t acting,” I shot back. “It’s just that.…” Tears coursed down my cheeks.
“God, there she goes again,” Claire said in disgust.
“Give her a break,” said Mary Alice. Then, to me, “Sweetie, you know we all love you. Even Claire, though at this exact moment, she’s not acting that way. You can trust us. Whatever is causing your misery, tell us what it is. And I promise you, if we can help you get over it, or fix it, we will.”
She turned toward the other two women. “Right?”
Nancy and Claire bobbed their heads in agreement. And Claire took my hand. “I’m sorry if I was rough on you. But it makes me crazy to see you so upset. I want to help you. Really, I do. We all do.”
I took a deep breath, and began my story. “Remember freshman year at Mount Saint Francis? How nervous we all were at starting high school? But excited, too.”
“Of course we remember,” said Nancy. “Right before classes officially started, we had a sleepover at my house. But I don’t think any of us got any sleep. We stayed up all night giggling. And talking. And playing records. My mother kept coming in and asking us to turn out the light and go to sleep. Probably so she and Dad could get some sleep, too.”
We all laughed at the memory. “I never appreciated how much sleep an adult needs until my sons were born,” Mary Alice said. “That’s when I understood what being sleep-deprived could do to a person.”
We were getting off track here. Not that I’m immune from going off on side tangents myself, understand. But once I’d started this story, I was determined to finish it.
I cleared my throat, then said, “Anyway, that night the four of us made a solemn pledge to be best friends forever. We stood in a circle and held hands. That meant the world to me. I had siblings, at last.”
Nancy squeezed my hand. “I know, sweetie. It was tough on you, being an only child and born to older parents. But we’re still best friends, after all these years. And I treasure all of you now even more than I did when we were all fourteen.”
My eyes misted up again, but this time I controlled myself.
“But we weren’t always best friends, Nancy. Freshman year in high school, especially first semester, everyone went their separate ways. At least, that’s how it seemed to me.”
“What do you mean, Carol?” Claire said. “We were still close.”
“Maybe you thought we were close. But I felt that all of you abandoned me for new friends.”
There, I’d said it.
“Carol, you are being absolutely ridiculous.” From Claire.
“Carol, I never realized you felt that way. I am so sorry if I did anything to hurt you.” From Mary Alice.
“Sweetie, you know I love you. But I think you must be exaggerating. Or remembering wrong.” From Nancy.
I knew I had to keep going.
“I don’t mean to imply that any of you did this deliberately. But, Claire, when we got to high school, you immediately became part of the brainy crowd. As you should have been. I’m not trying to criticize you for being smart. I was so proud to be your friend.
“Mary Alice, when you ran for freshman class president and won, I was thrilled for you. We all were. But then, you had so many after-school meetings and activities that there didn’t seem to be a lot of time left over for old friends. And then you joined glee club, and got even busier.”
I didn’t dare look at Mary Alice. I knew I was upsetting her.
But I was wrong. Mary Alice was angry. At me.
“In case you’ve forgotten, Carol, my parents made me quit glee club at the end of first semester because my grades started to slip,” Mary Alice said. “Freshman year wasn’t as great for me as you think it was.”
I felt bad for her, but I needed to get all my gripes on the table once and for all. So I soldiered on.
“Nancy, you became so popular, right away,” I said. “Everybody wanted to be your friend. You got invited to all the cool parties.”
“But Carol,” Nancy protested, “I insisted that you be invited, too. That all of you be included, in fact.”
“I didn’t belong in that crowd, Nancy. And I didn’t belong with the smart kids, either. Or the class leaders. I didn’t know where I belonged. And I was too shy to try to find new friends. We didn’t even get to have lunch together that first semester. Sometimes, I used to skip lunch and sneak outside until lunch period was over, because I had no one to sit with.”
“I tried to save you a seat at my table,” Mary Alice objected.
“I know you did.” I flashed her a grateful smile. “But there were days when that didn’t work out. And….let’s just say that I got to know the grounds of Mount Saint Francis Academy very well.”
“That may be true, Carol. I’m not saying it isn’t. But if memory serves me correctly, you also started to write for the school newspaper in freshman year. So you had some other activities, and ways to make friends, just like we did,” Claire said.
“And you began to develop that particular brand of sarcasm and rapier sharp wit we’ve all come to expect from you,” Nancy said. “And I say that with admiration, not as a criticism.”
“I did start to write for the paper,” I said. “But not until second semester of freshman year. It was the only after-school school activity that interested me.
“And as for my so-called sarcasm and rapier sharp wit, I honed those skills as a defense mechanism. So nobody would figure out how shy and miserable I was.”
I sighed. “I guess it worked. It fooled all of you.”
I took a deep breath. “I suppose you all think I’m nothing but a big crybaby,” I said, “carrying on like this after so many years. And, yes, things did get better. I do have some good high school memories. And one more, very bad one to get off my chest. It’s about Mary Margaret Mahoney.”
“Meg? I never liked her when we were in school,” Nancy said.
“What? You must have selective memory, Nancy,” I said. “From where I was watching, you did everything you could to be included in the clique of extra popular girls she started when she transferred into our class. Including lending her your very best pearl necklace. I think she had it for a month before you finally got it back. I hope it was worth it for you, to suck up to her that way.”
Nancy’s face got so red I thought she was going to explode.
“Carol, you are so stupid,” she said. “I didn’t loan Meg my pearl necklace because I wanted to go to her parties. I did it because she forced me to. I made the mistake of telling her that I’d once snuck out of my house after dark to meet a boy that my parents didn’t approve of. She threatened to tell them if I didn’t let her borrow my special necklace for as long as she wanted. You don’t know beans about my relationship with Meg.”
“I didn’t like her much, either,” said Mary Alice. This coming from a woman who rarely has an unkind word to say about anybody. “At first, when I won the election, she was so supportive. She had lots of suggestions on how our class could be run, and how the school could be improved. Then she figured out that I had very little, if any, clout with the administration. So she dropped me like the proverbial hot potato. And that was the end of our so-called friendship.”
“Ha!” said Claire. “I bet I can top that. Meg made it clear that she thought anyone who studied for exams and got good grades was an idiot. Especially me, because I always got the best grade on any test in any subject. She was pretty smart herself, though, and got good grades, too. But never as good as mine. Senior year, she started a rumor among all her so-called ‘frie
nds’ that the only reason I got good grades was because I cheated on all my tests. And she actually had the gall to go to the principal’s office and tell Mother Mary Dolores that I was cheating. And Mother Dolores believed her! Without a shred of evidence! That’s why Meg ended up being the valedictorian of our class, and I was the salutatorian. Oooh, just thinking about that makes me so mad!”
Whoa.
“I had no idea that Meg picked on any of you, too,” I said. “Why didn’t you say something?”
“Ha, coming from you, that’s pretty rich, Carol,” said Claire, still smarting from the memory of the injustice she suffered 40 years ago. “You didn’t say anything to us about your problems, either.”
“I don’t know about either Claire or Mary Alice, but I was embarrassed to admit that Meg pushed me around that way.”
“Compared to what the rest of you suffered from Meg, I got off pretty easy,” Mary Alice said. “All she did was drop me as a friend. I think I was lucky, all things considered.”
“Carol, you started all this. But you still haven’t told us what Meg did to you that was so terrible,” Nancy said. “So far, it looks like Claire suffered the most from her. I mean, being accused of cheating. That’s terrible! By the way, Claire, what finally happened? Did Meg ever admit she lied?”
“No way,” Claire said. “Sister Rose went to bat for me. She convinced Mother Dolores that Meg must have misunderstood something she saw. And she must have ‘convinced’ Meg of the same thing. Fortunately, the story never got out. I could have been expelled, I guess.”
Claire pursed her mouth together to stop her lips from trembling. I could tell that she was close to tears.
“So, Carol, what happened to you? Did Meg tell lies about you, too?” Nancy asked.
“No,” I said. “But she publicly humiliated me at the freshman dance.”
“What happened at that dance?” Claire asked. “I don’t remember anything about it except my date stepping all over my feet and trying to dip me back until I almost fell down on the floor.”
“My mother had gone to a lot of trouble to remake a dress that belonged to one of my cousins,” I said. “I thought it was the most beautiful dress I’d ever seen. And Meg made fun of me and the dress. Publicly. Loudly. She said my dress looked like something out of a rag heap. Everybody started to laugh at me. And I ran out the door and went home. I’ve never been so humiliated in my life.”
“Where the heck was I?” asked Nancy. “I don’t remember any of this.”
“This must have happened when the zipper broke on my dress, Claire,” Mary Alice said. “You and I went to the bathroom and you pinned me back together the best you could.”
“Of course. I remember that now,” said Claire. “Although the rip wasn’t really that serious.”
“You wouldn’t have said that if you’d been wearing the dress,” said Mary Alice.
“I finally remember where I was, and what I was doing. And with whom,” Nancy said, blushing. “No need to bring that up now.”
“Carol, that must have been a terrible experience for you. Traumatic,” said Mary Alice. “But I’m so glad you finally told us what happened. In fact, I’m glad all of us shared our Meg stories. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m feeling better already.”
“I am, too,” I said, surprised that I was telling the truth. “I really am. After all these years of holding that story in.”
I turned to Nancy and said, “I can’t believe that you want Meg to help us organize the reunion after all she did in high school to make our lives miserable. Sheesh.”
“Meg contacted me and offered to help,” Nancy retorted, slightly defensive. “I haven’t gotten back to her yet. So, what do you all think?”
“I think it’s a terrible idea,” said Claire.
A phrase popped in my head. I think it was from one of Shakespeare’s plays, but it could also be from a movie (The Godfather maybe?). Something about keeping your friends close, but your enemies closer. It sounded appropriate for this situation. Maybe it would be better to have Meg on our committee so we could keep an eye on her than have her scheming to wreck the reunion somehow. Paranoia is my middle name.
And that’s how I convinced Nancy, Claire and Mary Alice to include Meg on the committee. The committee I promised my three friends I’d be on, too.
What the heck.
Chapter 13
I’m always willing to compromise.
Just as long as we do things my way.
“I suppose you think I’m crazy,” I said to Jim over coffee the following morning.
“If you think I’m going to respond to that, you’re wrong,” Jim said. “After more than thirty years of marriage, I know when to keep my mouth shut.”
I leaned over the breakfast table and gave him a quick peck on his unshaven cheek. “You are such a smarty pants. I’m talking about my agreeing to help organize the fortieth class reunion from Mount Saint Francis Academy.”
“Am I supposed to be surprised about that?” Jim asked. “Well, I’m not. First of all, Nancy would keep after you until she wore you down. You’d say yes just to get her off your back. And you always love organizing things. Running the show. Telling people what to do. It’s one of your most endearing traits.”
I resisted the urge to throw a piece of low-salt, fat-free buttered toast at My Beloved. (We’re both watching our cholesterol and blood pressure these days.)
“What made you change your mind?” Jim asked. “You were pretty adamant at dinner the other night that you wanted no part of the reunion. You weren’t even sure you’d go.”
I considered my answer carefully. To share my humiliation at the freshman high school dance with my husband would be a complete waste of time. He’d never get it. Nor would he understand how cathartic it was to finally talk about that incident. And find out that my three closest friends had suffered similar abuse from Meg Mahoney.
In fact, he’d wonder why all the hurts that we’d suffered in high school because of Meg were still bothering us after all these years. And I couldn’t blame him, because I didn’t know why, either. They just…were.
“Nancy, Claire, Mary Alice and I went back to Mount Saint Francis yesterday,” I said. “Sister Rose was there, too. Did I tell you that our school is being turned into a senior living community?
Jim nodded. “I hope you didn’t sign us up for a room, Carol.”
“Actually, Jim, you’ll be pleased to know that the marketing director of the new facility – her name is J.T. something – told us we were all too young to live there now. The target population they’re aiming at is aged seventy-five and older.”
Jim harrumphed. “It’s good to know we’re still too young for something.”
I ignored his comment. Since I, of course, had thought the exact same thing.
“Anyway, being back at school brought back a lot of memories for me.”
Mostly traumatic.
“And after the tour, we went back to Nancy’s and talked about old times. Gosh, I can’t believe we were ever that young and innocent.”
I took a sip of coffee and savored it, while I figured out what to say next.
“Anyway, I decided I wanted to be part of planning the reunion after all. I thought Nancy would faint when I told everybody. And there’s at least one other person from our class, Mary Margaret Mahoney, who wants to help.”
I almost choked when I said Meg’s name, but I didn’t. I hope you’re all proud of me.
“Mary Margaret Mahoney?” Jim said. “You mean, Meg Mahoney?”
Say what?
“Yes, Jim,” I said. “Meg Mahoney. Why? Did you know her?”
Jim wiggled his eyebrows in a suggestive manner. “I’ll say I did. We dated for a few months in high school.” He sighed. “Boy, she was a re
al hottie.”
Oh, boy. This was all I needed to start my day off wrong. And just when I was starting to feel more secure.
Betrayed by my own husband! The cad.
“I didn’t realize you ever dated Meg,” I said in as measured a tone as I could manage under the circumstances. I put my coffee cup down before the liquid began to slosh over the rim – my hands were shaking – and gave my husband a cold stare. “She was the bane of my existence in high school. And, as it turns out, was terrible to Claire, Mary Alice and Nancy, too. Why didn’t you tell me this before? Or were you trying to hide it from me?”
“Geez, Carol, lighten up,” said my clueless husband. “This was more than forty years ago, long before I met you. And we only had a few dates. You never told me about your old boyfriends, either.”
If I’m being honest, there wasn’t that much to tell. But I wasn’t going to admit that to Jim. So I contented myself with glaring at him across the breakfast table.
“What difference could my dating Meg Mahoney all those years ago possibly make now?” Jim said, trying to get himself off the hook he found himself on as quickly as possible. “Why do you care so much?”
Hmm. Good question. Why did I care so much? Maybe because good old Mary Margaret Mahoney was about to re-enter my life, thanks to the fortieth high school reunion committee.
Now I needed to make sure that, just for spite, she didn’t nudge her way back into my husband’s life, too.
Chapter 14
I’m too young for the senior center. But if you find
a junior center, let me know.
“I don’t see what all of you are so upset about,” Nancy said, pretending to examine the luncheon menu at Maria’s Trattoria with deep concentration. “We decided that Meg could help organize the reunion. All I did was follow up and invite her to join us for lunch today.”
Class Reunions Can Be Murder -- Every Wife Has A Story; A Carol and Jim Andrews Baby Boomer Mystery Page 6
