by Alison Tyler
Why wouldn’t she want to attend her reunion? Because her life sucked, that’s why. She didn’t want to go in this state, with all of her dreams in rubble. She’d split from the man she’d thought she was destined to marry, and she still wasn’t exactly sure what had gone wrong. They’d had a fight. A monster one. He hadn’t wanted to move with her to California, to her new job, hadn’t even been willing to consider the concept. ‘I like it here,’ was all Bryce said at first, as if that statement was enough to end all thoughts of argument.
‘But –’ Dori had started. ‘This would mean –’
‘I like it,’ he’d repeated.
‘What if I commute?’ she’d tried next. ‘You know, LA during the week, NY on the weekends?’ It sounded like a lot of traveling even as she proposed the idea, but she wouldn’t have minded. ‘We could take turns. You fly out sometimes. I’ll fly back others.’ She knew plenty of couples who were bi-coastal.
But Bryce had shaken his head. ‘You know how whipped I am by Friday night.’
He had not given her anything to work with. Not even been remotely flexible in his world. As if she only fitted in to a certain degree, as if he needed to keep her in a box.
Dori put her hand to her head. Jesus. She wanted to be with someone who would be willing to travel through time for her. Not someone who would balk at a change that would have meant so much to her career.
Even though she knew she’d made the right decision in canceling the wedding, Dori still felt an ache inside. Although not so much at missing her ex. More about missing what she thought her life should be like by the time her twentieth high school reunion had rolled around. She’d believed that she would be married with a family. Thought she’d be able to look back at her achievements over the past two decades with pride.
Maybe she still could do that. She’d set out to be a make-up artist, and she’d gone beyond her initial dreams, working for some of the top magazines and with some of the most famous faces in the world. But what did all that equal if she didn’t have –
The tears were starting again, the way they’d started during drinks with the girls. Thank God she had her friends. The girls she’d known since grade school had been planning to come to town for her wedding and when they’d learned the marriage was off, they’d come anyway. That was the sign of true friendship, wasn’t it?
But even though she felt better when she was with them, being alone hadn’t gotten any easier. She turned on her stereo, and then immediately realized that her music choice might not have been the best. All she needed to do was hear The Police and she was back there. Back in time twenty years to the high school gymnasium and Rowan with his arms tight around her. She might be anywhere – working on a set, riding the subway, standing in line at a coffee shop – and the music would roll over her and take her away.
The tears finally did come now. She sat on her sofa, with salty tears streaking her cheeks, as The Police sang ‘Wrapped Around Your Finger.’
Ah, for fuck’s sake. She’d go. She’d go to the damn reunion.
After all, what did she have to lose?
Violet arrived in her standard whirlwind of activity and kindly pretended not to see Dori wiping her eyes with the backs of her hands. It was easy to pretend. Violet was busy showing off the contents of a gift basket filled with 80s candy and a purse-full of movies, all of them at least two decades old. As Dori had known, simply being in Violet’s presence made her feel better.
‘Totally awesome,’ Dori said, trying her best to slip into her teen persona, and blinking away the last of the tears.
Violet raised her eyebrows. ‘Tubular.’
‘I forgot tubular!’ Dori reached into the basket and pulled out a string of Zotz. ‘Inside it’s like gunpowder, right? You suck hard on the outside, until you hit the fizz.’
‘That’s what he said.’ Violet grinned at her, and then continued rummaging around in the box. ‘Do you remember these?’ she asked, pulling out the 30th anniversary packs of Pop Rocks. She read the packet to Dori: ‘Real Popping Action.’
‘You were supposed to be able to explode your stomach if you drank a Coke through a mouthful of Pop Rocks,’ Dori said, recalling the urban myth as she ripped open the little packet and poured a handful of tiny strawberry-colored pebbles into her palm.
‘I wonder what happens if you eat them with tequila,’ Violet said, pulling out the secret ingredient, the one missing from their slumber parties back in high school.
Dori slid the first movie into the DVD player while Violet got the shot glasses. Violet had brought over all the classics: Sixteen Candles, The Breakfast Club, St. Elmo’s Fire, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, The Outsiders, Fast Times, Porky’s, and Valley Girl. She remembered how she’d felt when she’d seen each movie for the first time.
‘I had such a crush on him,’ Dori sighed as Matthew Broderick appeared on the screen. ‘Who would have guessed that the boy from War Games would grow up to marry the girl from Square Pegs?’ It was the kind of statement that would have sent Bryce into a fit. He didn’t have time for pop culture, couldn’t understand how Dori could spend an entire evening watching VH-1’s I Love the 80s, or Behind the Scenes: Poison.
Violet understood.
They stared at the TV together, oohing in mock jealousy at Sloane’s fringed white leather jacket, marveling at Jennifer Grey before her nose job. Just watching the high school scene made them shudder, recalling their own home room teachers.
‘Remember when the principal banned Dolphin shorts and OP tops? They had no idea, did they? What was next? Low rider jeans so you could see a thong.’
‘There was no such thing as a thong,’ Dori told her, reaching for the candy.
‘I saved the best for last,’ Violet told her, bringing out a new DVD from the depths of her huge bag: Rocky Horror. The 25th anniversary edition.
‘We went every weekend, didn’t we?’
‘For four years,’ Violet said. ‘My mom couldn’t understand how we could see a movie so many times and not get tired of it.’ From her pocket, she pulled out a Ring Pop, a giant diamond ring made of candy. One of Dori’s favorite accessories in high school.
‘I know it won’t replace the one you gave him back. But will you be mine, Dori? Will you?’
‘I’ll be your date for the reunion,’ Dori agreed, suddenly feeling excitement at the prospect, ‘but I’m not promising anything else.’
Chapter Two
‘He’ll come,’ Violet insisted.
Dori’s friends had persuaded her to attend her twentieth because of Rowan, and now he wasn’t even here. They’d been in touch several times through the reunion web site: an email here, a text message there. Rowan had said he couldn’t wait to see her – and she felt the same way.
‘Besides,’ Janie insisted, giving her an impromptu hug, ‘you’ll have fun anyway. How could you not have a good time in a dress like that?’
The dress was vintage, an oldie as much as the songs that were being played loudly inside the gymnasium – Prince’s ‘1999’, a hit from 1984, considered a classic in 2007. But although the outfit she had on was twenty years old, she’d never have been able to afford a dress like this back in high school. Even her mother would have balked at the label: Christian Lacroix, one of the top designers of the 80s. She’d snagged the piece at a second-hand store for a steal at seventeen dollars, marveling at the way the strapless top adhered to her small breasts, the waist cinched in just right. A big bow sat on the right hip, one of those design additions that had been so prevalent in the 1980s, but would be considered tacky by today’s standards.
When Dori had first bought the dress, she’d felt electrified at the thought of wearing this outfit to meet Rowan, her high school steady. Now, she felt somewhat silly. Not all of the attendees had taken the 80s theme quite so literally. The pretty princesses from her school were wearing modern attire, making Dori feel as out of place now as she often had back in school. Not that she hadn’t been popular. Just like any high school,
Redwood had been divided into many different cliques – jocks, nerds, stoners, metal heads, punks, Goths – and, although everyone had liked Dori, she hadn’t been one of the A-list kids. Not like Chelsea.
Why hadn’t she chosen a simple sleek black suit, Calvin Klein or Donna Karan? Why had she let Violet talk her into dressing up?
Violet was one of the only other attendees she saw wearing 80s clothes: ripped 501 blue jeans, shiny patent-leather Docs, and a neon-painted shirt that read: FRANKIE SAYS RELAX all in capital letters. Violet had gelled her short hair into spikes, and was wearing chartreuse hoop earrings that matched the glow-in-the-dark nail polish she sported on her Lee Press-On Nails. Clearly, she had seen the event as a way to let down her guard, losing the corporate-style suits she favored when planning installations at high-end office buildings.
Janie had chosen to dress more like a grown-up. She wore a simple sheath in an emerald green which fitted the more voluptuous body she now had. Of their foursome, only Chelsea had gone all out, wearing the kind of little black dress that movie starlets are often photographed in, the back dipping so low there was no question about the fact that she’d gone commando.
Making excuses to every man who asked her to dance, Dori continued to check several times at the desk in front, ignoring the pitying expression from the overly peppy blonde girl at the desk who had been a hostess-in-training back in school and was now full-blown in her appearance as a Rachel Ray clone. But Rachel Ray had been a baby back then. Who had this girl’s role model possibly been? Martha Stewart?
Nerves running away with her, Dori ducked into a corner by the women’s restroom, reaching into her tiny turquoise pocketbook for the new scarlet slim-line phone Violet and the girls had bought her for her birthday. The thing was seriously high-tech: it could take pictures, make movies, download stock reports. But Dori hadn’t fully figured out how to make a simple call. She rolled the ball of her thumb over the options, tried to find her address book, squinting at the tiny screen, and then gave up.
If Rowan wanted to call her, he would. She didn’t need to hunt him down, did she?
Patience had never been one of Dori’s virtues, but she forced herself to remain upbeat as long as possible. She applauded her way through the range of demented awards: Most Successful, a geek turned multi-millionaire, who had arrived in a silver BMW convertible with a Playmate on his arm, an actual Playmate, who carried a copy of Playboy in her purse to prove her status. Most Changed? That award was bestowed upon a girl Dori had known all the way up through elementary school. A girl who was now a boy. A boy who accepted the prize with charm and a little flirty smile that made Dori think he was going to have his hands full tonight.
Watching him, this Jacqueline turned to Jackson, she remembered what he’d been like when he was little. In her mind, she saw him in first grade. Had he always known that he was a boy inside? Had he felt ridiculous in those little pinafores, the little frilly dresses? On some level had his mother known? Was that why she had bought those creamy little outfits for him, hoping to force him to be a girl through sheer will alone?
The dark-haired deejay responded immediately, replacing the J Geils Band’s ‘Centerfold’ he’d put on for the previous award with the Kinks’ classic ‘Lola,’ which brought a burst of laughter and applause from the audience – Boys will be girls and girls will be boys. The words were too perfect, as if the song had been written for Jackson, himself. Jack was a good sport, Dori had to give him that. He simply grabbed the prettiest girl in sight and spun her around to the music, and from the way she moved against him, Dori could tell that she was interested in discovering exactly what was hiding beneath Jackson’s dyed-black jeans.
‘Most Unchanged’ was the next award, and that prize went unsurprisingly to Chelsea, who gleefully trotted up to the stage in her spike heels. She did look like a well-preserved version of her former self: the smile plastered on her face, the hair long and straight and blonde, exactly the same style as she’d favored in school. No one could tell that the length was won by well-placed extensions. She wore the glittery tiara without any sign of irony, as if she had truly just been crowned Miss Universe.
Dori turned away from the bandstand. She felt as if she were back in school for real. The smell of the gym was the same. The music was the same. And the emotions rushing through her were the same: longing as she watched couples begin slow dancing together; longing that made her ache inside as the next song began: Air Supply’s ‘Making Love Out of Nothing at All.’ Who would have thought a ballad this blatantly goofy could make her want to cry?
She’d always hated being at dances when the slow songs started. Hated it, at least, until she had a boyfriend of her own. Then, dances hadn’t been so bad. Moving against Rowan in the dimly-lit gym, until one of the chaperones had thought to separate them, that had been sexy.
The start of sex. The promise of sex.
Why did thinking back like that make her feel so sad? Because Rowan wasn’t here? In spite of the fact that he’d promised to meet her …
Dori headed towards the ladies room, and sat down in one of the booths. There was graffiti scrawled on the walls, but nothing she recognized. Over the twenty years since she’d last been in the gym, the surfaces must have been painted over at least once. She stared at the curlicues and scrawled initials and wondered whether she could just leave. What could her friends say? Nothing. She’d shown up, as they’d asked her to. She’d made the effort. Nobody would care if she snuck out early. After a moment, she started to push open the door and saw Jackson kissing a girl by the mirror. She sucked in her breath, realizing the girl was Violet, and muttered apologies while she backed out quickly.
Christ.
She’d have a smoke. That’s what she’d done in school, taking illicit drags off a cigarette she’d stolen from her older brother’s pack of Marlboro. She was sure someone was out behind the gym with a pack. She was turning to slip out the back door when she felt a tap on her shoulder.
Even the touch sent her back so many years. That hesitant touch of a boy asking a girl to slow dance, concerned that perhaps the girl would shoot him down, and he’d have to skulk back to the far wall of watchers once more, waiting for however long it took to get the courage up again to ask someone else. She turned, heart racing, thinking Rowan.
Hoping Rowan.
But it wasn’t.
Luke Robertson, one of the kings of her school, was standing there. He had been the editor-in-chief of the high school paper as well as one of her favorite people in the world. A stud on campus, a killer editor, and a drunk even before he was seventeen. He had spent hours with her in the loft at the paper, sharing sultry stories about his various sexual conquests, teasing her out to share her own stories with him and, when she didn’t have actual stories to share, urging her to tell him the fantasies that she kept private.
Now, when she saw him, for no reason at all, tears started to form.
Nobody else seemed to be as emotionally demolished by the reunion. Everyone around her seemed to be simply having a good time. A ‘good time’ was the opposite of what Dori was having. Yet Luke seemed to understand. Without a word, he pulled her toward him, and they danced. Danced in the comer of the gymnasium, with the swirls of light around them. With bodies close, the heat pounding. No chaperones to break them up this time. They were their own chaperones, she thought, however new-age that sounded.
She tilted her face up, looking into his eyes, and he winked at her.
He was the same boy she remembered, but he wasn’t. There were the beginnings of fine lines around his eyes, the barest touch of silver at his temples. But those were only surface differences. The boy was the same, wasn’t he? He’d been confident in school, and he was confident now, pulling her closer, bending down to kiss her. Not speaking, not even whispering any words of comfort. Letting her feel the comfort with her body.
And letting her feel something else.
They’d never hooked up in school. He’d gone for the celebrit
y girls, the cheerleaders, the bouncy blondes with the flippy skirts and long straight hair. If she remembered correctly, every single one of his girlfriends had driven the ‘it’ car of the 80s, a VW Cabriolet. But although he’d dated above her league, he’d talked to her. Buddies. That’s what they’d been.
Air Supply slid seamlessly into ‘Smokin’ in the Boys’ Room,’ and Luke pulled away and grinned that wicked smile at her. ‘You were going out back?’ he shouted, loud enough to be heard over Mötley Crüe.
She nodded.
‘For a drink?’
Dori shook her head. She looked down at his left hand, but his hand was in his pocket. She didn’t see a wife in the background, lurking, yet who knew? Who would Luke have been married to? The chic brunette over at the bar, wearing the tight white tank dress? The redhead near the stage trying to get a word in with the deejay? In this dream world, where girls could turn into boys, she was sure that Luke could easily have become a faithful husband.
‘Then what?’ He was yelling because of the volume of the music. She remembered that from twenty years before: going home after a dance and feeling her head ringing from the sheer volume of the music. She’d loved that sensation, had never been able to go to sleep after a dance. Instead, she would crawl out her bedroom window to sit on the ledge, smoking another one of her brother’s cigarettes or drinking a stolen half-glass of liquor from her folks’ cabinet. (She always remembered to pour in a little water to hide her tracks, a trick she’d learned from Luke, himself.)
‘You staying with your parents?’
Dori shook her head, then leaned up to speak closer to his ear. Luke was tall. She’d forgotten how tall. But now that she wore heels, they weren’t so far apart. In her lustrous turquoise patent-leather pumps, his ear was in range when she stood on tiptoes.
‘My folks moved back east,’ she said. ‘They sold the house when I went to college. How about you?’
‘Divorced,’ he said, leading her toward the bleachers. They climbed up together to the top row, Luke’s hand steadying her when her shoes slipped on the shiny wood. From the top, they could both watch their peers dance and hear each other better. She stared down at the gyrating crowd and was surprised at how many people she didn’t recognize. There were so many strangers down there, moving to the 80s beats. Then she remembered there had been 450 in her graduating class, and now, with many of those classmates married or with partners, the group had expanded considerably.
