Chapter Two

Perhaps there was a sense of guilt that those of us who kept mementos felt. I could be wrong but I was pretty sure that it was true in my case. It could be worse, I told myself. I could have been holding onto a keepsake from a murder or an equally terrible crime that I had committed.

As it was, despite how I tried to make myself feel better by telling myself that there were worse things to have done or held onto, the letter remained in my shirt pocket for the first month. It felt as though it was burning a hole through the fabric more than half the time, burning my skin beneath my clothes and singeing the edges of the thoughts that raced through my mind.

My birthday had come and gone first and then so had Roland’s.

When it came to that middle day that we both celebrated together, I had found myself locked in my bedroom. It was the first day since I had started my job that I was absent without leave. I didn’t bother going into the office. I barely bothered getting out of bed. The only reason I did was to go and get the bottle of trusted whiskey that had always been there for me. The sun rose and set and for once, I didn’t see it.

Soon the months had turned into years. Two years, to be specific. I had since stopped carrying the letter with me, but I had been unable to throw it away. I thought about it occasionally. I had tucked it away in the bottom of a shoe box, shoved the box into the back of my closet, and had attempted to forget all about it the way I had the first time around. It was harder to forget about the pact once I had been reminded of its existence, not least because I had never shown up.

When I had shaken Roland’s hand all those years ago, it had been with the hope that he would forget that I ever had but because of the letter on my doorstep I knew that he had not. I also knew that my best friend had gone to the place that was ours, expecting his best friend to be there to meet him, and had been stood up.

Nevertheless, life had continued as usual. Time rolled on its invisible wheels, cruising by until it had gone all the way around the track and reached me once more. The days always repeated themselves and no one paid any mind to it until we reached what we considered the important days of the year.

My birthday didn’t belong to me alone. It had passed the day before. I was thirty-two years old. All I could think was that the following day would be Roland’s. I wondered when I would grow a year older without thinking about him, if I ever would.

A friend of mine, Alyssa, had decided to throw a party. It had started out as more of a reunion than anything else, but when she realized that it had been my birthday the day before, she had insisted that I come. I had been turned into the guest of honor so there was no way that I could miss the get-together.

It was with that in mind that I drove to the venue on my invitation. Alyssa had not named me, but she had mentioned that there would be two guests of honor at the party. I admit that my thoughts turned to Roland at the mention of a second but it couldn’t have been him…or so I thought.

The theme of the reunion was “High School Memories.” The irony didn’t escape me. The party was being held at a lodge just outside of town. When I pulled up to the venue, I could see that the decorations were almost an exact replica of the ones that had marked our high school prom. I parked amid a couple dozen other cars and climbed out onto a flashy red carpet, leading the way up a path to the lodging’s entrance, trees on either side of the path sparkling with fairy lights. Over the top of the entrance, the theme’s title flashed in glitzy pink and black colors. I had to stop myself from laughing at the intrusive thought that entered my mind—the place could very well have been a strip joint in Las Vegas. The similarities in decoration didn’t end where the red carpet ended.

Inside, the lobby of the lodge threw me backward in time. It felt like I had walked into the high school gymnasium on the evening of senior prom. Only, someone had definitely put more effort or more budget into the interior decorations than my school’s committee had. I smiled at the paper lanterns of all colors hanging from the ceiling, reaching up and gently brushing my fingertips along those that I could reach and watching as they swung back and forth lightly.

There were only a few other guests already present and I could tell they were experiencing the same nostalgic wonder as I was. I walked past them and headed to the back of the room. Where there would normally have been a reception desk, someone had set up bowls of snacks and fruit punch.

I had begun to pour myself a glass of punch when Alyssa noticed me. I’m notoriously blind to my surroundings and it wasn’t until she was standing right beside me, saying my name, that I realized that she was there. I jumped, the liquid in my glass overflowing the slightest amount and spilling onto me. I silently gave a prayer of thanks to my lucky stars that I had not worn white on this occasion. Alyssa pulled me in for a hug and I awkwardly returned it, watching my glass to make sure I didn’t spill anything on her.

“Lyle! I’m so glad that you could make it!”

“Well, you did make me an honorary guest. It would be rude to miss out on such an occasion.”

Alyssa beamed at me, her pretty face glowing with happiness. That’s when I properly took my friend in. She was wearing a bright pink ball gown, the neck cut low. It was more provocative than anything she usually wore. She had a light smattering of makeup, too. I had never seen Alyssa this way before. We had never been friends in high school and had only met afterward through work connections. We had been in the same year, but never crossed paths. It was funny how small the world was, yet how big the halls of high school had seemed.

“You look beautiful,” I said. “Is that what you wore to the high school prom?”

“It sure is,” Alyssa said. Her beam had yet to disappear and she took the frills of her dress in hand, swaying back and forth while the material swished. “I wanted to relive it. You never get to go back to that time of your life. I wanted to.”

“I can understand that. It was an innocent time when I didn’t have to worry about turning up to work every single day at the exact same time. Plus, my parents could tell me off for drinking booze.”

Alyssa laughed. It was a beautiful, carefree sound that rang out in the small place. Her laugh was one of my favorite things about her. Somehow, when Alyssa laughed, I got the impression that everything would work out just fine in the end, no matter what. I sipped on my punch and regretted it nearly instantaneously. I knew that I had pulled a nasty grimace before I saw the amusement written on Alyssa’s face. The drink was strong, even by my whiskey-gargling standards.

Somewhere in the back of the lodge, out of sight, someone had put music on. That time I couldn’t stop it and I laughed out loud. It was the first song that had played on prom night. Alyssa gave a sheepish shrug.

“You went through a lot of effort to sort this entire shindig out, didn’t you?” I asked, raising my voice to be heard over the music.

“I wanted it to be special. Don’t you ever wish that you could relive those days?”

I bit my lip, silent for a moment. When I finally spoke again, it had been long enough that Alyssa could excuse me if I changed the topic and left the question hanging. “It all looks really great so far, Alyssa!”

“You haven’t even seen the best part yet, Lyle!” Her eyes twinkled with mischief as she looked at me. “We have one thing that we never had at our prom.”

“And that is…?”

Alyssa didn’t give me an answer. She grabbed my hand and began walking to the far side of the lobby. Curtains had been drawn on both ends of the room, making it seem like there was only one entrance to the place and that was the one we all entered through. She glanced surreptitiously around the room, checking to see if anyone had their eyes on us, before she shifted the curtain. I caught a glimpse of the same colorful paper lanterns hanging outside, my eyes instantly drawn to all of the twinkling lights wrapped around the trees, and only once I had adjusted to all of those did I see Alyssa’s best part. I was looking over some sort of outside recreational area and right there in the center was a swimming pool. Its blue water had an eerie glow to it with all the lights surrounding it.

“Okay,” I said. “I have to admit, that’s pretty awesome.”

“It’s heated, too.”

I raised my hand, palm outward, ready for a high-five and Alyssa gave me one eagerly. A moment later, her eyes widened and she hurried off in another direction, looking back at me over her shoulder apologetically.

“Sorry,” she mouthed.

I wasn’t too fazed by the detail that Alyssa had abandoned me. She was the hostess. She was bound to be dragged away by certain guests. In fact, I was surprised that she had been able to stay with me for so long.

Soon, I found myself looking around the room. It had started to fill up shortly after the music began playing. I had forgotten that there was such a thing as being fashionably late and had been one of the first, though thankfully not the very first, guests. The same people who had been there when I arrived seemed to be milling about on the edges of the room, glasses of punch in their hands, swaying somewhat to the music. Every so often someone new would enter the venue. Several times that that happened, everyone in the room was unable to look anywhere but in their direction – the newcomers would either screech and draw the attention of everyone’s gazes or they would spot one of their old friends and flames and race toward them. I found the reunions as equally nauseating as I did sweet. That was just the bitter pessimist in me, I suppose.

It wasn’t long before my thoughts strayed to Roland. There would be a moment of silence between songs or a song played that he had loved at the time of its release and there he would be, racing circles in my mind. The longer I thought about him, the more uncomfortable the pit of my stomach would become. It had been quite a few months since the last time I had felt the guilt eating at me. Within that little lodge, surrounded by the reminiscing of old friends, I found myself wishing more than ever that my best friend was by my side.

About an hour and a half after the party started, I went to go refill my glass once more. The punch was doing its job well and I had begun to feel heady. A clap on my back surprised me and I turned to face a man with long, shaggy brown hair and a thin face. He had a glowing medal dangling around his neck but his eyes were what caught me.

“Freddie!” I yelled. I was face to face with a man I had once trained hard with, both of us on our school’s track team. I pulled the guy in for a hug and then pulled back to get a good look at him. He had changed a lot over the years but the grin on his face was still his, and no one could ever mistake those eyes for anyone else. Freddie was a heterochromia, meaning that he had two different colored eyes, one blue and one brown. “It’s really good to see you, man.”

“It’s good to see you too, Lyle. I didn’t know to expect you.”

I shrugged. “Well, you know, I’m a guest of honor and all.”

“What?” Freddie’s look of confusion was momentary, quickly replaced by realization as it dawned on him. “It’s your birthdays!”

Inwardly, I cringed at the plural use of birthday. That was something that I had grown accustomed to growing up and it had been a long time since I was anything more than Lyle. Roland and I had been a package deal. We were rarely separated, with the exception of sports since Roland had constantly been gawky and uncoordinated.

I wasn’t given the opportunity to answer as, out of nowhere, Alyssa reappeared. She had joined us and began chatting away. She was breathless and I figured that she must have been dancing. Her cheeks also had a deep rosy hue to them which I knew was from the amount of punch she had had to drink. I shoved my hands into my pockets to prevent myself from feeling my face, wanting to check whether or not I was as warm as she looked.

“Guys, my other guest of honor is going to be arriving soon.”

“Who’s your other guest, Alyssa?” Freddie asked. He gave her a hug as he did so.

“I don’t know if you guys know him but his name is Roland.”

Before then, I was sure I had never understood what it meant to have your blood run cold. It was as though Alyssa had poured a bucket of ice over my head and instead of being cold and wet on the outside, the inside of me felt frozen. My skin was warm to the touch but I felt cold. Freddie must have perceived something in my expression because his eyebrows shot upwards and he linked his arm through Alyssa’s, walking her away from the snack and punch table where we stood.

“So, I hear there’s a surprise for everyone,” I heard his voice trailing off as they walked away from me.

For the rest of the evening, I kept my eyes peeled. I was grateful to Freddie for how quickly he had assessed the situation and moved Alyssa away. There was no way that she wouldn’t have noticed that something was up if she stayed with me for more than a minute. I knew that I would need to explain things to Freddie later and wasn’t looking forward to that.

My eyes were flitting around the room, trying to discern whether or not he had already arrived, before they landed on the door. I found a table and sat down with my punch. My attempts at behaving like a normal human being were failing miserably. I tried not to stare at the door, instead looking around at the people on the dance floor or those mingling and laughing on the outskirts, but my eyes would always come back to the entrance. When they did, I would search the room quickly afterwards in case I had somehow missed someone entering the venue.

The only people who arrived had been two women who came together and a man shortly thereafter. I didn’t pay him much attention other than noting how muscular he was. Maybe I would find him later.

As seemed to be her habit, Alyssa soon found me once more. She tapped me on the shoulder to get my attention. “Lyle, there is someone I want you to meet.”

I turned and stood, pushing my chair outwards. Standing beside Alyssa was a good-looking man in an expensive business suit. I recognized him as the same man who had entered shortly before Alyssa found me. His skin was golden brown and his jaw had a faint line of stubble to it. His brown hair was wavy and flopped into his face ever-so-slightly. He looked faintly familiar to me but I couldn’t figure out why. That was until Alyssa introduced him.

“Lyle, this is my good friend Roland.”

Roland locked eyes with me and the pieces clicked together. I would know those green eyes anywhere, but I had not taken the time to look into them until that moment. I was face to face with my childhood best friend and I could barely distinguish him.

“Hi,” Roland said. He held his hand out for me to shake it and I did. His grip was strong, firm, and his hand was warm.

“Hi,” I said. My voice came out soft and wispy.

“I’ll leave you two alone,” Alyssa said. She had that mischievous look in her eyes and as she moved away from us, gliding across the floor in her gown, I realized that the reason she had been so eager for me to meet her guest of honor was that she was trying to set us up with one another.