Chapter 1

BLAKE

High-school reunions. Fuck me. Mine is in my face, and it’s the last thing I want to face, no matter how much better I am now. Too many memories.

“Dude. You still there?” My closest friend Ben’s voice is in my ear, bringing me back from my reverie.

“Yeah, sorry,” I glance around my old stomping ground. “I’m just not looking forward to this shit in the slightest. Why did I let you talk me into doing this?”

“Because you’re the big shit now, man. Time to show those bitches up.”

“Right. ‘Cause that’s me.” I roll my eyes and try to keep myself from turning on my heel and walking the fuck back to my car.

“Just hang out with some old friends and have a good time, Blake. Find an old girlfriend and tap that ass, brother.”

“You sound like an idiot. I’ll call you later when I’m smashed.” I drop the call and take a deep breath. He’s right though. He usually is. Bastard.

Besides, it will be good to see some of my old friends. And it will be even better to hear about how they’re doing and what they’ve been up to. That is why I’m here, or at least it’s how Ben convinced me to come. With a bit of luck and some conversational leading, I might be able to avoid talking about myself entirely. We’ll see.

“Fifteen years. Damn, I’m fucking old,” I mumble to myself.

It was odd for our class president to decide to do it on the fifteen-year mark. Personal agenda for sure. Five years before, the fucker got busted on a drug charge that took my ex down as well. Now though, he can brag about the successful sporting goods store he opened. My ex wasn’t so lucky.

I walk through the entrance to my old high school, feeling a weird sense of traveling back in time. Almost immediately, someone calls out from behind me as I walk through the hall.

“There he is!” It’s a man’s voice. I am tempted to keep walking and pretend I don’t hear it, but the shout is followed by the sound of rushed footsteps. Whoever it is runs up behind me. “We didn’t know if you were coming, Mr. Doesn’t Reply To Our Messages!”

Turning around, I instantly spot the owner of the voice. It’s Clark, one of my good friends from high school. He was the class clown of our year. As he rushes to me, he wears that same big goofy smile that he was known for, although now, he is about forty pounds heavier.

“Hey,” I say with a forced smile. It’s not that I don’t like Clark. In fact, out of everyone at the reunion, Clark is the person I’ve been looking forward to seeing the most. It’s just that Clark, like everyone else, reminds me of a past I’ve been trying to forget, and once again I struggle to understand why I’m even here. “It’s good to see you, Clark.” I stick out my hand to shake his.

“Me?” He asks. “Dude, it’s good to see you, Blake! Hot damn, what’s it been? Don’t you dare tell me I haven’t seen you since graduation. Don’t you dare tell me that!” He still wears that big goofy grin. I can smell the beer on his breath. He’s got to be a few beers deep at this point.

“Okay,” I say with a grin. “I won’t tell you that.”

“You—!” He smirks, feigning a punch at my gut. “Come on, the whole crew is here! I’ll show you.”

He grabs me by the arm and leads me through the hall to the actual reunion itself. Flashing, multi-colored lights spill from the doors to the gymnasium. Music thumps loudly in my ears as we get closer.

The gym is decorated in typical fashion. Streamers and balloons cover the walls, all blue and white to match the school’s colors. A huge banner reading “Class of 2002” hangs from the ceiling, stretching across the entire length of the gym.

The crowd that has turned up is a mixture of people like Clark, overly excited at the prospect of catching up on old times, and people like me, apathetic to the idea, but still here out of some sort of moral obligation.

“We had bets on whether or not you were going to make it,” Clark slurs. His arm drapes around my neck as he leads me through the masses. Some I recognize, some I don’t. I’m not the only one who has changed since high school.

“Oh yeah?” I say, raising an eyebrow. “How much was I going for?”

Clark throws his head back in an exaggerated laugh. “Not as much as you would like.”

With his arm still hanging on me, he leads me to a large table in the corner of the room. Sitting around the table are eight faces that I recognize all too well.

Five men and three women, they are my collective “friends from high school.” The ones I used to hang out with during the day and drink with at night. When we could find someone willing to buy us alcohol, that is.

A pleasant wave of nostalgia hits me as I look at them. Like most people’s high school experience, mine had its ups and downs, but these were the people who got me through it. We grew up together. A lot of my formative experiences were with these people right here.

Judging from their body language, I guess that most of them, like me, have fallen out of contact with each other, and they are using this night as a means to catch up and trade old war stories. It makes me feel a little less guilty about not having spoken to any of them for the past fifteen years.

“Look who I found,” Clark says as he pushes me onto the seat by his own. “Lurking in the bushes. Classic Blake!”

“Hey,” I say to no one in particular, not knowing who to address. I opt for a group chat instead.

“Blake,” the woman next to me beams.

“Hey, Sally,” I nod.

She has bushy red hair and white, porcelain skin. She was my first kiss, and I’m pretty sure I was hers. “It’s been so long. What have you been up to, Blake? Doing well by the looks of it?”

“Oh, you know, this and that,” I say, keeping it vague.

I was poor when I went here. Dirt poor. I come from a broken home that had more problems than money. It’s something that I don’t like to talk about, and I hate being reminded of it. But now that I’m successful and more than a little rich, I realize that I don’t really want to talk about that either.

I don’t want them fawning over me or grilling me about the specifics of my job. People always find my work a little too interesting, and it grates on a person after a while.

But then it hits me. I don’t have anything else to talk about. All I do is work. Whereas they’re all laughing and talking about their kids.

“Sounds interesting,” Sally continues, holding her smile on me as she does.

“Oh, it’s not,” I say, giving my head a shake. “Trust me. It’s just business crap. Suits, too much coffee and a lot of missed weekends. Nothing to tell really.”

I’m a film producer and getting to be a pretty successful one, too. I made my fortune through a few smart investments in college, and I used that money to open a production company. Ten years later, I’m worth more than I’ll ever admit to anyone.

“My son’s two now, the little bugger,” Clark says to everyone in earshot. “So cute that sometimes I just want to eat him up.”

I sip on my drink and listen.

“My oldest daughter starts school next year. So you never settled down, Blake?” Sally asks with a smile.

“No. No kids, no wife.”

I do my best to smile and nod along, but deep down, my stomach churns. Despite my money and success, the one thing my life is missing is a family of my own. I made a choice when I was younger to pursue a career over family. Lately, I’ve been questioning that decision more and more. I want to be a father, but I’m hardly about to enter into a serious relationship with someone. No fucking way.

“Oh damn, I wasn’t looking forward to this,” Clark says a little too loudly.

I look across the gym to see what caught him off guard. The moment I see it, I feel my heart sink.

A giant screen stands behind the makeshift stage. Projected onto that screen is a video, made specifically for the reunion. We were asked to send in clips of our own for a series of videos that would feature. The one playing right now is to commemorate the people who couldn’t be here tonight. Specifically, those who have passed away.

The reason my heart feels the way it does is that I know one face in particular who would be appearing on that screen. Her name is Lyndsey, and she was my high-school sweetheart. And sure enough, as I watch the few names and faces flash on the screen, Lyndsey suddenly appears.

“Hey, didn’t you used to date her?” Clark asks me. He is slurring even more than he was earlier. I guess the alcohol is really kicking in now.

“Yeah,” I say, my voice flat. “I did.”