I was at school reunion the other night and it was amazing to see people who I hadn’t seen in years, amazing to see how little they had changed in the 25 years since we had been dispatched to the big wide and wild world.
The reunion put me in mind to write a story, entirely fictional I can assure you about a chap called Jack and his own little reunion adventure. It might pass a few harmless moments for you, I hope you enjoy it.
The School Reunion
You know when you get butterflies in your stomach. When you get nervous, looking forward to something but worried about it at the same time. Well that’s how I found myself standing outside the Hotel that Friday night in August. A warm night but I stood there trying to figure out if I should leave my jacket on or take it off. Worried about how I looked, Jesus, where did my hair go?………where did that fucking belly come from?
Gab had just dropped me off for a school re-union, I hadn’t seen most of these people in 20 years, Christ 20 years, where had the time gone? I stood there wishing I had a cigarette and finally I said, “Pull yourself together man….For fucks sake, you’re a master of the universe”. I spent most of my days kicking ass and telling people what to do, sure I was capable of being an ass-hole, but not often, practically all of the time I was fair and level-headed, calm and cool but here tonight…I was absolutely fucking terrified.
I walked into the hotel lobby and saw a sign for the maple room telling me that’s where the fun and frolics would take place. It was a typical hotel function room dimly lit and for the night that was in it, someone had hooked up their Ipod to the stereo system with a playlist made up of what seemed like every song ever released in the 80’s. Peter, John, Martina and Joyce where facing towards the door talking to some others I couldn’t see, holding hands and drying eyes. Various tables around the room where occupied by two or three people, nervous too I guess, not joining up the conversations. Early enough in the evening I thought to myself, wait till the sipped beers and soda waters start turning to Gin and Tonics, Vodka and WkD’s. I walked over to Peter just in time to catch him say “Yeah, Jack the bollix, funny how he’s never around when it’s his turn to buy a drink” Martina, ever prim and proper kicked him in the foot while I smiled. I listened in to the conversation all the while looking at the door, waiting for Elaine. Elaine who I hadn’t seen in 16 years.
I went from table to table and laughed at stories regaled, stories I had never heard before and some which were all still way too close to the surface for comfort, all the while I kept an eye on the door, waiting for Elaine.
Jesus, remembering some of the things we did back then, how we weren’t killed or at least end up in a cell for a few hours I’ll never know.
The first holiday we went on, where we crashed the boat we’d hired and were left stranded for the night, each of us taking drunken turns at “keeping watch” and making sure the boat didn’t sink because of the Titanic sized hole in the side.
The time we “accidentally” took the hallucinogenic’s and 3 of us woke up the next day in the back of a truck, 300 miles from home
The time we borrowed Stephen’s dad’s car, forgot to put on the hand brake and it rolled off the pier.
The second holiday we took, when Joey drank a bottle of Johnny Walker and decided he could jump from our apartment block to the one beside it. I was never able to look Joey’s mother in the face again. At her funeral he cried because in a wheelchair, he couldn’t carry her coffin.
The time we got into a fight and Mick got stabbed with a broken umbrella, (yes, a broken umbrella, you read that right, Jesus, you couldn’t make it up). How in the hospital that night, while we waited to see if he was going to be ok, we tried so desperately to get three of the nurses to go for a drink with us, (Mick was ok of course and perfectly understood our over-riding need to chat up nurse’s).
Stories were told too of some of the people who hadn’t made it, I didn’t listen in to those stories though and I gravitated towards the tables where people laughed, all the while watching the door for Elaine.
Probably about two hours in, as I had predicted, the carefully sipped beers and soda waters had given way to the real poisons of choice….the Gin, Whiskey and Vodka started to flow. The room started to fill and happy memories and old gripes where shared and sorted, every so often you could catch a frown, a grimace or an eye wiped but alcohol has a funny way of easing conversation and pretty soon you had to try quite hard to hear that 80’s playlist humming away.
I strained my ears and just about made out Cindi singing about how she was going “to catch me if I fall”.
I looked towards the door and there she was. Elaine. As I walked towards her, she flicked her fringe back the way she always did, I caught my breath, the smile, the sparkle in the eye, the tilted grin, the wiggle of the nose, the way she nervously parted her lips, just ever so slightly to grab a deep breath for courage, everything I remembered. I smiled and said “Jesus you look fantastic, you haven’t changed a bit, do you have a portrait in your attic?” She laughed and my heart jumped, just like it always did whenever I was around her.
The others came to meet her and she was engulfed in hugs and kisses. I stood to the side and waited my turn as she looked around searching.
“Where’s Jack” she said to Peter. “Jesus” he said, “you don’t know?” “How could she”, said Martina, “she only flew in tonight.
“I’ve just come straight from the Airport” said Elaine, “My flight was late…what don’t I know?”
Martina took Elaine’s hand and said, “Jack died last night, he was at a bank machine and was mugged”….Peter burst in, “so fucking stupid, so fucking fucking stupid, they’ll probably never catch the bastard, camera wasn’t working”, he said with cracking voice and through the lump in his throat….Martina put her hand on his arm and apologised for his outburst….”there was nothing anyone could do….”
I walked up to Elaine and although I knew she couldn’t see me, I could see my own reflection in the tear that had formed in the corner of her eye. The tear welled up, bursting with a million memories, happy and sad.
Out of the corner of my own eye I saw Gab appear.
Gabriel, I should probably call him, he is an Arc Angel after all. He beckoned me over, smiled and put his hand on my shoulder.
“Thank you for letting me be here” I said. “Hey” he replied, “least we could do for the king of the school disco dance floor”
“Are you ready?”, he asked. “As I’ll ever be”, I said.
I turned back towards Elaine and she and the room around her began to shimmer. She looked straight into my eyes and I knew she could see me, she raised her hand and waved with her little finger, just like all those years ago. Through the tears, hers and mine, she smiled and whispered “Good-bye Jack”
