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“Come here, baby,” Jolene cooed, tucking the baby into her arms and producing a wet wipe from her purse.
“That is the best part. I can give them back,” I told Gabriel quietly.
Gabriel asked, “Where’s Andrea?”
Dick nodded to the stunning pale redhead standing by the punchbowl, chatting with Hector Gonzalez and a girl I used to take French with. Andrea was pretending to be Dora Grady. Overweight, cursed with bad skin and a shock of unruly red frizz, Dora was our very own Carrie White, without the telekinetic revenge. While I didn’t exactly participate in the locker-room abuse of Dora, my social paralysis, my failure to do anything to help her, still haunted me years later. If anyone deserved to reemerge as slim, beautiful Andrea, it was Dora. I wondered where she was and hoped that she’d found some measure of happiness, that she wasn’t here tonight because she’d decided her former classmates weren’t worth her time.
And that she wasn’t lurking in the eaves of the gym, waiting to trap us inside and kill us in a well-deserved inferno.
I shook off these thoughts. Andrea was adjusting to vampire life far faster than I had. She was already used to nighttime hours. She didn’t have the moral confusion I did about feeding from donors, having been in their shoes. And she and her vampire boyfriend, now fiancé, had settled most of their issues before she was turned. I could only hope that she wouldn’t ask me to be a bridesmaid.
I thought back to my plan for a Brave New Jane. Andrea would never need one, but so far, I’d made impressive headway on mine.
Normal, healthy relationship? As normal and healthy as I was ever going to get, so: Check.
Fulfilling career? Check.
Loving, nonjudgmental family? I’d created my own and managed to include a few blood relatives, so: Check.
Plan for world peace? I’d get right on it.
I was standing there, admiring my friend, when Gabriel tapped me on the shoulder.
“Can I talk to you for a minute?” he asked, leading me away from the punchbowl, oozing infants, and our friends.
“Where are we going?” I asked as we quietly left the gym and headed for the electives building.>“Why do I get the feeling that I’m being used for my pretty face?” he asked as we passed under a white and blue balloon arch and a banner that read, “Welcome Back, Howlers! Class of 1998!”
“Hush up, arm candy,” I muttered.
Half-Moon Hollow High School’s gym smelled exactly the same, like BO and anxiety. The reunion committee had tried valiantly to transform the gym into an Enchanted Paradise using the same props they used at our prom ten years before. Let’s see, transparent plastic palm trees lined with twinkle lights? Check. Giant papier-mâché volcano with fake flame streamers blowing out? Check. Giant parachute billowing artfully from the ceiling to give the impression that we were extremely well-dressed castaways under an impromptu shelter? Check. Ignoring the fact that said parachute’s storage closet was rumored to be the conception site of Coach Kelly’s love child with Mindy Noonan? Check.
“This is a rite of passage?” Gabriel asked, eyeing the faux volcano. “What exactly does this signify?”
“Nothing, let’s go,” I said, turning on my heel and making what would have been a brilliant dash for the door if Gabriel hadn’t caught my arm.
“We agreed this was an important part of your emotional development.”
“When did we agree to that?” I demanded as he dragged me toward the registration table.
“You said it, I agreed to it. It’s similar to a verbal contract.”
“You’re not a nice man,” I told him.
“I think we’ve established that,” he said as he planted me firmly in front of the table, where a brunette in a cantaloupe-colored suit turned to me with pasted-on smile. I searched her face. Huh. I was expecting to be confronted with someone who’d tortured me in the cafeteria or mocked me in math. But I had no idea who this person was.
“Jane!” she cried. “It’s so good to see you!”
“Hey …” I zeroed in on her name tag. I didn’t even recognize the little senior photo that was laminated next to her name. Like so many of us who graduated from HHHS in the 1990s, she suffered from poufy bangs combined with the horrid plaid flannel of the grunge period. (Pop-culture influence had only so much sway over Hollow girls. We could not be persuaded to put away our curling irons.) I scanned the name. “Mary Beth. How are you?”
“Oh, you know me.” She chuckled as she handed me my name tag. I winced, because, no, I didn’t. “I’m always busy. I’m just so glad to see you here. You look great. And who is this?”
“This is my boyfriend, Gabriel,” I said as she scribbled out a guest name tag with a Sharpie.
Mary Beth winked broadly at him. “Well, you better watch her, Gabriel. She was always one of the sassiest girls in the class.”
“Not much has changed,” Gabriel informed her.
“I can’t wait to find the two of you later so we can catch up,” she cooed.
