"I want you to meet my friend." The idea had been a quick drink after a long week. Friday afternoons I liked to sneak away and slip into my favorite watering hole. Anders knew where I would be and frequently met me when he could. We wouldn't stay long. Anne would get angry if I drank too much or had too much fun. Anders was late but his wife Tracy was there already sitting with a tall blonde woman. The woman was not unnaturally large but she seemed to be. Next to Tracy's tiny frame she looked like an Amazon warrior. I didn't want to meet Tracy's friend and as much as I enjoyed Anders' company on Friday afternoons his wife was insane. I attempted a courteous how do you do and a quick escape to the end of the bar where I would have a tall cold light beer and possibly some chicken wings.
"Oh my god! Scott!" said the woman. I had to study her carefully. "You haven't changed a bit!" I scanned my brain and the old records that were stored in dusty old boxes beneath the list of presidents, state capitols, and German vocabulary where I kept things I knew but had little use for. "It's Stephanie! Oh my god, it's been twenty years."
It had been more than twenty. It had been almost thirty. "Stephanie! Wow. It's great to see you!" I pretended excitement to meet her. It was awkward. I was tired.
And so my casual drink turned into a recounting of major life events since High School. We compared records - college, marriage, children, and current profession. Our lives had been more or less mirror images of each other.
I had never dated Stephanie. To be honest, she was too attractive, too popular, too blonde and pretty to ever take a moment to notice me. We were little more than passing acquaintances. She was tall then too, but thin. She had filled out. I will admit it, she had filled out nicely. I don't mind that extra ten pounds or whatever women over forty put on but consider extraneous, a burden to be dieted off. Honestly she looked good.
"This guy! He was a crack-up. I had such a crush on him. We had chemistry together junior year and every day we went just to watch him spar with Mr. Richert. You tortured that poor man."
"Did I? I wasn't trying to."
I hadn't enjoyed high school. I wasn't excited to relive those days. I am not a fan of those movies, romantic depictions of the trial and tribulations of kids trying to decide if they will go out for football senior year or get a job. High school for me was just a holding pattern where I circled aimlessly until I was cleared to land at college.
"I should go. Anne will be looking for me." I said. The truth was I probably still had another hour before I was convicted and sentenced to a weekend of dirty looks and cold shoulders but I had to leave. I had to leave not because Tracey was being annoying, she actually was being quiet. I didn't have to leave because it was unpleasant recalling my high school days although that might have played some part. I had to leave because the longer I talked to the tall blonde, the more I looked at her the more I found myself attracted to her. It was a strange feeling. Four years past my fortieth birthday I had more or less stopped feeling these sorts of feelings. Shit, Anne and I hadn't been intimate in weeks and although that sounds depressing I had gotten used to it. It was like when my eyes started to go and had to get glasses. There was an adjustment period but I was used to them now. I was used to jacking off a couple times a week when it was quiet and I found myself alone at the house.
I left twenty bucks on the table. I think my beer had been $ 3.50 on happy hour but I really didn't care. Tracy of course had to hug me. Before I could get away Stephanie was standing as well and I was pulled into a second awkward hug, you know the hugs where you are trying to be polite but make as little physical contact as possible. Damn she was tall. Her height and her broad shoulders had deceived me. Now that she was standing I realized how her broad shoulders, full chest, and curvaceous hips had created an illusion that she was heavy. She was actually proportionate in that lurid way women had been in the fifties and sixties and I imagined her bent over awkwardly as Dean Martin gave one of his trademark looks.
I ran.
I was half way across the parking lot when I heard my name and turned to see her. When I said I ran I was being metaphorical. The tall woman's run was literal and in high heels she made a clopping sound across the asphalt. Her breasts bounced heartily. She called my name several more times. She panted slightly when we were again standing near each other at the trunk of my car. She said my name twice more for some reason.
"You didn't ask for my number or anything," she said.
"Oh. Yeah, sure. We should exchange numbers." She pulled a business card out of her small purse and handed it to me. As a realtor she had one of those cards with her photo on it. Despite whatever touchups they had made she was more attractive in person. "Oh, cool. I can text you. I have a Texas area code." I told her so she would recognize it. I was torn and it was even money as to whether I would text her or not.
"Do you really need to go?"
"I should. My wife will be angry."
She looked at me strangely and I was suspicious. "I don't want you to get in trouble. Trace' says she's pretty awful. God. I'm sorry. I shouldn't say stuff like that."
It was another terrible awkward moment and neither of us could quite figure out how to get out of it with our dignity.
"You know... we kissed once. At a party... At Ryan's house..." I had been suppressing the memory but it had always been there, knocking at the back window of my consciousness.
"I know." She looked at me with only the slightest of smiles. I liked her hair - long thick blonde curls. "Tracey told me the other day about her friend Scott. She had mentioned you many times but she had always called you 'Mike's Dad.' You know I have met Mike at a couple school events and it was only the other day when she said your name was Scott that I realized he looks exactly like you did twenty years ago." She looked sad. "We've lived a mile apart for five years."
"I will call you." I said.
"You were supposed to call me after that party at Ryan's house too." She stepped backwards awkwardly to allow a car to pull into the parking spot next to me. I let it go too long before I said anything and she turned and walked inside. I watched her. I watched her ass. I watched her and let my mind think the things it didn't like to think anymore. As I drove home I felt dirty. I think Anne had beaten that reaction into me. Fucking was dirty. I went home.
I love my wife, as much as she will let me anyway. She loves me in her own way. That said we are little more than roommates with the mutual connection of having bred a six-foot-four weak-side linebacker and honors student together. He would be gone in 18 months and lord knows what is going to happen when he left. When I got home I opened a bottle of wine. She drank about half a glass before falling asleep. She was snoring gently on the couch before our son even went out for the night.
"Andy told me you used to go to school with Reed's mom." he mentioned as he left. Andy was his girlfriend and Tracy and Anders' daughter, it was how we were all connected.
"Yeah, I heard." The kids talking about us and our having known each other was dangerous. Tracey, I had mentioned, is insane and was prone to really stupid decisions like setting up two of her married friends on a date. I was filled with an uneasiness that I knew came from the fact I couldn't chase the woman out of my head.
My son took off. I left Anne asleep on the couch and went to my den. It took a minute but I found an old yearbook. I looked her up. In her picture she had that crimped hairstyle they all wore back then and she had her hair piled high on the top of her head. I scanned the pages in the front and back of the book. She had left a nice note, signed it with a heart, and written a phone number beneath her name. It was so different back then. We didn't call them "land lines" they were just phones and if you wanted to talk to a girl there was a pretty strong likelihood you were going to have to talk to her mother first. I thought about the business card in my car. I had decided it would be a bad idea for it to be discovered in my pocket. I checked that Anne was still sleeping and fetched it from the pocket in the car door. Inside in my den I set it on the stack of business cards that I have collected there for normal legitimate business practices and tried to forget about it.
I opened a second bottle resolving only to have one glass. It was around ten when Anne woke up and moved from the couch to the bed. The coast was clear and I slipped out the front door and fished a cigarette from beneath the eve of the house. I was such a good boy in high school. I didn't smoke or drink. I didn't do much homework either but it was okay, I seldom got less than an A on any test. It had been such a waste of four years. I set the burning cigarette on a rock and scurried to my desk and back before it had a chance to burn out. I typed the phone number into my cell phone and attached my contact information; it was a pretty slick use of modern technology. I thought twice about pressing send but in the end I did it. I stuffed my phone back into my pocket.
I hadn't even finished the cigarette when it vibrated silently on my hip.
"I know where you live now." She said.
"You are a realtor. Couldn't you look that up in about thirty seconds?"
"Yes. It took me longer to get your phone number though. Probably a whole minute."
"Ha ha." I typed back. I didn't use lol or smiley faces.
