Dear Readers - Lisette makes a brief early appearance in this story, but it is really about her younger sister, Jillian. Enjoy!! Gapster
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I smiled as I glanced at my phone and saw that it was my daughter, Laura, calling.
"Hi sweetie."
"Hi, Daddy. How are you?"
"I'm doing well, thanks. What do you need?" I joked. Well, it was sort of a joke. It was pretty unlikely that Laura was calling me on a random Tuesday morning in October to just say hi.
"Daddy, that's unfair. Can't a girl just call her father out of the blue?"
"Hmm, I hadn't thought of that remote possibility. But, yes, a girl can. It's kind of you to think of me in the middle of a Tuesday morning."
We made small talk for a few minutes as she caught me up with her studies as a junior at Clemson. She had followed in Jenna's footsteps and was attending the same school her big sister had. I knew she was in the midst of mid-terms.
Life had changed considerably over the past four years since Jenna had been a junior herself. Our real estate business in Columbia had had a couple of excellent years and we had traded in our condo on Isle of Palms for a beautiful ocean-front house on Sullivan's Island. It had a pool and four bedrooms, so it had had been ideal for when we were able to get our entire family together.
The girls were both doing well - Jenna had graduated and was working for a bank in Chicago and Laura was early in her junior year and excelling in her studies. The dark cloud in all of this was the passing of my wife early the previous year. An aggressive cancer had taken her at much too young an age and left the girls and me in a funky mist that was just beginning to clear.
"So, Daddy. I do have a favor to ask."
I smiled. "Of course you do, sweetie. And that would be?"
"Well, exams are over on Friday morning and I was hoping a few of my friends and I could come down to the beach house for the weekend to chill. We won't bother you. We just all need to get away from campus for a few days."
The thought of having a crew of college girls bouncing around the house was certainly an easy vision to embrace. It got lonely around the house now when I was there on weekends alone, so a little younger generation company would be good for the soul. I was working four days a week now in Columbia and spending the long weekends at the beach as much as possible. I suppose I could have let them have the house to themselves, but I liked the idea of being there. Can't always trust kids these days.
"Well, as long as you don't mind me being there, sure. No problem. I'm heading down Thursday after work myself. How many of you will there be?"
"Hmm, probably six. You know a couple of them - my roomie, Shelly. But there's also a couple of other girls from my floor coming too. It's good group, Dad. You'll like them," she said with a giggle.
"I'm sure I will, sweetie. I'll see you for dinner on Friday. I'll get something together for you to eat when you get here."
"Thanks, Daddy. You're the best! I love you."
"I love you too, sweetie." I hung up the phone with a smile on my face. It was always great to hear from my girls, but now I had something to look forward to for the coming weekend as well.
That wasn't to be my only surprise, however. On Thursday morning I received another call on my cell phone - this one out of the blue.
"Hi Jack," I heard as I picked up my cell phone. My brain raced as I recognized a voice I hadn't heard in over a year.
"Lissie? Wow - to what do I owe the pleasure?"
Lisette had been Jenna's roommate in college for two years and had spent time with our family at various times during their days together at Clemson. I had had a fling with Lissie, which I chronicled in an earlier story (Lisette), and it had been one of the more intense and wonderful sexual experiences of my life. We had kept in touch since her graduation and I had visited her once in Baltimore when I was there for business. But Lissie had a serious boyfriend now - a very lucky older gent, to my chagrin - and our relationship had continued on a purely platonic level. I would always cherish, however, the few days I had shared with her four summers ago.
We made small talk for a few minutes as she caught me up on her life and I on mine. Then she got to the reason for her call.
"So," she said in a way that told me we were getting to the meat of the matter. "I understand you're going to have some guests this weekend."
I was a little taken aback and confused, but I acknowledged that I was, in fact, expecting guests. How could she know this?
"Umm, yes, I am. My daughter, Laura, and some friends from her dorm."
"Well, Jack, you're not going to believe this, but I know one of the girls coming to visit with Laura very well."
"Hmm. I know she's bringing a posse, but I only know her roommate, Shelly. What are you trying to tell me?" I asked, trying to get to the point. "Who is coming that you know?"