Chapter 22
The Hermosa High gym still smelled the same. They could drape it with crepe paper and string it with balloons, but it still smelled like varnish and sweat socks to me.
A tuxedo-clad combo was stationed under one of the basketball hoops, playing dance music. But it was too early in the evening for alcohol to have loosened inhibitions, so only a few couples were dancing.
I looked around for Walter, but he wasn’t there yet.
Neither were Denise or Cheryl. Which didn’t surprise me. Denise had surely outgrown her hometown classmates. And I seriously doubted Cheryl would want her fellow grads to see how low she’d fallen.
One person I did see, however, was Principal Seawright. His hair had gone silver, and he walked with a cane, but other than that he looked pretty darn good for a guy who had to be in his eighties. He was chatting with a bunch of alums, honor roll kids, no doubt. Cringing at the memory of our last encounter, I vowed to avoid him at all costs.
I headed over to the buffet table and helped myself to a mini-quiche. Gooey with cheese and studded with chunks of ham, it was absolute heaven. I could not possibly allow myself to eat more than one.
As I stood there shoveling it down, I heard snippets of conversation around me. Everyone was buzzing about Patti’s death.
What a way to go.
Impaled on a statue of cupid.
Ugh! How gruesome!
I plucked another mini-quiche off the platter—this was the last one, absolutely—and popped it in my mouth just in time to hear:
They say that one of the guests turned up at the wedding with a paid escort and tried to pass him off as her fiancé.
You’re kidding!
I’m serious. Turned out the guy was really a male stripper.
My God. Who would be so desperate?
Before they could look around and wonder if the woman with the quiche in her mouth was the desperado in question, I scooted down to the other end of the buffet table. Where the hell was Walter, anyway?
At last I saw him scurrying across the room. As he got closer I tried not to gasp. I know it defies rational belief, but his new toupee was even worse than his old one.
His last one had looked like a dead hamster. This one looked alive. I swear, I thought I saw it wink at me.
“So how do you like my new hair?” he asked, with a pathetically hopeful smile.
Somehow I managed to choke out the words, “Very nice.”
“Who says you can’t get a good hairpiece for $29.99?” he beamed.
“Look.” He took out another equally hideous hank of animal fur from his jacket pocket. “I brought a spare. Just in case you get anywhere near a match, haha.”
I smiled weakly as he shoved it back in his pocket.
“And see what else I brought,” he said, holding out a box.
I just hoped it wasn’t Cheerios.
“A corsage!”
He took out a corsage the size of a funeral wreath.
“Why, thank you, Walter. That’s very sweet.”
And it was sweet of him. I just wished it didn’t look like he’d picked it off a grave site.
“Let me pin it on you.”
“No, I’ll do it,” I said, not wanting him anywhere near my chest.
With some difficulty I managed to pin it on my shoulder strap. I’m surprised it didn’t break the strap.
“Gosh, you look pretty,” he said. “Want to dance?”
Along with Principal Seawright, dancing was high on my Must Avoid At All Costs list. The last thing I wanted to do was revisit the scene of my prom night humiliation.
“I don’t think so, Walter.”
“Oh.” He was disappointed, I could tell, but nothing was going to get me out on that dance floor.
“Okay, then,” he said. “How about a drink from the bar?”
Now he was talking. At last my eyes lit up with genuine enthusiasm.
“Oh, yes, thanks. A white wine would be lovely.”
“Don’t go away,” he said, shooting his finger at me like a gun, in a gesture that was considered passé back in high school. “I’ll be back.”
And then he trotted off to get on line at the bar.
I was standing there, debating about whether I should go back for my third (okay, fourth) mini-quiche, when I heard:
“Jaine Austen! Is that you?”
I turned to see a handsome dark-haired guy in a tweed jacket.
“It’s me. Dylan Janovici.”
Oh, Lord. My druggie prom date. I had to admit, I was surprised at how good he looked. I would’ve thought by this time he’d have ingested so many illegal substances he’d be incapable of speech.
But no, he had an intelligent gleam in his eyes and turned out to be perfectly articulate.
“How’ve you been?” he asked.
“Fine.”
“Interesting corsage,” he said, nodding at my chest.
“Yes, I think in a former life it was a centerpiece at a Bar Mitzvah.”
“You know, Jaine,” he said, flashing me a most disarming smile. “I really owe you an apology for the way I behaved on our prom date. What a jerk I was back then. I’m so sorry for showing up at your house stoned.”
“Oh, that’s okay.”
“I still can’t believe those crazy dance moves of mine. Do you know I threw my back out that night? I guess it must have happened when I tried to flip you over my shoulder.”
Oh, great. The poor guy broke his back trying to lift me and my mega-thighs.
“I had to spend three months in traction.”
“That’s awful, Dylan. I’m so sorry.”
“Don’t be. It was the best thing that ever happened to me. Trapped in bed, I started reading. I never did get around to Nietzsche,” he said, smiling at the memory of the phony “book” where he stored his stash of weed, “but I did read James Joyce and Edith Wharton and P. G. Wodehouse. And all of Jane Austen, I might add.”
This said with another most disarming smile.
“Now I’m an English professor at USC. And I owe it all to dancing with you.”
An English professor! My high school fantasies of Dylan as a sensitive intelligent guy had actually come true.
“So what about you?” he asked, as if he really wanted to know. “What’s going on in your life?”
I told him I was a writer, carefully omitting the fact that I spent much of my working life writing about Toiletmasters’ fine line of Ever-Flush commodes.
“You married?” he asked, a twinkle in his eye.
“Nope.”
“Me, neither.”
“Oh?” I tried not to break out in a happy little jig. that case,” he grinned, ”I’d like to make
“In that case,” he grinned, “I’d like to make up for my bad behavior at the prom by taking you to dinner. Can I call you some time?”
Before I could shout a resounding yesyesyesyesyes!, we were interrupted.
“Hi, hon!”
I turned to see Walter and his hamster hair.
“I got your drink.” He handed me my wine and at the same time clamped his arm around my waist in a steely grip.
“You two together?” Dylan asked, his smile stiffening.
“No, no,” I said, wrenching myself free from Walter’s grasp. “We’re just friends. Right, Walter?”
“That’s right,” Walter said, with a suggestive leer. “Just friends. Wink wink. Nudge, nudge.”
“Well, catch you later,” Dylan said weakly, and before I could stop him he disappeared into the crowd.
The minute he was gone I whirled on Walter and shot him a look so smoldering, I was surprised his toupee didn’t spontaneously combust.
“For crying out loud, Walter. I thought we agreed. This night was supposed to be strictly platonic. We are just friends. No arms around my waist. No wink wink, nudge nudge. Understand?”
“I understand,” he said softly, looking down at the floor.
“Really, if you tell one more person we’re a couple, I’m leaving.”
He looked up, alarmed.
“Don’t do that. I’ll be good. I promise.”
And he was.
He spent the next hour or so doing a reasonable impersonation of a human being. He didn’t touch me once as we circulated among the crowd. Nor did he leer or call me “hon.” We stopped to talk with the few people I remembered (Joey Romano, the class clown, I was interested to learn, was now a funeral director) and spent a stultifying twenty minutes chatting about the good old days solving equations with the members of Walter’s old math club.
“Want to get some chow?” Walter asked when we’d run out of former acquaintances.
He didn’t get an argument from me on that one. It had been a while since my mini-quiches and I was feeling a bit peckish.
I restrained myself, however, from piling my plate with food in case Dylan came back to join us. Just a few Swedish meatballs and some macaroni salad. I did not want him to think I was the kind of woman who needed a forklift to carry her buffet plate. I am that kind of woman, but Dylan didn’t need to know that.
Walter and I grabbed two seats at one of the tables scattered around the gym, and I spent the next half hour dutifully listening to him yak about the wacky world of insurance actuaries.
True, my mind wandered a tad as he yammered on. Every once in a while I’d see Dylan out of the corner of my eye, making the rounds. For a few disconcerting moments I saw him deep in an animated discussion with a most attractive blonde. I kept hoping he’d stop at our table, but he never did.
Somehow I managed to keep my eyeballs propped open as Walter droned on.
At last, I was put out of my misery when the president of the alumni association, Peggy Chapman, stepped up to the mike. Peggy had been one of those terminally perky kids in high school, the kind of kid who showed up at every pep rally, brimming with school spirit and, I suspect, just a few amphetamines.
After a highly fictional speech about our golden years at Hermosa High, she gave a moving tribute to Principal Seawright, seated at one of the ringside tables. Then door prizes were awarded—as well as a special prize to the person who’d traveled the farthest to come to the reunion.
“Linda Ruckle,” Peggy announced, “flew in all the way from London, on her corporate jet. In case you guys didn’t know it, Linda is chairman and CEO of her own cosmetics company. C’mon up, Linda, and get your prize.”
And then the attractive blonde I’d seen talking with Dylan stood up. She strode to the mike in a nosebleed expensive cocktail dress, the picture of poise and grace. Was that Linda Ruckle, the same acne-ridden outcast from my gym class? If only Patti could see her now!
I guess the meek really could inherit, if not the earth, at least a corporate jet. And, from the way I’d seen them chatting together, what should’ve been my dinner date with Dylan.
The official ceremonies having come to a close, the band started up again, and Walter begged me for a dance.
“Please, Jaine,” he pleaded. “Just one, before you go.”
The combo was playing a slow tune. I figured my odds of being hurled across the room were minimal.
“Okay,” I said, “but no dipping, no spinning, no twirling. No fancy moves of any kind.”
“I promise. No fancy steps.”
He guided me in an uneventful foxtrot, and as we shuffled around I couldn’t help but feel proud of myself. I’d made amends for setting Walter’s toupee on fire and for showing up with another guy at the prom. I’d atoned for my sins and could now head off into the world a guilt-free woman.
Yes, I had paid my dues, and I was just about to call it a night when Walter looked into my eyes and said:
“So how about it, Jaine? Will you give me a chance? Will you go out with me again?”
No, absolutely not. I had to end this thing here and now. I could not let him guilt me into one more date.
“I’m sorry, Walter. But it’s not going to work for us.”
“Oh.” His Adam’s apple bobbed as he gulped back his disappointment.
I felt like heel of the year, but I couldn’t weaken, otherwise I’d still be dating this guy when I was on Medicare.
“There are lots of other women out there, Walter. And I’m sure one day you’re going to meet someone special to have a relationship with.”
“Oh,” he said, “I already have. Min Lin.”
“Min Lin?”
“My mail order bride from the Philippines. I haven’t exactly met her yet, but in her picture she’s really hot. We’re getting married next month in Vegas.”
“Wait a minute,” I squawked. “You’re getting married next month and you want to have a relationship with me?”
“Oh no, Jaine. I don’t want to have a relationship with you. I want to have an affair with you! What Min Lin doesn’t know won’t hurt her. Wink wink, nudge nudge.”
Can you believe the colossal nerve of that guy? I came thisclose to nudge nudging him in his privates. Instead, I took the high road and stomped off in righteous indignation.
And that’s where fate stepped in and pulled one of her dirty tricks.
Because I hadn’t stomped very far when I tripped over something. Something soft and furry and exceedingly slippery. Omigod! It was Walter’s spare toupee! The damn thing must’ve slipped out of his pocket while we were dancing.
The more I tried to regain my balance, the more I stumbled, and before I knew it, I was reeling across the dance floor and heading straight for Principal Seawright.
Holy Moses! It was prom night all over again! All eyes were glued to my tush as I crash-landed in the poor man’s lap.
The courtly octogenarian looked up at me with a wry smile.
“Ah, Ms. Austen,” he said. “We meet again.”
Any shards of dignity I’d had in high school had been scattered to the winds.
I leaped up from Principal Seawright’s lap with a strangled cry and raced from the gym, my reputation as the Class Idiot cemented for all eternity.
Cursing myself for ever agreeing to go to the reunion, I sped all the way home, stopping only for red lights and an emergency pint of Rocky Road. I planned to eat it propped up in bed, hoping to calm my shattered nerves with chocolate and sitcom reruns.
Home at last, I trudged up the path to my apartment.
The minute I opened the door, I realized something was amiss.
The first thing I saw was Mamie’s toy cell phone on floor. What was it doing here in the living room? Last I saw it, it was behind a firmly shut door in the bedroom.
The second thing I noticed was that the philodendron plant on my bookshelf was no longer on my bookshelf. It was on the floor, dirt splattered everywhere, its pot shattered to smithereens.
“Prozac!” I called out. But she was nowhere in sight.
Filled with misgivings, I headed down the hallway to the bedroom and saw the door wide open. How the heck did that happen? Maybe I hadn’t shut it securely enough and Prozac had managed to push it open.
I stepped inside and gasped.
My bedroom looked like it had been struck by a cyclone. My pillows were on the floor, my shoes dragged out of the closet, and my hamper overturned, undies scattered about the room. And in a zany bit of interior design, my pajamas were draped over my lampshade.
And there on my bed, chewing happily on one of my favorite—and most expensive—suede boots, was Mamie.
Prozac was sprawled out on top of her, like Cleopatra lounging on the Nile, purring like a buzz saw.
I think I like having a dog.
“Mamie!” I shrieked, wrestling the boot away from her. “Did you do all this?”
At least she had the grace to look ashamed. Which is more than I can say for Prozac. She swished her tail delightedly.
Isn’t she a hoot? She’s so much more fun than I thought she’d be.
I surveyed the wreckage and sighed. I simply could not deal with it now. I’d clean up tomorrow. All I wanted was to get in bed with my Rocky Road and watch mindless TV.
Then, for the first time since I walked in the room, I noticed that the Lassie marathon that had been playing when I left was off the air. The television screen was filled with snow and static. Rats. The cable had gone out. I was just about to grab my phone and report the outage when I saw that the wire had been severed.
A few inches of cable still dangled from the back of the TV, but the rest of it lay coiled on the floor, cut clear through. Well, not exactly cut. Chewed was more like it. I could still see Mamie’s teeth marks on the rubber.
“Mamie, you chewed right through my cable!”
Prozac leaped down from the bed and sniffed at the rubber.
What a neat trick, huh?
With a weary sigh, I plucked my pajamas from the lampshade and got undressed. Then I climbed into bed and scarfed down my Rocky Road listening to talk radio, where only the world’s looniest nutcases can be found calling in on a Saturday night. One guy claimed he’d just been released by aliens from the planet Playtex.
“You think you had it rough, buddy?” I muttered. “Try going out with Walter Barnhardt.”
When I’d licked every morsel of ice cream from the carton, I turned off the light and settled down for the night. Yes, I know I didn’t brush or floss, but I was in no mood for oral hygiene.
I was just about to drift off to a well-earned sleep when I realized I hadn’t taken Mamie outside to do her business.
I staggered out of bed, muttering a string of unprintable curses, and reached for my Reeboks. I started to put them on but stopped when my big toe felt something warm and squishy. It looked like Mamie had done her business after all.
Prozac preened proudly from her perch on my pillow.
I taught her how to do that!
YOU’VE GOT MAIL
To: Jausten
From: Shoptillyoudrop
Subject: Happy Ending
Well, Roberto’s gone and we all had a marvelous time. Once Daddy saw that my “lover” was a chubby, balding man, he was as charming as could be. And your father can be quite charming when he wants to be. Which is why I married him, I suppose. I have to remind myself of that the next time he’s driving me up a wall.
As for Roberto, what can I say? Such a sweet man—it’s hard to believe how many years have passed since our picnic on the Spanish Steps. Try to enjoy every minute of your life, darling; it all goes by so quickly.
And the really good news is that Daddy was feeling so guilty about abducting Signor Facciobene, he didn’t even put up a fight when I insisted he return his library book. He brought it back, meek as a lamb, paid the fine, and Lydia issued him a new library card.
Best of all, he’s given up that ridiculous lawsuit, which is all that matters.
Your very relieved,
Mom
To: Jausten
From: DaddyO
Subject: If At First You Don’t Succeed, Sue, Sue
Again
Guess what, honey? Roberto turned out to be a pretty nice guy. I suppose I overreacted a tad when I heard he was coming. After all, your mom is entitled to an innocent romance in her youth. Live and let live. That’s my motto.
Love and kisses,
Daddy
PS. I’ve decided to drop the Pinkus case. But don’t worry, Lambchop. All my legal training wont go to waste. I’m suing the city of Tampa for false arrest.