Reunion

"1 new message"

I click. An abbreviated name that means nothing to me.

I almost instanteously delete, just another spam message in the social networking sea. But I don't, I open the link.

I read the first sentence, suddenly I'm 16 again...

It's 4am and we're lying on the hardwood deck of the barn turned recording studio. Sharing an afghan that someone else's grandmother probably made. Huddled off in a corner, under the rafters, where maybe the other 15 people on the deck won't notice, deep in the black darkness of the New Jersey hills.

Tentative hands fumbling, trying to get a sense of where each of us is. Then quickly we scoot closer together, our mouths meet. Our breathing is louder, our mouths smack as they come together then pull apart. I'm sure everyone else can hear us, but for the first time in my life, I don't care. I'm the one being daring, adventurous, in demand.

SHE wasn't even supposed to be there that weekend. It wasn't HER reunion, SHE didn't run away from the mocking and the awkwardness to our summer sanctuary. She was just a friend of our host, who lived near the meeting place when we finally all came back together. But she still fit in.

We met up again four months later. Same location, same result. Something was different that time though. Maybe I expected it too much, it was too easy. Had I actually gotten cocky? She certainly wasn't beneath me.

The next time I returned, just before college, she didn't come. Couldn't come? Who knows...

I visited her friends for prom, not to be her date, someone else's. I don't remember if we even talked that night. Maybe she was a year ahead? It's all hazy.


Twelve years later, I have one new message. But with the click of my mouse, it's still the reunion.