The Right Equation (2 page)

Troubles. God, I wish Will had a Facebook page. Finding out what sort of "trouble" he dealt with would be as easy as sifting through his timeline of the last five years. I stalked his name a few times over the years but eventually gave up a little over a year ago when I realized he'd never join the social network. In high school he had been social enough; he probably didn't need it. If I
had
found a page for him, I definitely would have friended him and tried to get together.

Tammy and Matt sat at the table, both on their phones, not speaking to me or each other. Was that what happened after three kids? So help me if Will were my husband, I'd jump him every night and never take my hands off him. I glanced around the room to see other couples acting the same, or the significant other stepping back as the high school buddies reminisced with one another.

A tight, black leather outfit caught my attention, red sandals burning my eyes. I moved my stare from the feet, up the slim legs, the body hugging top, and recognized one face I'd no sooner want to forget. Standing probably ten feet from me, her brown hair in curls flopping around her head, deep, crimson lipstick on her lips, was Mandy Sanders.

Mandy Sanders, my arch enemy. We
hated
each other. Every day, she strutted through the halls of Polk High as though she were the principal. She might as well have been the way she enforced her own rules and standards for the entire student body - and they followed. Mandy made my life a living hell. Okay, now that I look back on it, I allowed her to treat me like crap because I didn't think much of myself then. If put back in those situations today with my personality now, I would've given her a piece of my mind. Or my fist. Either way, shit would've gone down. The first years of high school, before I obtained a license and drove myself, she teased me relentlessly on the bus, and when I got on every morning, she made everyone scoot out, leaving me nowhere to sit. The damn bus driver didn't do a thing about it. Sophomore year I wanted to be on yearbook, and I was part of it, until she cut out the heads of some of the students freshman photos and put them on adult movie covers. I got kicked off yearbook and detention for a month, and even though later she was found out to be the culprit, she still got on homecoming court. Oh, and prom. Senior year I went with two other girls I considered friends. The theme was Under the Sea. Mandy, along with my two "friends" tossed a bucket of water on me, ruining my suede dress (it was the 90s!), and I never even glimpsed inside the gym.

The Halloween Class Reunion was the first time I saw the gym decorated for an event like this. The whole night would be ruined by Mandy Sanders. I wiped my hands against my trousers as they clammed up. I didn't notice I had them balled up in a fist. I wanted more than anything to waltz up to her and give her a piece of my mind, but the ethical side of me told me to maintain my composure and be civil.

"Whoa, Penny, you're seething at the mouth. You might want to take your mustache off before it catches fire. What's got you up in a bunch?" Tammy jabbed Matt in laughter.

I pointed to .... I guessed she was dressed as Sandy from
Grease
. Okay, she pulled it off. Toss a cigarette in her mouth, John Travolta on the other side, and she was a Pink Lady.

"Mandy? You two got issues with each other?" Matt's finger motioned between the two of us.

Tammy moved her plate and napkin aside, resting her elbows on the table. "Those two
despised
one other."

"Despised is putting it nicely." Good thing Tammy was a lawyer because the thoughts I had toward Mandy would land me in jail.

"Will should have married someone like you." My murderous visions slipped out of my mind for a moment as Tammy spoke. "Instead of a money-hungry snob like Mandy."

Her sentence repeated in my head as I attempted to make sense of what she just said. Will's ex-wife was Mandy? No way. Nice guys didn't commit their lives to jerks like Mandy Sanders. "He married that piece of trash?" Not the nicest choice of words but much better than the big B word taunting the tip of my tongue.

In a villainous manner, Tammy rubbed her hands together. "Sure did. Once he realized all she cared about was money, he filed for divorce. Yeah. She did get the house, like he said, but no alimony or anything, and since Will didn't make his money until well into the divorce proceedings, she walked away with barely a dime."

I didn't know what Will did to make him wealthy. I remembered our conversations in the library centered around Algebra and science, mostly, and rarely anything outside of those topics. Will played baseball - varsity - and the coach needed him to keep his grades up. Around graduation, I heard some college wanted him under full scholarship, but he turned the offer down. Since I didn't keep in contact with anyone from high school, and I didn't ask any of those I'd reconnected with online, Will's profession was completely unknown to me.

While I wanted to keep talking about Will, and find out more about his relationship with Mandy, I didn't feel right discussing him when he wasn't here to defend himself. I never considered myself a gossipy person. My high school reunion wasn't where I wanted to earn the title of Gossip Queen, and certainly not under any rumors concerning Mandy. I slapped my hands on the table as I stood up. "I'm getting a drink." I excused myself and gravitated to the beverage area. A green goo punch bowl and two-liter soda bottles renamed things like
Devil's Delight
and
Bewitching Bubbles
filled the table. Non-alcoholic beverages weren't going to suffice. I needed liquor. Shit, I'd settle for a beer. Didn't this place serve drinks? I spun around, glancing in every corner, and, finally, I spotted a makeshift bar with an older gentleman - an old teacher, perhaps? - handing out alcohol. That's where I was headed.

As if the beer would run out, I practically sprinted toward the bar. I smiled at a few people along the way, not caring to stop and chat until my blood alcohol level increased slightly. When I arrived, the man already had a beer ready to hand to me. I reached out for it, another grabbing it the same time another did.

CHAPTER THREE

My heart bounced in my throat, my insides twisted like a pretzel, as I saw the hand belonged to none other than Mandy. She cackled when she ripped the beer out of my grip. Maybe she laughed, I don't know, but the way I heard it, she cackled like a witch.

"Penny Radcliffe."

In all the years I imagined running into her, I always figured she would forget me. She made fun of me so much, I assumed I was a peon in her big, elaborate world of popularity. My name tag may have given it away, but I highly doubted so based on the pitiful tone she used with me. "I believe you took my beer."

Her cat eyes squinted at me while the corner of her mouth turned up. My pulse raced as she popped open the can and took a long drink. "This one?"

My nostrils flared as I huffed out my chest. It was only a beer, but really, it wasn't. All four years of high school consumed themselves in that little aluminum can. Every insult, prank, conniving laugh existed in that beverage, which Mandy threw in my face. After so many years had passed, I thought all the pettiness would be set aside, but clearly, I was mistaken. "Forget it," I said, defeated. "You're not worth my time."

"Excuse me?"

Damn. I said that out loud. "Mandy, sorry, I didn't mean that." Except I did. A thousand times over.

Beer splashed out of the can as she slammed it onto the bar. "Yeah, you did. I don't care. I never liked you." She eyed me up and down. "What? You're dressed as a
boy
? Seriously. You have the same problem now as you did in high school. You don't give a damn and not in the way I don't give a damn. Wow, your braces are off. That's about all you have going for you. I bet the mustache is real."

I forgot how to breathe, my head floating away from me. Everything I wanted to say to her disappeared with her hurtful words. In a single instant, I wanted to bury myself in the corner and sob, my sixteen-year-old self trying not to feel sorry for what I went through in the past. Mandy strutted away toward a group of girls whose names escaped me, but I recognized as part of her crew. The tears remained welled in my eyes, but I needed them to escape, so I did the only thing I could think to do. Just as though I again walked these halls every day, I bolted to the bathroom, flinging the swinging door open, racing into a stall and locking the door behind me. I wailed, the tears streaming down my face as I tried to calm myself, reminding me what my mom always told me. "Mandy only picks on you to make herself feel better." Her cruel words masked pain within herself.

The music blared from the gym into the bathroom, and I recognized the song playing as
Thriller
. What an appropriate song for the evening. I pulled toilet paper off the roll and dabbed my eyes. I could get through tonight. Mandy Sanders wasn't running me out of my high school reunion. She won too many times in the past. Now, the opportunity to redeem myself stood in front of me. I tossed the paper into the toilet, just as everything went black, and a blood-curdling scream echoed from the hall.

Don't panic
. The dark didn't terrify me completely, but I was much more comfortable with even a thread of light to guide me. If I walked along the side of the wall, I could find my way to the door. But the scream. What happened? What if someone was waiting outside the restroom door with an ax or even worse, Freddy Krueger with freshly sharpened nails? I could walk out of the bathroom, stumbling over dead bodies, sliced to pieces with his knife hands. Okay, an exaggeration. Paranoia. Either way, I couldn't stay here all night. Once I got out of here, I'd probably find the lights on in every room except the bathroom. The humming of the florescent light disappeared, the only noise my heavy breaths.

As though a monster waited on the other side, I inched the door open, and immediately punched out in front of me. Nothing but air. Good. I'd been in this bathroom dozens of times in the past, usually after an encounter with Mandy, so nothing changed. However, fifteen years had passed and with the blackness, I couldn't seem to remember which side the door was on. I kept my palms against the stalls as I took small steps to the left. The jacket I wore weighed heavier on me as the minutes moved on and my anxiousness increased. Sweat blanketed my armpits and now my thighs. My head throbbed at the same pace my heart did. Then I remembered my phone. I reached into the pocket and pulled it out. Of all the apps I downloaded, a flashlight wasn't one of them. I knew there was a button to press to use the camera light on my phone, but in all honesty, I sucked at remembering that kind of stuff. The light from the screen gave enough light to illuminate the area around me, so if I held the phone in front of me, getting out of the bathroom should be a snap.

The tile floor appeared as it had years ago, dirty, dark, and sticky. Holding the phone in front of me, I groaned as I realized I went the wrong damn way. My groan echoed through the bathroom as I started back the other way. I picked up the pace since I knew I was headed in the right direction. My step almost had a skip to it, knowing in a few seconds, I'd be out of the stuffy bathroom and hopefully into some light.

My clammy hand moved along the stalls again, until I slammed into the wall. Shit. I paid too much attention to the floor and not what was in front of me. Once I moved around the wall, freedom would be only a few steps away. I slithered around it, and stepped to the side until the door was in front of me. I pressed my ear to the door, not a sliver of noise outside. Utilizing the phone, I found the metal handle, pulled the door open to be greeted by more blackness.

Great. The whole school must've been out. Now, not only did I have to find my way back to the gym, or the main entrance to just get the hell out of the building, I was alone. No footsteps, no one's breathing but my own. The slight ringing in my ears drove me crazy. I tugged at my jacket and straightened my stance. If I acted as though I wasn't afraid, getting to the gym would be a snap. "Okay," I said out loud, comforting me a little to hear a voice, if even my own. "Here I go."

The gym couldn't be far. I sprinted to the bathroom, but still it didn't take me too long to get there. The halls of the school flashed into my mind, and the hallway I was in led straight to the gym, which would be on my left, directly opposite the main doors. Once I got there, I could decide if I wanted to stay or not. I didn't get a chance to say goodbye to Will, though, and he
was
the main reason I came. I planned on leaving tonight with his phone number.

I took a step forward, stopping with the echo. Was that my foot, or someone else's? "Hello?"

No one replied (thankfully), and I continued forward, my confident stance now a slouch as I stepped ahead again with the small light of my phone. My throat closed up as steps scurried past me. What the hell was that? A mouse? A person? I hugged myself, as though that would do anything, too freaked out to move. A small flash of light startled me, and I glanced around, hoping to see something, anything. The hall went black again. I didn't see anything, I moved forward again. Another little flash of light. I wasn't alone.

CHAPTER FOUR

Blackness filled the hall once again. "What's going on?" I panicked. "Who are you?" The last place I wanted to spend my last moments was at my high school reunion, surrounded by people who mostly made my life a living hell, with the slight exception of a (very) few people. I twirled around, as if the motion promised to bring light to the area. Someone, or something, grabbed me. Three short, earth-shattering screams later, a hand clasped over my mouth.

"Shh, Penny. It's me, Will."

I took a hold of his arm, bunching the fabric of his suit in my hand. He removed his hand from my mouth and I let out a deep breath. "Will. Thank God. What's going on?"