Calumet Page 2

  school, but not by much. I can go with you if the salespeople

  scare you. If you got rid of the rust bucket and the pocket

  protector, you might find someone without a strange hang-

  up.”

  “Why are we friends again?” Bert asked.

  “Because you love me, and I don’t ever want to comb

  your nonexistent chest hair.” They laughed together as she

  collected all the papers she needed before she went home.

  It was nice to have Bert to talk to, and the next hour went

  by in a blink. “Do you need to change?”

  “I want to take a quick shower—then I’ll Uber to your

  place.” He fooled with his glasses again, and she put her

  arm around his shoulders.

  “How about we rent the movie and cook something for

  Margot? We can have a romantic evening of grading papers

  and watching the brilliance that is Jane Austen.” She kissed

  the side of his head and pushed him out the door.

  “That sounds even better. You have all the good booze.”

  “Fantastic. Viola, anything else this afternoon?”

  “No, but you have seven appointments in the morning,

  and I already told them you’re not in the market for a

  girlfriend, boyfriend, or anyone to have your baby in

  exchange for an A.”

  “I’m sure none of them are interested in that, so stop

  threatening people.”

  “Honey, wake up. Margot wrote out a script for me, and

  I’m not sure I’ll like what’ll happen to me if I don’t follow it.”

  “If you’re done, I’ll see you in the morning. Try to behave,

  so I don’t have to bail you out of jail.” She pushed Bert

  gently to get him walking and thought about letting Margot

  set him up again. There had to be one sane man out there

  who could appreciate Bert for who he was, pocket protector

  and all. “Have a nice evening, boss,” she said to Viola.

  She thanked the universe for her life as they headed for

  her truck. It didn’t get any better than what she’d built, no

  matter what her family thought of her. Their disapproval of

  her lifestyle, a word her mother always said with the

  prerequisite air quotes, was plain. It was why she hadn’t

  gone home after high school, and why she’d built her own

  family to share her life with. Happiness made it easy to

  forget all the things that brought pain.

  “Get all that shit out of your head before you get in a

  funk.” She spoke softly to herself as she unlocked her door

  and got in. There were some things that just were. They

  couldn’t be changed, and trying was like hitting yourself in

  the head with a brick. Nothing good came of that.

  * * *

  Iris Long Gravois clapped her hands to get everyone’s

  attention. The reunion wasn’t that far off, and they had a lot

  of planning to do if they were going to have another

  successful class event. Their class president had left for

  bigger and better things and had never looked back, so it

  fell to her and the others who’d served on student council to

  organize everything. This wasn’t her favorite set of tasks,

  but her job at the high school meant she was one of the

  coordinators by default. The others reasoned she had all the

  information at her fingertips.

  “Do we have a complete list of everyone from the last

  time?” she asked her good friend, Nancy Lyons.

  “Everyone, including the spouses of the three people

  who passed away. Can y’all believe we’ve lost that many in

  only sixteen years?” Nancy shook her head as she handed

  Iris the list. “Adeline and I went ahead and got the

  invitations ready to mail,” Nancy said, mentioning her

  daughter. “If everyone agrees there are no changes to be

  made, we’ll mail them out today.”

  “Thanks for doing that, you two,” Iris said. She placed a

  check next to invitations, so they could move on. “We’ve

  gotten permission from the school board to use the gym at

  the high school again. I spoke to the superintendent myself.

  It’ll be like reliving prom.”

  “Let’s hope not,” Molly Speller said, making them all

  laugh. “I have no desire to go back to high school. That was

  a brutal time—brutal. The booze was horrible, and my bad

  hip means I have no desire to have sex in the back of a car

  ever again. The fact that I ever drank Boone’s Farm pains

  me to admit.”

  “Not all of it was bad,” Iris said softly. High school was a

  time most people chose not to think about afterward unless

  they were the captain of the football team, or a cheerleader,

  but she’d been happy all those years. After graduation she’d

  lost something vital to her, and she’d never gotten it back—

  not really. She wasn’t unsatisfied with her life, but What if?

  was the question she asked more often than she’d like.

  “Iris, girl, you have to stop romanticizing what was

  basically a hot mess of a time. None of us could drink

  legally, drive, or buy a vibrator,” Molly said. “I’d never go

  back, and after kids and marriage if they outlawed wine

  tomorrow, I’d become a bootlegger. There are certain things

  I can’t live without. The other thing we stupidly did was wish

  to be treated like adults and have children of our own.

  Remember how we said we’d raise them so differently?”

  Tori Hopkins laughed the hardest and nodded. “God, yes,

  but then you have them, and you wonder how you can

  survive it without social services showing up at your house

  on a daily basis. If I’d actually cut a switch every time I

  threatened to do it, my trees would be bare. And now that

  they’re teenagers, I have to keep myself from committing

  murder daily.”

  “I’d give anything to come home and go to my room and

  eat pizza rolls,” Claire Guidry said. “I miss the days when

  my only responsibility was doing my homework and picking

  my dirty clothes off the floor. You were the one who started

  early on those kids, so you know what I mean, Iris.”

  Iris smiled, thinking of her after-school activities, then

  lost it when the gossip that never really died down was

  brought up again. “I wanted a family, but I didn’t start that

  early.” She’d actually been pregnant at graduation but had

  hidden it well. “If y’all don’t mind, let’s get back to what we

  need to get through. You can all reminisce about your

  childless selves later.”

  “But the gym, yet again? Is there anywhere else we can

  go?” Claire asked.

  “It’s the only place we could get with our small budget,

  and the decorations from the last reunion are in the attic of

  the high school.” Iris swore these women did this every

  single time to be obstinate. “People act like they’re destitute

  when we plan this thing, so it can’t ever be elaborate. You’d

  swear they’re still on an allowance from their parents and

  are saving for something special.”

  “Do you think our fearless leader will ever come back

  and
help us with any of this?” Molly asked. “This was one of

  the things you had to promise to do when you ran for class

  president, plan reunions. Besides, I’m sure you’d love to see

  her again, Iris.”

  “Did anyone call her?” Tori asked.

  The false sincerity in their voices was hard to take, and

  Iris knew there was no way any of them had the guts to call

  Jaxon and ask her to come back. Their graduation was the

  last day they’d all been together, and she missed those

  times most of all. If there was a way to go back to those

  years, she’d do it, if only to spend another afternoon with

  Jaxon Lavigne. She hadn’t had any contact after Jax had left,

  and she’d never expected any. Not after how it had ended

  between them. For that, she was to blame.

  “Did you?” Tori asked her. “You two were tight back then.

  Surely you’ve kept in touch.”

  Tori was always the instigator in the group, and not one

  of her favorite people. The town of Chackbay, Louisiana,

  wasn’t that big, and pretty much everyone knew everyone.

  You were born here, you grew up, had your own family, and

  then you eventually died and were buried with all your

  relatives going back a few hundred years. That’s the way

  things were done, and trying to change it was futile.

  Some found it comforting that everyone was aware of

  their neighbors’ business, but it was hard keeping secrets

  when you lived in a fishbowl. She’d tried her best to keep

  that part of herself she treasured hidden from everyone she

  knew, to avoid uninvited attention. Some secrets, though,

  were hard to hide in plain sight.

  “I haven’t talked to Jaxon since she left for college. Her

  mother gave me her address, and we’ve sent an invitation

  every five years, but she’s never responded.” That was all

  she could say without getting upset.

  “Jaxon should be ashamed of herself for staying away for

  so long.” Claire shook her head again and voiced what they

  were all probably thinking. “Her dad had those health

  problems, and her mom didn’t deserve being cast aside like

  that.”

  They all saw Gene and Eve Lavigne at church every

  Sunday, and they never appeared happy. Gene still had that

  straight posture he’d perfected in the army, and Eve had

  that disapproving snarl that didn’t exactly make her

  approachable. Iris said, “You don’t know what goes on in

  families, so I try not to judge. It’s not like any of us have

  given Jaxon any reason to come back.” That part was true.

  There’d been nothing to do but figure out the next stage of

  their lives those last days before Jaxon left for LSU. It had

  quickly gone wrong, and it’d been brutal for her old friend.

  “Come on, Iris, don’t be so nice. That’s one fucked-up

  family dynamic, and you know it. Jaxon’s older brother, Roy,

  is the only one who turned out halfway normal, and that’s

  me being generous,” Tori said. “And along those lines, have

  y’all done any reading in the checkout lane at the grocery? I

  doubt any of it is true, but the National Enquirer reported

  our Jaxon is dating Margot Drake.”

  “Are you kidding?” Molly asked.

  “They didn’t mention her name, but the woman in the

  picture with Margot has to be Jaxon. I guess all those rumors

  about her in high school weren’t bullshit after all.”

  Nancy glanced her way and gave her a slight smile.

  “Ladies, let’s finish this and we can get some lunch. What

  are we going to do about music?”

  Iris was grateful to Nancy for trying to get them back on

  track. She wasn’t sure which of them decided on planning

  these every five years, but the avalanche of memories

  always hit her just the same. Not that she didn’t think about

  Jaxon at least momentarily nearly every day, but she tried

  her best to submerge the thoughts beneath her daily

  responsibilities and her family.

  “We ran into that poor Foret girl who got pregnant in our

  senior year,” Molly said pointing between her and Tori.

  “Y’all remember her,” Tori said. “She eventually married

  the crackhead in our class long before we knew what a

  crackhead was. He left her high and dry with another three

  kids somewhere in Texas.” Tori always seemed to know

  every bit of gossip, especially when it painted someone else

  in a bad light. “Her poor parents had to go and get her, so

  she’s been back about a year now.”

  “I thought we were talking about music,” Nancy said.

  “We are, if you’d let us finish.” Molly waved her off. “No

  sooner than she got back, she started up a pen pal type

  situation.”

  Iris nodded and sat back in her chair. When the

  committee got like this, they got very little done. “I’m

  almost afraid to ask, but with who?”

  “Remember that weird little kid who went away for life

  when we were juniors?” Molly asked.

  “Timmy Chapelle?” Iris still couldn’t believe one of their

  classmates had beaten a man to death in Devil’s Swamp.

  He’d been one of three attackers, and two of them had been

  in their year.

  “That’s him, and I would’ve voted him most likely to go

  to jail,” Molly said almost too gleefully. “Tori and I were

  having lunch this weekend and ran into Donna. She told us

  she had an in to getting the Angola State Penitentiary Band

  to play at our reunion. Can you imagine?”

  “And you said…?” Nancy asked.

  “No, of course,” Tori said as if Nancy was crazy for

  thinking otherwise. “Can you imagine the press we’d get if

  we agreed to that? Donna said Timmy’s in the band, and if

  we agreed he could attend the reunion under guard. It’s too

  crazy to think about.”

  “We’ll hire a DJ like we always do, then,” Iris said. She’d

  tried to convince herself this was going to be a good idea,

  but this meeting was a reminder of the landmines the past

  threw in her path. She’d never had any luck and usually

  stepped on every single one. “If that’s all, I need to get back

  to work.”

  “So you’ll take the job of calling Jaxon?” Molly asked,

  staring right at her.

  “Let’s send out the invitations and see how it goes.” It

  would be as always, with Jax ignoring it, and in a way maybe

  that wasn’t all bad. There’d be nowhere to hide her

  mistakes if Jaxon came back.

  * * *

  Margot Drake flipped her hair and walked off the main set

  of the sitcom she was a regular on and entered what was

  supposed to be her bedroom as far as the viewing audience

  was concerned. The writers, she was convinced, hated her

  since the new season brought in a romance between her

  and one of her costars. Never mind that Mr. Grabby Hands

  was someone she couldn’t stand. On-air chemistry was

  important, but in this case the only way the storyline would

  work was if it revolved around her planning hi
s murder.

  “What the hell?” she whispered as she shook her hands

  to relieve the tension she felt.

  “You okay?” Judith Bradford asked. Judith was one of the

  producers and had gone to bat to get her this job. They

  were now at the start of their third season, and the show

  was a huge success, and it was Judith’s job to keep their

  cast of seven happy.

  “The writers hate me,” she said, then sighed. “Did it have

  to be Britt Anderson, of all people? If I have to kiss him, I

  might be sick.”

  “The writers don’t hate you, but the fans wanted you and

  Britt in a romantic relationship. You can’t stand him, but on

  camera you two pop. According to the guys upstairs, the

  chemistry is undeniable, so you can see why they want

  that.”

  “Seriously?” She headed to the coffee stand, wishing

  they had a station that served vodka. “I would’ve thought

  Britney would be a better choice. There’s no accounting for

  taste, but she really loves Britt almost as much as he loves

  himself. We all know no one will rise to that level of

  adoration, but Britney comes close. That would leave

  Shauna free for me,” she said, batting her eyelashes at

  Judith.

  “The show anchors our Thursday nights, and the ratings

  are gold. There’s no way the network is going to gamble

  with that. You’re America’s sweetheart, and they want to

  keep you on that pedestal. You don’t hide your sexuality, but

  you were smart and fell in love with someone who’s not

  famous.”

  “It depends who you ask on campus when it comes to

  Jaxon’s star power.” She laughed and poured two cups and

  handed Judith one. “It’s been my experience that no one will

  put you on a pedestal more than a woman who loves you.

  Jaxon was a little slow out of the gate, but she finally came

  through, and now she’s the biggest romantic in the world.”

  “I’m not disagreeing with you, but you know better than

  anyone that the networks are run by old white men who

  collectively are assholes.” Judith followed her to the break

  area and sat next to her. “How is Jaxon these days?”

  “Just when I think it can’t get any better, it does. There

  are still parts of her I know she keeps hidden from me, but

  she’s a wonderful person to go home to.” Her phone rang as

  she smiled at Judith. “Hi, baby.”