When Heart Becomes Home

Chapter 2-1

Chapter 2The official reunion tour of Shelby United Consolidated High School began at ten on Monday morning, but a lot of us who’d attended the original Shelby United got there fifteen minutes early.

I’d had a quick breakfast with mother and Raymond, who were getting ready to go to some sort of fitness class at the college. Mother had handed me a schedule of their weekly activities and classes and said she and I could chat later. Since I called them every Sunday, we really didn’t have much to talk about.

As I sat in the parking lot staring at the high school building I’d loathed for four years except for the bright spot of Manny and me having s*x in some out-of-the-way places, I dug in my pocket for the lanyard with my name tag. The chirpy reunion letter welcoming all Shelby High graduates to this year’s week-long event had included a lanyard, a tag with my non-Shelby name of ‘Wes’ on it, and a round sticker with a bright red A in the middle.

This year’s reunion coordinator, whose name wasn’t familiar to me, explained in the letter that as a “fun” thing to do this year—and only if we wanted to participate—we could get an instant reading on whether our classmates were available for dating by affixing (yes, her word) the A on our name tags if we were. The irony of the bright red A and the number of unplanned births after senior year was not lost on me.

If it weren’t for giving back the jacket and, okay, getting to see Manny one last time, I’d have happily walked away from this march into hell.

I glared at the school’s façade and watched the parade of people too old to be in high school walk up to the front doors. At least there didn’t seem to be any upperclassmen lurking to shake me down for any cash I had on me like there had been in the past. It didn’t necessarily mean things were looking up for a visit though.

Slowly I got out of my car and walked into the high school, ready to take the promised tour and to check out my old locker. I was curious to see if the number I’d written on the back of a photo of Eminem still worked. I’d torn the pouting gold-haired picture out of one of the teen mags Chuck had called his stack of stardom. Back then, he’d told us he was going to become a superstar singer or a businessman. Instead, he’d turned into a hotshot stylist with a trendy hair salon downtown.

My old locker combination was scrawled on a piece of paper I’d put in my wallet. I’d found the original scrap in my yearbook with other memorabilia stuck between the pages. Old receipts for comic books, Magic the Gathering cards, and candy bar wrappers fell out when I pulled the yearbook from the bottom shelf where I kept books I no longer consulted or read.

One glance at the string of numbers, and I knew exactly what it was.

As I entered the locker corridor, I was startled by the size of the pristine lockers. None of the tall student-sized lockers remained. All the ones on both sides of the hallway were backpack size. Tiny by the standards of fifteen years before.

My first thought was relief because no one could stuff or lock another student in one of these without going to a hell of a lot of trouble. Even then, the perpetrator of “boys will be boys” probably couldn’t get a person all the way inside.

Ha! Take that, bullies!

I didn’t do a little victory dance, but I sure felt like it.

Okay, lockers gone. A huge nightmare of high school lifted from my memories and vanquished.

Maybe coming back wasn’t such a bad idea after all.

A chime rang. A very mellow Zen-like tone seemed to fill the hallway with the reassurance that whatever cares I had were small in the grander scheme of things.

The voice booming over the P.A. system, however, was definitely not Namaste quality.

“Welcome to Reunion Week! Please proceed to the new presentations classroom, alums. We have coffee, tea, water, and other refreshments for you there. B wing, Room 11.”

I saw a few others moving toward what I hoped was B wing. I followed them. In my day, there had been only one wing: school.

Zack’s husband Teddy was standing outside the classroom. As I spied him, he raised a hand and ambled over to meet me.

“Hey, Wes! You got here!”

“I thought nobody from the group last night was going to the open house.”

“So did me and Zack, but last night ain’t this morning. This morning my super was asking around when I got in for someone to come and listen to the presentations. She said it would help us bid during the next school refurb. The rest of the guys didn’t want to go, but since I knew you’d be here, I said sure. Good to see you again.”

The top of my head probably came up to Teddy’s shoulder. I felt weird walking with a tower of muscle behind me. I wondered how Zack, who was my size, had gotten used to the height difference. Love sure did make strange bedfellows.

We were walking into the room, talking and looking for two empty seats, so I didn’t see our instructor right away.

When I did, Manny was staring at me. Standing in a pool of light at the front of the room, he looked shocked to see me. Like I hadn’t been one of his classmates and entitled to be here. Or we hadn’t been secret high school lovers. In fact, I couldn’t read his expression—other than total surprise. Was he pleased or scared to see me again?

“Well, shit.” I muttered the words low enough I thought nobody but maybe Teddy heard.

“What?” Teddy stiffened like he was ready to protect me.

“Tell you later. Much later.” I hustled him to the back of the room into one of the darker corners.

“Yeah. Okay. Good. Wanna have lunch after this?” He tried to squeeze himself onto a student-sized chair, but gave up halfway down. He stood, turned the chair around, and straddled it like most of the jocks had when I’d gone to classes here.

We were at one of the two-person tables forming a three-tiered semi-circle around Manny.

At a few minutes after ten, when it looked like most of the participants had arrived, Manny asked someone near the door to shut it so we could start.

We settled in our seats.

My heart was beating out of control. Manny looked…Manny looked…

I took a few deep breaths. Teddy glanced over.

“You need help?” He whispered, but I could barely hear him over the beating of my heart and the roar in my ears. “Oh, wait, yeah. I get it now. You’re freaking over that guy, Mr. Garcia, right?”

I shook my head. I’d die rather than admit the sight of Manny was making me hyperventilate. I took a few more calming breaths and centered myself like I’d learned in yoga. In-out. Slowly. In-out. I could get through this. I could.

Suddenly the classroom door slammed open.

“Oops! My bad!” A short Hispanic man stopped abruptly, one foot inside the door, and giggled. “Hey, baby. I tried to get here on time. I really did.”

The guy stood about five feet three or four and kind of glided like a Spanish dancer to an empty chair in the middle of the semi-circle. He gracefully sat and turned to smile at everyone. He had Manny’s dark black hair and eyes, but sported a string mustache and soul patch under his thin bottom lip.

The reaction to his entrance wasn’t totally positive. A few people who looked like they were at the reunion for their fortieth or fiftieth year tsked. The younger the faces appeared to me, the more he got a grin and one young woman even waved.

Manny looked up from the laptop he’d been fiddling with and turned bright red. Other than his heightened color, he didn’t acknowledge the interloper at all.

“If we can get started now. I’m Manuel Garcia. If you don’t remember me, I graduated from Shelby High fifteen years ago.”

His voice rolled over me and washed away the years. His voice, oh, I remembered his voice. The soft, sure way he had of speaking. His breath skittering down my…

Nope, not going there. Paying attention was my goal. Calming my heart and getting through the next hour were equally important. An hour wasn’t very long, was it? So far it had only lasted a couple of days.

“Yeah, Manny, you graduated the last time Shelby won a state championship!” The woman sitting next to the older guy who had spoken up gave him an elbow nudge. He turned to her. “I’m just saying.”

The audience laughed as Manny grinned and nodded to the guy. It was obvious everyone remembered one of the school’s star football players. How could anyone forget Manny Garcia and some of the spectacular touchdowns he made?

I forced myself to look at him, to study him. The hour had just passed the month mark.

Manny still had the broadest shoulders and blackest hair and eyes I’d ever seen. I remembered the feel of his curls running through my fingers and the look of love in his gaze. I could feel his arms around me in a reassuring hug. My lips tingled at the bittersweet memory of his kiss.

To my surprise, tears started falling down my cheeks. I hastily wiped them away, not looking over at Teddy, whose growing concern I could feel. I glanced up at the clock and groaned. Six minutes? Really? Not even ten. Damn.

“I’m okay.” My whisper was husky and unconvincing. “Really. I’m all right, Teddy.”

“Whatever you say, but if you need me to do anything…”

I shook my head and stared at grown up Manny, someone who, I convinced myself, resembled my Manny’s uncle or older brother or dad. Time to get myself under control, since he was starting his presentation. If we were asked to introduce ourselves or share reminiscences, God forbid, I didn’t want to do it with tears on my eyelashes.

Manny was going over the physical changes between the school building we remembered and the place where we were sitting. From the outside, Shelby High, an industrial shoebox with phalanxes of windows along each side, looked exactly the same. The inside might have landed from another planet.

“You probably all noticed the lockers right away and the fact the hallways aren’t straight alleyways. The administration doesn’t take ‘boys will be boys’ as an excuse anymore. If someone gets stuffed into a locker, there’s a safety catch inside the door that the person can use to open it. The halls are monitored at all times by surveillance cameras. You do something criminal here, you get caught.”

He glared around the circle. I’d only seen his stern, unyielding look once. When he refused to let me wear his letter jacket one memorable night. He’d been afraid some of his teammates would see me and know the truth.

His glance landed on Teddy. His frown darkened. I wondered what Manny could possibly have against Teddy, who I was finding out was one of the most gentle men I’d been around.

“On the desk where you’re sitting, there’s a netbook. Please open it and turn it on. If you have trouble, there are a couple of students here to show you how.”

A few nervous laughs went around, but we all opened the netbooks. Nobody, even the oldsters, had any trouble firing them up.

“Babe! I don’t got one. My desk is empty like a—”

Manny turned away from the latecomer. He walked over to one of the student helpers and whispered something in his ear. The student rose, strutted up to the man, and tried to escort the guy from the room. But the man was loudly adamant about staying.

“Okay, all ready. I’ll shut up. Stop already.” The guy frowned at the student, crossed his arms over his chest, and slouched down in his chair.

Everyone consciously ignored him. He looked vaguely familiar, but with the mustache and soul patch I didn’t recognize him. I wondered what his relationship to Manny was. Oddly, I wasn’t jealous, but more curious.

Now the orientation had begun, it was easier to distance Manny the boy and love of my life from the teacher figure at the front of the room. Breathing was easier. I shot Teddy a reassuring smile, and he grinned back at me. He radiated relief.