Page 5 of The Reunion

Until finally, she smiles at me.

It’s that smile she always used to give me. The one that felt specially reserved for me. A little bit cheeky around the edges, and entirely kissable. Blue eyes warm and open, like she has nothing to hide from me, is willing to lay every emotion that might flicker through them bare for me to see.

Like she’s so completely and utterly happy to see me.

I can’t help but grin back at her, and I know I’m done for.

Chapter Four

Hayden

‘Most Likely to Succeed’

The school feels so … plain. When did it get like that?

These halls used to hold so many memories – good and bad. This place was the epicentre of years of my life. The most ordinary things used to feel so important, like the fact that my locker was right in the middle of the bottom row and I’d practically get trampled by everyone else in between classes just trying to swap out my books, or that one seat in the library that I favoured because it had good natural lighting and the librarian couldn’t see if I was eating lunch there, and the supply cupboard down by the English rooms that I avoided for an entire year, taking the long way around to class, because I heard some of the rugby lads were shutting unsuspecting people inside it for a laugh.

I don’t know what I expected to feel, coming back here, but I do know it wasn’t this sense of … complete underwhelm.

It’s just a building. Just walls with too many layers of paint on, and scratchy carpets and creaking radiators and fluorescent strip lighting. It’s so unextraordinary that I pinch myself, wondering if my sense of detachment is because this is all a weird dream.

Nope. Real.

I rub my arm and fall into step behind a couple I don’t recognise, joining a small queue for the party. Bryony is ushering people in, greeting them like a hostess, which makes me scoff. I bet she’s loving having the limelight, despite the fact she called this whole idea ‘kitsch’.

(I did wonder if she thought it meant ‘cute’ rather than ‘tacky’, but I don’t think Bryony’s the kind of person to get that wrong. She strikes me as someone who is – who always has been – very deliberate in everything she does.)

Still, I manage a smile for her when it’s my turn to enter the party, and I see the blank look on her face before she does a double take, her whole body physically reeling backwards as she blinks up at me in shock. ‘Hayden?’

I give a stilted chuckle. ‘That’s my name, don’t wear it out. How’s it going, B?’

She just blinks at me for several seconds longer, her green eyes wide and her mouth hanging open. Finally, she gets a grip, and draws me down for a hug. Once upon a time, I probably would’ve baulked at that sort of unnecessary affection. Once upon a time, I would’ve assumed that the only reason Bryony Adams would have to hug me was to stick a kick me sign on my back – ‘You know, to be ironic!’

‘God, sorry,’ she’s saying as she draws back. ‘You’re just – you don’t look anything like I thought you would. Did you dye your hair? I swear, it used to be bright red. Like, properly Weasley, you know?’

I scrub a hand through it. It’s already a mess, so I can’t make it much worse. Her own hair is bright purple in the harsh lighting. ‘Nope. Just, uh, faded with age, I guess. Few premature greys.’

She pouts. ‘Well, now you’re just an ordinary ginger. That’s boring, isn’t it?’ She laughs, and I don’t get the joke but smile back anyway. Her gaze snags on my hands, and she pulls a face. ‘You know you’ve got pen all over you.’

I look down at the colourful felt-tip streaks over my fingers and palms as if seeing it for the first time – which I sort of am. I’m so used to getting in such a mess after a colouring session with Skye who, at four years old, enjoys turning her dear old dad into artwork as much as she does her colouring book, I hardly notice things like this anymore.

‘Er …’ is all I manage, and stuff my hands into my pockets instead. There’s a snotty tissue from Margot in there I forgot to put in the bin earlier. I panic for a moment that Bryony can sense that, too. ‘Right. Occupational hazard.’

She laughs, and does a much better job of pretending to get the joke than I just did. Then Bryony adds, mostly to herself, ‘Jesus, and you got so tall, too,’ before telling me, ‘Guest book’s just inside on the right, help yourself to food and drink.’

‘Thanks, B.’

I can’t escape the conversation quickly enough, but once inside, I’m stunned.

I had pretty high expectations that Bryony would do something outlandish since she was organising this – I almost expected some cheesy theme and to walk into a scene from a prom in a high-school romcom – but she’s really outdone herself.

The place looks fantastic. Sure, there are some of those awful plastic chairs dotted around (they’re really still using those? They must be donkey’s old by now) and the table of party food and cheap bottles of pop looks a bit sad, but she’s got a red carpet, for crying out loud. Loose balloons scatter the floor and a massive banner declaring CLASS OF 2014 hangs across the stage. There’s a balloon arch in the school colours, currently a focal point with about twenty people gathered around, rooting through a box of dress-up supplies to take photos with, and little box-lights in different colours set around the room, flashing pink and blue and green and white like a nightclub, which does a great job of distracting from the fact that, you know, it’s a party in the school hall, like a crap Year Seven disco. The playlist – currently Arctic Monkeys – and the presentation scrolling automatically up on the projector add to the atmosphere. Even I’m not immune to the sense of nostalgia this time.

For a minute, I stand in the middle of the hall and watch the slideshow play out. It’s the same one that Steph shared with us a couple of months back, but, I quickly realise, Bryony must have updated it.

I watch as eighteen-year-old me, with his violently red hair cut short and school tie only slightly askew, all the rebellion I would allow myself back then, stands in front of a robot, looking a bit awkward but also a bit excited, showing off my creation for a national competition. I remember that robot. ADA – Automatic Dynamic Android, named for Ada Lovelace. She took home second place, but I still maintain that the winning robot only won because it had voice recognition. (ADA’s morse-code operation was a selfish indulgence because I was really into World War II spy stories at the time. I was my own worst enemy.)

‘Most Likely to Succeed – Hayden Vaughn’ the slide declares, and I feel a pang in my stomach for that kid on the screen. He was busy tinkering with robots and reading up on neurological science breakthroughs or trawling Game of Thrones fan-theory forums, with no idea of what was waiting just around the corner. (And I don’t mean the turn the writing and plot took in Season 8.)

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