Page 27 of Sam & Justin

My eyes sought him out. It didn’t take long to spot him. He was standing off to the side. Alone. Separated from the groups around him.

He wasn’t signing any yearbooks, and no one was signing his. My heart sank down to my toes, but I wasn’t too surprised. I had already learned the ways he’d changed since high school, but it didn’t seem like anyone else was too interested in discovering it. I wanted to go to him, to pull him into my group. I wanted everyone to see the things that I saw in him, the things that I’d seen in him twenty years ago. Even back then, I’d known that he had a depth to him that people didn’t see underneath the leather and sneers, hidden away behind clouds of cigarette smoke.

But I kept getting pulled into conversations. Stolen glances were all I could get of him for at least another half hour. Finally, the crowd around me thinned and I was able to make my way to him, still holding the glittery blue pen I’d grabbed from the table that started this whole thing.

“Can I sign your yearbook?” I asked him.

He looked up and smiled again. He looked exhausted. He hadn’t looked that way when we’d been eating lunch. How was it that so much had changed in the time since I’d (pointlessly) left to help set up the yearbooks and pictures? He passed me his yearbook, and even though he’d not asked to return the favor, I handed him mine. He stared at it like it was a foreign concept. “You want me to sign yours?”

“It wouldn’t be a good picture of my senior year if you didn’t,” I told him, “and itreallywouldn’t be a good picture of this reunion without your signature.” After all, he’d been the best part of the reunion so far, and I doubted that was going to change. Nothing and no one else appealed to me the way he did.

He nodded and pulled a black pen from his pocket. I stopped watching him as I opened his yearbook. There were a few signatures, and I smiled when I saw that Robbie had left an actual note. The other handful of signatures were just names. It was easy to find a blank spot to leave him a little message:

Sam,

When I saw your name on the RSVPs for the reunion, I was surprised. I’d always wondered what happened in your life after you left Gomillion. I’m so happy I had the chance to catch up to you, to get to know the man you’ve become.He’s just as amazing as the boy I knew in high school. Keep in touch. I don’t want to lose contact with you again.

XOXO,

Justin Kirkwood

I closed the yearbook before I passed it to him. He handed me mine back, and I fought the urge to read what he’d written. I didn’t want to open it and discover nothing more than his name on a page. I’d read it later, when I read through the messages everyone else had written. When he was back in King’s Bay.

The thought filled me with dread. I didn’t want tomorrow to come.

It settled over me like a heavy blanket, lingering as we all stood together for a class picture. Even the weight of Sam’s arm around my waist could barely lighten the load or dim the reality of the fact that I did not want to lose him again.

11

Reunion - Saturday Afternoon

By the time pictures wrapped up, I was peopled out, and my social battery was about dry. I was thinking I might skip the whole prom thing. I hadn’t gone to the real one twenty years ago. Had no desire to, though one of the girls we’d run around with back in the day had offered. Might have taken her up on it if I hadn’t known she was looking to get dicked down after prom. I didn’t need another night where my dick betrayed me because the person I was making out with didn’t do it for me.

That was the kind of bullshit that came with being a closeted gay kid in a small town.

My mind was good and made up until I got to my car. Then, Justin jogged up beside me, those pretty green eyes of his sparkling. “You’re going to save me a dance tonight, right?”

I raised an eyebrow, my hand freezing in place on the door handle. “Wasn’t really planning on going,” I admitted. His face fell, and that sparkle in his eyes dimmed. I didn’t like that disappointed look on his face, and I already knew that my plans for the night to veg out in my shitty motel room were done and dusted. “But if it means a dance with you, guess I can show up.”

And just like that, his eyes were glimmering again. Yeah, even if the whole dance thing sucked, I was going to go, and I was going to pretend to have a good time. “Are you sure?” he asked. I could hear the hesitation in his voice, different from the guy who’d taken me apart the night before. I think I liked the guy from the night before better, but I was intrigued by this other side of him. This vulnerable side of him that he was showing off now. Did he let other people see it? Hell, did he even know he was showing it now?

I reached out and touched his forearm, resting my hand there lightly until his eyes met mine. “I’m damn sure that a night dancing with you sounds a hell of a lot better than watching whatever channels that shitty motel’s got.”

And just like that, Justin’s confidence returned in full force. He was a bit of an enigma, and every bit he showed me had me just as intrigued by him as I was back in high school. Back then, I could see that the scrawny school president had a bit more going on beneath the surface. He was like one of those lakes that were deeper in the middle, the ones you couldn’t see what was underneath it til you dove in, and I’d wanted to dive in.

Fuck, I still wanted to dive in now. Find out what was beneath that calm surface. I’d seen bits and pieces when we’d hooked up the night before, and usually, that was enough. I was starting towonder if any amount of Justin Kirkwood would be enough, and that was going to be a problem.

Because he lived here in Gomillion, and it was the one place I didn’t want to be for too long.

Justin and I chatted for a few more minutes about the prom, and finally I got in my car and drove back to my motel.

Back in my room, I realized that I didn’t have jack shit to wear to an 80s themed prom. I’d packed that button down, thinking that I’d wear that if I decided to go. But now, it didn’t seem like enough. Justin had put so much effort into this whole thing. He’d slaved over details, and I could see the way he lit up every time he saw our former classmates enjoying the shit that he’d put together.

I didn’t want to show up to his prom dressed in normal clothes. I wanted to be just as impressive as he was.

I was fucked.

I pulled out my phone and looked up thrift stores in the area. I had no idea if the one secondhand store I’d shopped at when I was younger was still in business, and I wasn’t about to show up and find out it had turned into another dollar store or some shit. Internet directed me to two stores in Gomillion. One of them was the one I’d gone to when I was younger, and the other one was something that had opened up in the years I’d been gone. Looking through the reviews, I decided it was my best bet.