Days 144 and 145

Take or normal reunion and discussion, then add what it is the speakers are not saying

I hated reunions.  My family insisted on one every five years, and the only excuse for missing one was if you were dead.

I tried to pretend that I didn’t get the invitation, but my older sister Elaine flew to the middle of nowhere, as she called it, to take me back.  She even paid for the ticket.

She was so rich I was surprised she hadn’t come down in the family jet.  Yes, they had one, and yes, she could fly it.

I hated her.

I was the black sheep.  I was the one who was always in trouble, married the wrong girl, invested in scams, and ended up in a Humpty with no one and nothing to show for my life.  Oh yes, and a nothing job as a security guard.  I just had to turn up and go home.

It didn’t matter how many times I mentioned this, Elaine said that it didn’t matter. Family was everything.  I would have accepted that, except for her tone.  It was the same one she used when admonishing me when my marriage fell apart.

It’s not your fault, but who else is there to blame?

Elaine lived in New York, Merilyn lived in San Francisco, Roger in Albuquerque, and Sam, the family hero, in Washington.  Every one of my brothers and sisters was a high achiever.

My father, joking, he would say, would sometimes ask whether or not my mother had had an affair and I was the result of it.  She didn’t quite see the joke in it, but I could.  He was happy I was out of sight and out of mind.

Elaine swept into a room, followed by adulation.

I stayed at the door and barely got a glance. 

Until my father saw me.  “James.  I’m so glad you could make it.”  He didn’t move from his seat.

What he meant to say, as he had in the past, was ‘look what the cat dragged in’   It was a surprise he hadn’t.

My mother looked over, and I could see just that momentary sigh, as if it wouldn’t be a bad thing if I’d just stayed away.

Then smiled and said, “James, you made it.  I thought you had something you couldn’t get away from?”

True.  I was using a non-existent conference as an excuse.  “This was more important,” I said

Her look told me it wasn’t. 

Roger and Merylin had already arrived.  The Star Act, Sam, would make the grand entrance, outdoing Elaine.  It was a competition, and he had no chance, even if he was elected president.

Roger came over.  “You know this isn’t going to end well.  You look well.”  No hand shake, no hug, nothing.  It was like we were not relayed.

“Nice to see you too, bro.”

He winced.  Yes, I can read his mind, ‘don’t call me bro, you asshole, were definitely not relayed.”

Merilyn was a little better. She gave me a two-second hug.  She was the second-lowest high achiever, one rung above me, and not married yet.

Mother’s looks covered her sentiment, ‘you’re getting older, and it’s harder when you have children at that agency’.

She couldn’t tell her mother she hated the idea of having children, much less bringing them into this horrible world.  Maybe I would.

Now, if I left now and went up to my old room, left as it was the day I stormed out, maybe no one would notice me.

“Jimbo.  You came?”

Alex, Elaine’s husband, had been hiding out back.

“Your wife dragged me here under threat of death.  I had no choice.”  And wait for it…

“Everyone had a choice, Jimbo.”

Jimbo.  The cretin couldn’t even get my name right, or it was his way of treating me like I was nothing.  I’d corrected him for a few months and then given up.  His contempt for me knew no bounds.

He was riding on her coattails, and that was a marriage that was heading for the rocks.  He was a ‘player’.  Snobby pretentious twit.

Elaine was still doing the rounds and had the limelight.  Alex would wait a minute and then attempt to take it away.

My cue to leave.  Before I ran into Angelique, Rogers was a long-time partner, had no wedding date in sight, with a phony French accent. 

No one knew she had been a Playboy model and a porn actress before she met Roger.

We had a pact.  I wouldn’t tell anyone, and she wouldn’t treat me condescendingly, but that was two years ago.  She’d have to think the secret was safe.

If Sam made the move and started down the presidential path, the skeletons were not going to stay in the closet very long.

“James.”  She had a nice voice and was alarmingly beautiful.

“Angelique.”

“Back for round three?  I saw you arrive with Elaine, so perhaps not willingly?”

“Elaine made a special trip.”

“Then you can bet there’s trouble in paradise.”  She smiled.  “Try not to listen through keyholes.”

In other words, get the gossip; something is going on.  Or not, I could never quite tell what she meant.

The noise level dropped, and everyone was grabbing a seat.  Like musical chairs, the last man standing was the last man standing.

Mother saw me by the door.  “Just grab a chair in the dining room, dear.”

“No need.  I’m going up to my room to sulk.  You lot feel free to talk about me.  My situation hadn’t changed since the last time I was here, so I’ve nothing to add.”

“Donr be like that.  You are as much a part of the family as all of us.”

It sounded earnest and welcoming, but mothers all practised that line.  What she was really saying was ‘please go so I can talk to Elaine’.

Dad was thinking, ‘son of the bloody milkman’, and Alex, ‘please leave and don’t come back’.  Of course, without the ‘please’.

I shrugged.  “I’ll be down for dinner.  It’ll give you time to think up some insightful questions.”

Then I left, closing the sliding doors that felt like I was stepping from one world into another.

And bumped into Sam.

Who immediately motioned me to be quiet and follow him into the study up the passage.  Inside, he closed the door.

“What the hell, Sam?”

“I don’t want them to know I’m here yet.”

“Why.  You’re the golden boy, just one step removed from Elaine.  But if you…”

“I’m not.”

“What?”

“Running for office.”

“Why?  Because you have a low life brother.  I’m sure no one cares.”

“No one does.  No, there are bigger secrets than that that would come out, secrets I’m sure no one really knows about, or if they did, they would have told me.”

“What secrets?”  I hardly thought an ex porn actress would cause problems because nearly all of the current era presidents were known to dabble.

“That’s what I’m here to find out.  And you bring the only one no one cares about. I need your help.”

“I’m a useless security guard.”

“You are the only one who hadn’t got an axe to grind out of that lot in that room.  I’m sure if I asked you to give me a one-sentence description of each of them, it would be caustic but true.”

“I can’t help you.  Haven’t you got staff who do that sort of thing?”

“I can’t trust any of them.  There’s no loyalty, just a paycheck.  But tomorrow, they’d sell me out for twenty pieces of gold.  It’s politics at its finest.  So, are you in?”

“Just you and me?”

“Just you and me.  Shake on it.  Your word is your bond.”

“And you being a politician…”

“I get it.  I do.  But yes.  I give you my word.”

I shook his hand

This had all the hallmarks of a gag they had all thought up before I got here, and it was going to explode in my face.  Sam was the last person I could trust and would.

“Now what?”

We go in and work the room.”

Why did I feel like this was a setup of the worst order?  They could have just found an old girlfriend to humiliate me, but no, Sam and Elaine were always trying to outdo each other at my expense.

At least when it was over, I could leave.  And this time, I would go where neither of them could find me.

…

©  Charles Heath  2025