Class Reunion

Author's note:

The characters in this story got their names as a tribute to the amazing "Chasing the Dragon" by AwkwardMD.

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June 2006, Illinois

Brandon sat at the bar alone. His shoulders were hunched and he was hanging his head, staring down at the glass of amber whiskey he was lazily swirling in his hand. It was late, getting too late, and he was drunk, getting too drunk.

It had been a mistake to come here. When he had first received the invitation to the class reunion he'd had no intention of participating, and that would have been the right decision. But his divorce was in a phase that was getting even more bitter and resentful than he had thought possible, and somewhere along the way he had started to reconsider.

Maybe he had thought it would be a good idea to put two thousand miles between himself and his soon-to-be-ex, Shirley. Maybe he had thought rubbing his financial success in the face of those less fortunate would make him feel like he had at least achieved something measurable in his life. Maybe he had thought it would be gratifying to look at the faces of all of those who had never believed he would make it, never believed he would become the famous movie director he had aspired to be when he went to school with all these strangers. The famous movie director he had indeed ended up becoming.

Maybe he had thought Roxanne would be here.

Dinner had included an uncomfortable and oddly formal round of everyone telling of their later accomplishments. Twenty years had passed since their graduation, and it was amazing how little most of them had achieved since then.

The devil had possessed him when it was his turn. He had bathed them in his easy Hollywood smile and spent a full fifteen minutes listing the movies he had directed, awards and nominations he had received, charity organizations he had established and promoted and rounded the globe representing. He told them of his wife, former supermodel slash actress and their two poster perfect kids, eleven year old Sandra and nine year old Leo. He told them of their comfortable life in their house that wasn't quite a mansion on Hollywood hills. He failed to mention Shirley was in the process of leaving him and ripping him off while doing it.

After a perplexed silence the baton had been passed to flustered, still clumsy and plump Joe McPherson who had apparently become a science teacher in their old school and was still unmarried.

He had felt ashamed afterwards. They all knew already, he was famous enough that there was no doubt, and it was boorish to boast like that. Not to mention it hadn't made him feel any better.

After dinner there'd been dancing and free socializing. He had tried to stay and mingle, but after fending off a few gold diggers who thought him turning up meant he was willing to finance their petty businesses he had gotten so disheartened he had retreated to his hotel.

None of the others were staying in the same hotel. It was the best in town, after all, well above their pay grade. The ridiculously expensive lobby bar was empty except for him and the bartender, who was gracious enough not to let out if he recognized him.

"Hello, stranger."

He lifted his head, words of rejection on his lips, and felt them catching in his throat.

Roxanne. Roxanne Stone. Roxie. He would've recognized her anywhere, even without following her on the media for years and knowing full well what she looked like nowadays. Her smile was the same, her eyes were the same, there was dizzying familiarity in all of her.

Her long, dark, curly hair flowed down on her shoulders and back. Her brown eyes were clear, sharp and twinkling. He used to tell her they were like squirrel's eyes and she had always been mightily annoyed by the comparison. She had a dimple on her right cheek, but not on her left. It used to make her crazy, she had even tried to learn to smile so that it wouldn't show.

He lifted his hand without a conscious thought and touched her lone dimple. They both shuddered and he withdrew his hand.

"Hiya," he said. She always did bring out the poet in him.

He gestured his drink, questioningly. Roxie ordered one for herself. She climbed up on a bar stool next to his, and they sat in silence and drank.

Roxanne had been his lone comrade growing up in this dump. His partner in crime, the only one who had believed in his vision. The only one who'd had a vision of her own. They had spent long afternoons daydreaming of their future glory days, success and fame that would surround them. They had encouraged each other, sparred each other, bettered each other. They had loved each other for a few glorious years.

His career had been so tumultuous from the early days it had quickly shredded their relationship, or what little of it they had left after being separated by going to different universities. They had separated on good terms and hadn't kept contact since.

Roxanne was a writer. Her career was different from his but no less successful. It had taken her longer to establish herself, but by now she had written one bestseller after another and everything she said was received in the media as manna from heaven. She frequented talk shows and panel discussions and wrote articles in numerous magazines and newspapers on various topics. She was becoming some sort of all around public influencer in society. Her intelligence was keen and dazzling, almost intimidating. Brandon was nowhere near as sophisticated or well informed of current issues. His work was more centered on feelings, portraying moods and feelings through pictures.

"I hoped I would meet you," he confessed. She knocked back her drink and asked for another, waited until she got it until she turned to him.

"Is that why you came? To see me?"

"I think so," he said. "I mean I wasn't going to attend at first. But my marriage is failing, Roxie. Shirley's leaving me, it's getting really ugly. So I thought I'll escape it all. But I still wouldn't have come if I didn't hope to see you."

He went over the words in his head. Now that he had vocalized it he knew it was the truth. He was unhappy that he was so wasted already, he would've really wanted to talk to her. He would've wanted to meet her on some honest, personal level.

"So how about you?" he asked. "You weren't at the reunion. How come you're here now?"

Roxanne sighed and gulped down another shot of whiskey. She asked the bartender to leave the bottle and charge it on her room.

"You staying here as well?" he asked.

"Sure, this is the only decent place in this hellhole and you know it," she said lightly. He chortled. She drank deeply from her glass, shuddering when it burned on the way down, and turned to look at him.

"I'm a few years ahead of you on this," she said. "I got divorced three years ago. We have a daughter together and a joined custody. And Fred is still so angry and petty that when he found out where I was coming this weekend after I'd drop Tracy to him he caused me to miss my flight. I mean really, so childish.

"He wasn't home when I went to take Tracy over and he didn't answer his phone. He took just long enough that I'd be late but not long enough for me to call the police or get Tracy to someone else or anything. He did it on purpose, I'm so fucking sure of it. Not that he'd ever admit it."

"Yeah? Sounds a little like Shirley," he said with a weak smile.

"Just wait, it'll sound exactly like her, sooner or later," she said and knocked down another drink. "You've got kids as well, right? You'll see. Ain't nothing like getting back to your ex through your kids for those willing to sink low enough. And the gist of it is that it works, time and again."

"You're really catching up," he observed and nodded towards the bottle and her glass which she was filling up again.

"You've got quite a head start," she said and smiled. "Just trying to catch up before you're too drunk to sit in that chair."

He shrugged. "It wasn't a very enjoyable dinner. So yeah, I've had a few."

"Or ten, or fifteen," she said. "I know. I can see it in you."

He smiled into his glass.

"So, guess why I came?" she asked. "When I knew I would miss the actual event, no matter what?"

"I don't know," he said. "To spite your ex?"

"Yes," she said. "That's one way to put it. But there's two points to it. He wouldn't have done what he did if you weren't coming here. And I wouldn't have rescheduled my flight if I didn't hope to see you."

He choked on his drink and coughed for a while.

"That so," he said weakly.

He looked at her and their eyes met. He could feel the years melting away, feel them sliding into that old almost telepathic state of shared existence they'd had way back when.

He hoped he wasn't so drunk. He hoped he knew what he wanted to say to her. He hoped he knew why they had ever split up, because right now he couldn't think of a reason.

She looked at him evaluatively and turned back to the bartender. "Can I take this up to my room?" she asked, gesturing with the bottle. The bartender nodded politely.

"Come on then," she said. "You know I can't carry you."

"Why would you carry me," he asked but slid out of his chair and let her take him by the arm. They turned towards the elevators.

"Because you're just about to get too drunk to walk," she said. "What's your room?"

He showed her the room key and she got him there. It was a suite, nice enough, and she put the whiskey bottle down on the coffee table. She got him a water bottle sand poured herself another hefty drink.

"So tell me about it," she said.

And he did. He was slurring slightly and it wasn't coherent by any means, but he told her about the rise and fall of his marriage.

He asked her to pour him a drink, too. She gave him a look, and he thought she'd decline and tell him he was too drunk, and how fucking annoying and patronizing that would be. She didn't say anything, she poured him one, and he continued his rambling recollections.

First he was vomiting it out, telling her everything that came to his mind. There was no order, not chronological or logical or even order of importance, he just regurgitated all of his relationship out to her. All of his life, now that he was at it. He didn't know what point he was trying to make with any of it, something in her just unlocked him and all these words came tumbling out.

Later he was vomiting for real. He heaved and retched over the stylish toilet bowl, cold sweat running down his neck, a ringing sound booming in his ears. It was so violent it made him whimper, and after he had thrown up everything he collapsed on the floor.

Roxanne was there. She held him, she wiped his face with her smooth, cool hands as his whimpering turned into sobbing. She gathered him into her arms and held him tight. She didn't hush him, and even though it must've been uncomfortable for her to sit on the tiled floor she didn't move, she kept hold of him and let him cry.

It wasn't pretty. It was as violent as his vomiting had been, it tore at his chest and the sounds he was making were animalistic and repulsive. He felt like he was drowning, like he was drowning both of them in his tears and snot. He was shaking, he was trembling, he was clutching her like his life depended on it. He felt like it did, it was so far out of control he was genuinely afraid he'd die if she let him go.

She never did. She held him long after he stopped crying. Finally she pulled him up with some difficulty, he wasn't the largest of men but she was smaller than him, shorter and lighter. She washed his face of snot and made him brush his teeth.

He was spent now, totally hollow, he didn't have anything to go on. She walked him up to his bed, her arms around him, keeping him up. She undressed him unceremoniously. There was nothing sexual about it, she just pulled off his clothes and he let her. She pulled off the covers and guided him to lay down, and he did, but he couldn't let her go.

"Please," he whispered in the darkness. "Don't go Roxie. Roxanne. Don't leave me alone."

"Hush," she said quietly and leaned in to kiss his forehead softly. "I won't. I just need to go to the bathroom. I'll be right back."

He passed out while she was gone.

—#—#—#—#—#—

He had a dream. It was about him and Roxie, they were eighteen again, heads brimming with big ideas and hopes for their future. They were in love, full of energy and self confidence of the very young and inexperienced.

They laid in the grass beside the river, watching it flow, enjoying the hot summer day and each other's company. School was out, summer seemed endless, and their future seemed equally endless, boundless, unbridled. Full of possibilities.

They made love under the tree beside the river, in the dappled shadow.

—#—#—#—#—#—

He woke up with a start, his heart thumping in his ears. He had a raging hard on, there were morning erections and then there was this monster. It was so intense it almost hurt, and he thought he must've been really close to cumming in his sleep, something that hadn't happened to him in well over twenty years.

He was terribly hungover. His mouth was dry and his head was pounding. He opened his eyes to careful slits.

The bedroom of his suite was shadowy. Curtains were closed and they blocked out the sunlight, but there was a crack near the far corner and some light filtered through.

He was afraid to see if he was alone in the bed. He wanted nothing more than to have Roxie there, but he remembered last night now, remembered throwing up and crying, and he was ashamed.

He was alone. But just as he started to feel the weight of the enormous disappointment and loneliness there was a sound of a toilet being flushed. Then running water and door opening and closing. And then, oh yes thank God, her light footsteps along the corridor, padding towards him.

He watched her as she came in. She had on panties and a t-shirt which he recognized as one of his. She closed the bedroom door quietly and their eyes met.

"Sorry, did I wake you?" she asked softly. She came back to bed and under the covers, and he moved closer for a hug before remembering his embarrassing condition. By then he had already exposed himself, pushing against her hip. He blushed, another first for twenty years or more, and said, "I'm sorry."

"Don't be," she said and reached to touch him. He let out a hiss and for a second he thought he'd cum right away. She held him as he twitched and stroked him slowly when it stopped.

"I was aware of this. Woke up with you pressed against me. I'm sorry I woke you, must've been a good dream."

"Oh, it was," he said. "Was I...doing something?"

He was an active sleeper and now he was afraid he'd humped her in his sleep.

"Just sighing," she said quietly. She let go of his penis and he was equally disappointed and relieved. It would've been embarrassing to cum in his boxers like a schoolboy.

She took hold of his face and looked at him, cupping his cheeks.

"So how do you feel now?" she asked. "Better?"

He thought about it, scouting himself. He knew it would be useless to pretend he'd been so drunk he didn't remember opening up last night. He couldn't worm his way out of talking with her, she knew him too well. And it seemed like she genuinely wanted to know.

"I feel empty," he said. "Not relieved and not happy. Sorta...resigned. But like I've accepted my faith. Like I've finally understood it's over and there's nothing I can do to make it right."

He thought for a minute and pressed closer, nudging his face to the crook of her neck.

"And like I wouldn't want to fix it even if I could. Does that make any sense? I think I'm letting her go for real."

"I know," she said. "Been there."

"So what happened to you and Fred?" he asked.

"I cheated on him repeatedly," she said levelly.

"Oh," he said. "But that's what I did."

"I know," she said. "Been there. Told you so."

They were silent for a moment. He felt her fingers in his hair, caressing his scalp, edging towards his neck.

"And I'm really hungover," he added quietly. "I know you knew I should've stopped drinking. I'm glad you didn't say anything."

He lifted his head to look at her. "And being hungover makes me frightfully horny."

"I know," she said, meeting his gaze. "It was always like that."

"So it was for you as well," he said quietly.

"So it is," she said with a small smile. "Why do you think I tried to catch up with you?"

He chortled, then started to laugh for real and couldn't stop. He pressed his face back against her neck and laughed helplessly. It was like this new emptiness inside him was capable of producing feelings and reactions he hadn't had in a long time. She seriously messed up his cool.

"Do you think you're up for it?" she asked. She was smiling but her eyes were concerned.

"I hope so," he said, choking on the rest of the laughter, trying to extinguish it before it became any more manic. "Because I'm gonna die if you don't make love to me right now."

"Wow, no pressure, huh," she mocked, but moved closer and kissed him.

They traced each other's lips slowly and tenderly. She was soft and yielding. He touched her carefully, tracing her back down to her lovely, round ass. She was so familiar and then again not, she was more womanly, her hips were wider and her curves fuller.

He wanted to touch her everywhere, but she had other ideas. She pushed him over on his back and kissed him more deeply. He sighed and leaned back, memories flooding back to him. Roxie had always been active in her search for satisfaction, not exactly dominant but definitely not submissive. Shirley always wanted him to be the one to go through all the trouble, never suggesting anything herself, never taking the lead. Maybe it was her idea of femininity. But he didn't want to think of Shirley now.

Roxie kissed his neck down to his chest. She pressed and massaged her soft body against his and he touched her where he could reach, tugging on her shirt but not getting a chance to take it off her. Her hair tickled his skin, her mouth was hot and wet and he gasped when she nipped his nipple with her teeth.

She got more determined and purposeful when she approached his loins. She got up on her knees, smiling radiantly down at him, and pulled the covers off him with a firm yank. She gestured for him to lift his hips so that she could pull his boxers down. She didn't ask now, she was telling him, and he complied meekly.

She stroked his shaft slowly, still looking at his face. She had stopped smiling, her expression was difficult to interpret. She spread precum over his head slowly with her other hand, keeping the rhythm of her strokes. He moaned.

That small sound seemed to break the spell. She flashed him another smile, hungrier, and then she bent down and swallowed him.

She was fierce. She took him deep, deep enough to make him moan and whimper. She held his base with a firm grip, pointing him upwards to her mouth, pumping up and down in the same rhythm as her mouth. She pulled out to explore his head with her tongue, then sucked him in again. He took hold of her hair, pushing deeper. He was moaning continuously now, he couldn't stop, and in a terrified moment he realized he would explode any second. He was still so worked up from his wet dream and she was working him way too hard now.

"I, Roxie, oh...I...ohmygoddon'tstopnow," he was stuttering incoherently, "I'm...I'm...oh...oh..."

He gripped her hair and arched up, his glutes nearly cramping. He let out a long, wailing moan and exploded, his cum spurting out of him in almost painful jets, and Roxie kept on a suction that felt like it would drag his testicles through his penis and into her mouth. As he stopped cumming she eased up, getting gentler and slower. She licked his head thoroughly and finally let it out. She smiled at him again, looking pleased and amused. He sank into the mattress, sweaty and weak, his heart thumping so that he could hear it in his ears.