Lies That Bind Us(24)

“OK,” said Melissa, standing up, “you guys have to promise not to get all miserable if we play the Prince song, yeah? Coz we’re gonna party.”

“Deal,” said Kristen.

“Wait,” said Brad. His previous mood, whatever it had been, was utterly gone, and he was genial and funny again. “By my calculations, we’re at day one thousand nine hundred and ninety-six. We don’t get our millennium-even party till the end of the week.”

“I can’t wait that long,” said Melissa. “Plus, who says we only get to party once, am I right?”

“You’re right,” said Simon.

“OK, then,” said Melissa, satisfied. “So I figured we would start at the very beginning. Marcus, you’re up.”

I gave him a quizzical look as he rose and began hooking his iPad up to the flat screen on the wall, muttering about compatibility issues.

“Right,” he said, turning and smiling at the rest of us. “Melissa asked me to cobble together a little presentation—sorry, Gretchen, this might be boring for you—to remind us all of why we’re here.” He tapped the iPad and the TV on the wall came to life, displaying a truly glorious photograph of the original six of us, sitting in our swimwear in deck chairs, toasting the camera with multicolored drinks. We were joy personified. Across the top, in large, festive letters, it said, “1999 days of friendship!”

Marcus made another click, and the inevitable keyboards, drums, and bass kicked in. As Prince crooned away in the background, everyone cheered and the slide show began. Every swim, every meal, every dance was catalogued, the images full of life, energy, and flashing smiles. Here was Brad with a towel on his head and an eye patch made from a napkin, waving a bottle of rum and pulling an argggh! face.

“Pirate Brad!” shouted Melissa. “I’d forgotten Pirate Brad.”

“Well, he hasn’t forgotten you, me hearty,” said Brad in his best Captain Jack Sparrow voice, leering at her.

“Check us out!” said Kristen as a picture of just the women came up, all modeling the same Charlie’s Angels pose in our bikinis. “We are svelte!”

The next image added the boys to the picture, all mimicking our look and holding halves of oranges and melons up for breasts. Gretchen about wet herself at that one. Then we were splashing each other in the sea, unwrapping grape leaves at our favorite taverna, and posing with the staff.

“Waiter boy!” Kristen exclaimed. “I’d forgotten him. He loved you,” she said to Melissa, teasing.

Melissa always seemed to be the center, the focus of attention, but she wore it so well that no one minded. There was one where you could see Brad looking at her with a kind of mute adoration that was both touching and hilarious.

“Hey, mister!” said Kristen, reaching over and slapping him lightly on the back of the head. “Save those looks for me.”

Brad winced.

“Honest to God, Officer,” he said to Simon in a bizarre hick voice, “she beats me something rotten, so she does! Domesticated abusing, it be!”

“Not to worry, my lad,” said Simon seriously. “We’ll put the mad witch behind bars; just you see if we don’t!”

“You’ve got your own little show going here, huh?” said Kristen, grinning.

“You just don’t recognize good art if there are no aliens in it,” said Brad, earning another slap upside the head.

Next up in the slide show was a gallery of each couple gazing lovingly at each other. I blushed when the one of Marcus and me came up, surprised that he had included it, but could not look at him, even as Kristen made awww noises beside me. Then there was more dancing and toasting, Melissa looking sour on a donkey, some gloomy cave formations, another meal, another round of drinks, and our notably tanned faces gazing back at the camera, smiling still, if a little weary.

“Boy, we look exhausted,” said Simon.

“Partied pretty hard,” said Melissa.

“Still going strong!” said Gretchen, as if she had been part of it all. I wanted to feel sorry for her at the way she was being excluded, but she either didn’t notice or didn’t seem to care.

The final slide was a view of the coastline from above, onto which had been Photoshopped the words: Here’s to the next 1999 days!

Marcus received his applause with a modest bow, and I found myself gazing at the blank screen in the hope of seeing more, of falling back into those pictures, that time. I don’t think I was the only one. After a moment I refilled my drink and caught Marcus’s eyes on me.



It rained that night. I didn’t notice at first because it was so dark outside and I was so tired, but then I noticed the streaking down the great windows and saw, when I shaded my eyes and pressed my face to the glass, the way the cedars on the cliffside were bending in the wind.

The lights flickered, and Kristen gasped an uneasy “Uh-oh.”

“No worries,” said Simon. “The landlord said they lose power here all the time. AC burnout in the summer, snow on power lines in the winter, storms in the fall. Flooding, downed trees. You know the drill.”

“Maybe we should have come in the spring,” said Kristen, who sounded spooked.

“It’s fine,” said Simon. “There’s a generator and lots of gas. Eight hours of power in one tank, if we need it. Sound good?”