VANGUARD(104)

He could see the glares from where he was sitting on the porch. The windows were rolled up, air conditioning blasting and music playing, yet Carter could hear their voices as they yelled at one another inside the car. They hadn’t even noticed him, so intent they were on their fight. This was going to be a disaster, just like back in GYL.

The volume of the shouting and intensity of the glares increased. He was thinking about intervening when Michael suddenly lunged across the front seat. Carter saw coffee cups, keys, and sunglasses go flying as Sophie’s arms flew around his neck and Michael started devouring her mouth. Carter shook his head in disbelief, and walked over to bang on the window. He could see Michael’s hand heading up her shirt, and he cringed a little.

“Cut it out! Crissakes, get a room!” The two of them sprang apart. Carter saw Michael reach down and adjust himself before getting out of the car.

“Cock blocker,” he said in a low voice that Sophie couldn’t hear.

“Don’t touch me until you get rid of that wood.” Carter turned to sweep Sophie up in a huge hug. “Hi, beautiful! It’s so good to see you. I’m not going to ask what the hell you two were doing in the car there.”

“Arguing,” she said, blushing.

“Didn’t look like it at the end.”

“We like making up,” Michael said sardonically behind him. “Will you hug me now? Or do you wish to inspect me for ‘wood’ first?” The three of them laughed as they went into the house. Carter could see Sophie’s eyes darting, searching.

“Who’s here, Carter? You said there would be people here from the class.”

“I told you, it’s a secret.” Carter opened the front door with a grin and waved them in.

This had been in the works since Michael had returned to the US – a reunion of as many of their classmates as Carter could scare up. The doors of the DeVries estate had been thrown open to anyone who wanted to travel to welcome their lost classmate back home.

Sophie and Michael turned toward the closed doors of the den, knowing that their classmates were in that room. Not just because the doors were closed, or because they could hear the sounds of people gathered together…but because they knew when some of them were close. They could feel it. More than ten years off the road, and the connection remained strong.

Carter let them walk through the doors first. There would be a video camera or two running in the room, so he’d see their faces after the fact. They stepped into the room, hand in hand, then stopped dead and stared. There weren’t ten people there, or even twenty.

There were forty-seven of their classmates in front of them. Plus a couple of dozen babies, children and spouses. Carter. Michael. Sophie. The entire class.

Carter could see his classmates’ faces as they processed the sight of Michael and Sophie together – truly together. Then the roar went up. They were supposed to yell “surprise,” but everyone went nuts, and it didn’t really matter anymore. Against impossible odds, they were all back together again. Then again, they’d never truly been apart.





-





A few hours later, Carter came over to sit on the floor beside Sophie. Ana sat in one of the few chairs. She never should have flown here from S?o Paolo nearly seven months pregnant, but there’d been no stopping her.

“Hey.” Carter kissed Sophie’s head as he settled down, beer bottle between his legs.

“Hey, yourself. I can’t believe you did this.” She looked out to the back deck where Michael was sitting in a patio chair, nursing a beer and laughing over someone’s story. “Look how happy he is.”

“I’ve never seen him this happy. But it’s not just all of us being together again. It’s you. You make him happy. I never thought you two could be in the same room without murdering one another, and now you’ve gone and proven me wrong.”

She smiled and looked back out at Michael, her heart in her eyes. He suddenly looked up through the patio door. He had his sunglasses on, so Carter couldn’t see his eyes, but he was looking at Sophie. Carter wondered if he and Janet looked like that when they were together. He hoped so. A sniffling sound broke the moment, and everyone looked at Ana. She waved her hand at them and blew her nose.

“Nothing, nothing. I have pregnant woman hormones...” She broke off in a little sob, and Carter jumped to his feet, rubbing her shoulders. “I can’t believe you two are finally together,” she said. “Do you remember, Sophie, on the very first day, at the lunch table together? When Michael was looking at you?” Now both of them were tearing up. Women.