Page 18 of The Marriage Pact
Alex smiled. “I remember. They didn’t like students bringing cars in. It clogged the place up, apparently. I sold her for fifty dollars. I used the money to rent a laptop. That’s how I started the first business. You could say I owe it all to Betsy.”
Kaitlyn laughed. “She was quite a car. When you managed to get her started, that is.”
Alex pretended to rev the engine, squatting down in a bouncing movement, just as they’d so often done together to get the car going.
“I was glad I didn’t have to do that on prom night in that dress,” Kaitlyn said, shaking her head and smiling.
“You looked so beautiful in that dress. I remember seeing you in the hallway with your mom. I thought I was the luckiest guy in high school.”
Kaitlyn blushed, but it made her happy to hear him say that. She only wished he’d said it sooner. Why had they drifted apart? Why had they waited so long? She pushed the questions to the back of her mind, not wanting to cause an argument or make a big deal out of it. Right now, they were together, and that was all that mattered.
“And you brought me roses. It was very sweet,” Kaitlyn said as they walked together along the street.
The route was the same that they’d taken on so many other occasions, along the tree-lined suburban streets, then passed the drive-thru with its flashing neon signs, and over the bridge that crossed the sluggish river that had first brought inhabitants to settle hundreds of years before. Cedarhurst hadn’t changed that much in the past twelve years, and neither had the high school. The façade was looking a little tired and worn-out, the rows of windows symmetrically arranged on either side of the entrance over two levels, above which the fluttering Stars and Stripes flew from the flagpole, just as it always had.
“Are Miss Gunter and Mr. Berloski still teaching here?” Alex asked.
“She’s Mrs. Berloski now. He’s the principal,” Kaitlyn replied, for she’d recently bumped into the two teachers in the thrift store, where they’d exchanged a few words of greeting and news.
“It was inevitable, wasn’t it?” Alex replied. “You don’t imagine teachers having real lives.”
Kaitlyn smiled. “They were the same age as we are now at that prom.”
Alex shook his head. “That’s weird. They seemed so old. I suppose anyone over twenty seems old when you’re in high school. Why don’t we get a coffee? Is Mason’s still around the corner?”
Kaitlyn nodded. Mason’s was the café where the mathletes used to celebrate their victories or commiserate over their losses.
“Let me guess. You’ll be having extra vanilla syrup, and that horrible squirty cream they put on the top of the hot chocolate?” she said, slipping her arm into his.
“Well remembered. And you’ll be having a flat white, and… a pastry, the chocolate twist,” he replied.
Kaitlyn laughed. “We obviously remember more than we thought,” she said as they made their way toward the café.
CHAPTER 7
ALEX
“You’ve got cream all over your top lip,” Kaitlyn said, smiling as Alex set down the cup of hot chocolate.
He laughed, taking a paper napkin and wiping it away. Mason’s was exactly as Alex remembered: the same scrubbed tables, folding chairs, and Manhattan skyline prints on the walls. Even the staff were the same, and the two of them had been greeted like long-lost friends by Jeannie Wells, who’d insisted on their drinks being on the house.
“I always liked having you in here. You and those… mathletes, wasn’t it? You all had the same order every time. Who was that boy who only drank water?” she’d asked as she’d brought over their unchanged orders that she still remembered.
“Drayton. He works for the CIA now. Something to do with coding,” Alex said, smiling at the thought of their friend Drayton, whose mathlete prowess had led the team to state-level victory.
“It doesn’t surprise me,” Jeannie said, shaking her head as she returned to the counter.
Alex smiled. It felt pleasantly familiar to be back at Mason’s, another reminder of the life he’d once lived, and which now, unexpectedly, he’d stepped back into again. He’d been surprised when Kaitlyn had agreed to his marriage proposal, surprised because it had been made partly in jest. But her emphatic yes had made him realize there was a serious side to what he’d asked, the fulfillment of so many regrets. It was extraordinary to think they were to be married, having only just reconnected, and yet it felt entirely right, too.
“How do you know that?” Kaitlyn asked.
Alex smiled. “He was at a White House briefing I went to last year,” he said.
Kaitlyn raised her eyebrows. “With the president?” she asked.
Alex smiled. He had a direct line to the White House. Lancaster Holdings had government contracts. The president occasionally asked his opinion on important matters. But the look on her face was another reminder of the very different worlds they inhabited. He’d been embarrassed when they’d talked about staff, forgetting that his own situation was far from normal.
“It’s nothing major,” he replied, taking another sip of hot chocolate.
