The High School Reunion: Forever Home Romances, #1

By Jennifer Griffith

Can a single night at a class reunion change everything?

She was the wallflower. He was the jock. She sent him anonymous love notes. Now, he's at the 10-year reunion to find out who his mysterious pen pal was.

Tansy has come a long way since her nerded-out days as a high school nobody. She owns a successful tech business, learned to do her hair, and might even wear her sexiest red dress to the reunion. One big worry: Bridger might be there.

What if he overlooks her again?

Basketball star Bridger only ever dated the popular girls, but he shared his secret heart with someone else—someone unknown to him. Those anonymous letters-in-the-locker they exchanged during his private crisis kept him afloat.

But who wrote them? Will he solve the mystery of the girl he fell for through letters all those years ago? Or will his shallow exes entangle him again?

With old flames flickering to life, old habits dying hard, and new possibilities dancing near the punch bowl to the DJ's beats, The High School Reunion is a hope-filled romance that makes every former wallflower's dream come true.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Stewart Plaid Publishing
• Release date: Jun 11, 2020
• ISBN: 9798215875698

Book preview

The High School Reunion

Jennifer Griffith

Stewart Plaid Publishing

Chapter 1

The First Note

Thursday 11/14

Hey, Bridger—

Good game last night. You don’t really know me, but I want to say this: I know you have some rough stuff going on at home. Don’t ask how I know, I just do. But you didn’t let that stop you on the court. You did great.

–A Friend

Tansy Taylor hobbled into her walk-in closet, one patent-leather pump on, one off. I’m not wearing these ridiculous shoes, no matter what you say, Pete. Note to self: male cousins should not be consulted on fashion. What had she been thinking by asking his opinion?

You’re the one who asked me what you should wear. Besides, I’m telling you, they make your legs look hot. He signaled for her to spin. Not that cousins notice that kind of thing, but someone else might. Think about it. You might even get asked out.

Stop. Tansy kicked off the offending footwear. If you so much as hint that I’m going to our class reunion to try to get a date, I’ll make sure you end up lugging the speakers out to the DJ’s van. She peeked her head out of her closet to shoot him a look that said I mean it, cousin, and don’t test me on this.

Well, I intend to land a date while I’m there, whether or not you squander the opportunity—which is a massive mistake on your part, by the way, considering that you’ll probably be swamped with guys hitting on you after you win for Most Unexpected.

Ugh. Why had Queenie insisted on rehashing the class favorites section of the yearbook for their ten-year reunion? That was a minefield no one should walk. I’m not running for that or anything else.

Pete walked into the closet and yanked a dress off the rack. Nobody runs for it. People just vote. Queenie told me the rules to the one and only portion of the reunion that she planned as class president.

Yeah, after dumping the rest on Tansy—who hadn’t even run for vice president, need she point out? When the original class vice president and class clown, Bobby Devo, moved mid-year, the administration had appointed Tansy in his place without holding a class vote. Popularity princess Willow McDevitt had led the charge of haters with cries of, Ugh! Tansy? The Grade Digger? No one had been thrilled.

Then again, that wasn’t entirely true. Someone had been thrilled—Queenie. Having a dependable vice president allowed Queenie to shove everything off on Tansy—and still take all the credit.

Which was exactly what would be happening at their ten-year reunion this weekend. Again.

What about this one? Pete waved the dress at her. You’ve worn this to business meetings after-hours.

That? It’s way too fitted. Yeah, it was fine for after-hours business meetings with clients for the software startup she and Pete ran, but that was when she met them for drinks and needed to look attractive to land accounts. It’s definitely not something high school Tansy would be seen in.

Pete shot an eyebrow northward. Your point is?

Expectations.

Shatter them. Like you have every day of your life since leaving that school.

If only that could be the case. The truth was, the second Tansy went back among those people, she’d be stuck back in their quicksand, instantly retrograding to everything she used to be. She’d never be able to change in their eyes. She’d always be the frumpy geek who ruined their grades, according to the school-wide torment system of grading on the curve. By doing well, Tansy made everyone else do poorly—and they never let her live it down.

Tansy took the dress, pushed her way past Pete, and hung it back in the closet. Instead, she pulled out a brown tweed frump suit. I’m thinking of this one. And what are you going to wear, by the way? Why don’t we get to discuss that, instead of just my wardrobe?

Because I’m all set. Hollianne Ives loves the color green, and I look good in green, so decision made.

Hollianne Ives! Seriously? The former star of every school musical? The one who looked like the Little Mermaid and sang just as well? That’s who you have your eye on for landing a post-reunion date?

Yeah, way out of my league, but she’s single. Pete flexed. I’m not the scrawny shrimp I used to be.

No, he wasn’t. Cousin Pete got his money’s worth with that gym membership. And dermabrasion had done wonders for that scarring.

Besides. He picked lint off his shirt sleeve at his improved bicep. It’s been ten years.

Ten years. Tick-tock, tick-tock. Tansy’s life was audibly flying away. What did she have to show for it? An education, this great apartment, an awesome software business she and Pete had built from scratch.

Just because it wasn’t exactly the life she’d planned didn’t mean it wasn’t awesome.

Well, except for the being alone part.

Besides, Pete leaned against the doorframe of Tansy’s closet door. Hollianne might have been ten levels above me in the Mendon High social strata, but she wrote in my yearbook.

She did? Did you ask her to?

Nope. She even offered on signing day.

Well, well, well. What wisdom did the queen of the Mendon High stage share with you?

Believe it or not, she thanked me for being kind. Pete frown-smiled. Some would call it smug. "Her exact words were, We never regret a kind act."

Which could be considered generic, but no sense popping that smugness bubble, or deflating his confidence. Pretty pithy.

Right? It made me think there was a lot more there to her than I expected even at the time. Pete squared his shoulders and planted his hands on his hips. Look. I’m going for her, Tanz. Even if she brings a date.

Of all the populars at Mendon High, Hollianne had been the least pointedly snotty to Tansy. She never once called me Grade Digger. To my face, anyway. I have to give her that. Maybe Hollianne actually was kind.

Didn’t someone leave a shovel in your locker once, right after third quarter grades came out? Hey, I’d almost forgotten about that, Pete said.

Seriously? Please. It was a main point of gossip of our senior year. In fact, it had even made an appearance in the senior slide show, Tansy’s only mention, despite all the time she’d put in as vice president and all her work in the robotics club.

And contrary to Pete’s yearbook with pithy sayings, any parting words written in Tansy’s yearbook had addressed her with the awful nickname—and quite a few had drawings of that shovel.

I wonder who did it.

Yeah. Tansy, too. I still think there had to be collusion with a janitor for that prank. Prank. That was all it had been. And yet at the time …

Well, no seventeen-year-old girl wants to be referred to even obliquely as a grave digger, not even for doing well in school. Why had they always blamed Tansy for dashing their hopes for getting into good colleges? When, frankly, that was exaggerated. Come on! Tansy and Pete and the whole rest of their class all probably went to their first or second choice schools regardless. Why did they have to be such … meanie heads?

We should try to find out, Pete said. Maybe at the reunion someone will slip up and mention it.

Probably not. But … Maybe there’s an old VHS tape somewhere. Security footage of the person or people who did it.

Pete snort-laughed. You’d better hope not, considering. He reached in and pulled out a completely unacceptable white pant-suit.

I’m not wearing that one either. Its V-neck is way too low.

If you got it, flaunt it.

Tansy had it, but she did not want to flaunt it. Not for this crowd.

Wait a minute, Pete. She jerked it away and shoved it back into the mass of clothes. What do you mean, I’d better hope not—considering?

"Because, genius, who in our high school class should have been voted Most Likely to Secretly Leave Stuff in Other People’s Lockers? Pete pulled out a backless pink dress. If there’s security footage out there on VHS or otherwise, guess who is toast? You."

A chill trickled down her neck. Pete had never been more right in his life. Good honk. You’re right.

"I’m so right. Pretty sure that there’s no way you would want that little tryst between you and Bridger Carrigan ever going public."

Hush! Tansy pushed Pete aside. My cell phone or the Alexa might be listening. No one could know about that. Ever. There was no tryst. Fiasco was probably more the word for it. And thanks for bringing up the pinnacle of my high school humiliations while we’re at it. Now I really want to attend the reunion. Snort.

Actually, I’ll bet you do—to get an eyeful of Bridger Carrigan.

Nuh-uh. Uh-huh. She totally did want to see him, but no way was she admitting it. Or anything else about her life-shattering crush on the school jock. Science nerds never caught the attention of guys like Bridger Carrigan. At least not at Mendon High. When that situation crashed and burned, so did my interest in him.

Oh, really? Pete reached for a shoebox on the top shelf. Then why do you still have these? He shook it, and the contentsrattled Tansy to the teeth.

Hey! Tansy lunged for the box, snatching it away from Pete. What the—? Give me that. She clutched the box, the corner gouging into her chest. Knock it off. What are you doing looking through my stuff, anyway? Having a cousin as a best friend was great sometimes, but it was far too close for comfort other times.

Like now.

"Dude. If you ask me to help you move apartments four times in three years, there’s a chance I’m going to be side-eyeing things to see what stuff is actually necessary to keep transferring back and forth to my dad’s cargo van