The 25-Year Reunion

By Caroline Erwin

An unspeakable act of arson… a sexual assault case… and the worst type of deceit a best friend could ever display, are just three reasons why former best friends - Lily, Marnie and Grace - have never returned to their childhood hometown of Holly Bay.

Not since that eventful night of their graduation dinner…

But when an invitation to their 25-year reunion turns up, each of the women begin to wonder if it's time to face the past. To return to the scene of the crime and finally hold the right people accountable.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Dec 20, 2023
• ISBN: 9798350935189

Book preview

Grace

Grace could see the glossy silver envelope before she even opened her mailbox. The corner of it anyway, peeking out through the lid, the shininess a stark contrast to the rusty letterbox it was sitting in.

Instantly she knew what it was, felt sure of it, and she reached for the bills it was sitting amongst before allowing herself to grasp the invitation. Her heart began to race as she slowly unsealed it, swearing quietly under her breath as she did so. Why had she provided them with her address a few weeks back? Why, when the notification had popped up on her Facebook account, had she decided to reply? And why did they need to mail out some fancy invitation anyway… surely a simple ‘paperless post’ invite would suffice for a school reunion.

But she knew why she had replied, her hand shaking as she had typed the response. Because maybe, after two long decades of trying to forget it all, Grace was finally ready to face the past.

Hermione

‘T he twins didn’t want the dinner you left for them, said anything with carrots in it was poison and only for adults,’ the nanny greeted Hermione warily as she walked through the front door, her high heels click-clacking on the parquetry flooring of their apartment.

Hermione sighed. ‘So, what did they eat then, if not the delicious stir-fry I whipped up before work this morning?’

‘Um, well, they kind of convinced me that Nutella toast was allowed some evenings. Flo said the hazelnuts provided plenty of protein and nutrition.’

Hermione sighed again. This was the problem with new nannies. It took weeks for them to learn how to discipline her eight-year old twin daughters, Flo and Rosie, who often seemed more like twenty-eight the way they carried on. But for once she said nothing, the silver envelope she clutched in her left hand currently far more anxiety inducing than her daughters not eating dinner. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow Meg, 7am again please,’ was all she could reply, the young red-haired girl nodding in response and scurrying with relief out the front door.

Hermione quickly placed the envelope into her handbag before venturing further into the apartment to find her girls. She still could not quite believe that she had RSVP’d a few weeks back when it had popped up during work but, in a moment of weakness, she had decided to say yes and provide her details, convinced she probably wouldn’t go through with it anyway, wouldn’t actually attend.

Years ago, when the ten-year invite had come through, it had been an easy no. She hadn’t even blinked at the email. Wild horses could not have dragged her to that reunion. But now, now that twenty-five full years had passed since, well, since all the drama, maybe she was finally ready to go back there. Back to Eddington College and Holly Bay, the high school and coastal town which, until her final three months there, had been a magical place to grow up.

‘Mum, mum!’ the squeals of her daughters were loud, but not too loud having berated them many times before for being noisy when she arrived home from work, often with a headache and she happily brushed away all thoughts of the reunion for now, stretching out her arms to envelop her dark-haired, pyjama-clad girls in a hug. At least the nanny had got them bathed if not appropriately fed.

‘Guess what mum, guess what!’ Florence (more affectionately known as Flo) exclaimed now. ‘We made the school musical, both of us, and we landed really good parts! Rosie’s going to be Gretel and I’m Brigitta, both Von Trapp children like we were hoping for.’

‘Oh, that’s amazing news girls. Well done. The singing lessons are clearly paying off,’ replied Hermione, her brown eyes shining in genuine delight at her daughters’ happiness. Especially as she had worried that Flo, the more confident of the twins, would be the only one of them to make it or would land a better part than Rosie.

She gratefully peeled off her high heels and followed her daughters into the living room to hear more about the school production, Sound of Music, which of their friends had made it in and when rehearsals were likely to begin. Hermione herself had loved singing and dancing as a child so she was not surprised that her daughters had taken to it also, the memories of her own school production now filtering into her mind. She batted them away as quickly as they had come in though, because that would take her back to her first year of high school - when she was twelve - and had first met Grace and Lily, the two girls who had been her closest friends while at Eddington College and whom she had not seen nor heard of in twenty-five long years.

But would two and a half decades really be enough? Hermione wondered now. Enough time to have passed for ‘bygones to be bygones’ and all that? For all the drama to be fully forgotten and old wounds to have healed no matter how deeply they had cut?

Lily

At the distant rumble of thunder Lily felt her heartbeat quicken for a second, just as it always did in the summertime when a storm was brewing. It was hard to believe that the sound still unsettled her all these years later, since that eventful day, but it did. Every summer when the humidity became unbearable, her slightly frizzy brown hair sticking to the back of her neck and grey clouds rolled in menacingly above, she would remember that evening back in Holly Bay like it was yesterday.

She had just turned fifteen, the youngest of the three - of her, Hermione and Grace - and Marnie (as Hermione was known to her friends) had instructed them to meet her at the school rugby oval once the sun went down. ‘Around eight, it’s never dark until then in February. Up on the mound behind the try line,’ she had whispered during maths that afternoon, a glint in her eye, and the two girls had nodded back excitedly wondering what their friend had in store for them that Friday night.

Hermione was the rebellious one of their group, the boy-crazy one, the one who instigated most of their weekend shenanigans, Grace and Lily always more than happy to oblige though, just so long, that was, as Lily could manage to convince her strict father she was allowed out for the evening.

‘Can I sleep over at Marnie’s house tonight please dad? To watch a movie. I’ll ride over straight after dinner,’ she could still remember asking, her knife and fork hovering tentatively over the lamb cutlets on her dinner plate, her eyes not quite meeting his. She hated lying to her dad, she really did. But Lily also knew she couldn’t say they were meeting at the school footy oval, the school of which her over-bearing father was principal and a situation which in itself was headache enough for poor Lily.

‘Tonight? It’s nearly seven already… surely it’s getting a bit late to ride over to peoples’ houses,’ her father had replied, his blue eyes piercing his only daughter’s. ‘Besides, Hermione’s not currently in great favour with me if you’ll remember. Not after she locked poor Mrs Perriot out of the classroom last week.’

Lily stifled a giggle. That had been a little naughty of Marnie actually, even if it was because she urgently needed to rub the writing off the whiteboard before Mrs Perriot and the other students entered. The black marker declaring Grace was in love with Joey Hughes. Lily’s eyes had widened as innocently as she could manage though. ‘She didn’t mean to dad, it was an accident… you only heard Mrs Perriot’s version, and it’s not that late. I’ll head off after dinner and be back early in the morning, in time for my softball game.’ Then, a little more desperation to her voice she added, ‘I am fifteen now, not in primary school. Everyone hangs out with their friends on the weekend.’

She had watched as her dad took a long sip of his red wine and nodded slowly. ‘I guess teenagers do like to see their pals a lot, but yes, you need to be back early please. Well before your softball match.’ Lily, not wishing for her father to focus on her for one second longer and perhaps change his mind, thanked her dad then quickly directed the attention onto her younger brother instead, enquiring after his cricket game the next morning and whom they were playing against.

About forty minutes later, still in her ripped denim shorts and pink tank top that she had changed into after school, her brown wavy hair loose around her shoulders and a small bag on her back, she had begun pedalling the two kilometres towards the school. The opposite direction entirely to Hermione’s house and a small surge of guilt swept through her. She hated fibbing to her dad, but she also needed to have some fun at this age, Lily justified to herself as she had continued cycling, and she was going to stay at Marnie’s house, that part was true, she was just going somewhere else first.

Arriving at the rugby oval which sat towards the back of the College, Lily noticed some dark clouds in the distance, and she swore quietly, not having been aware the forecast was for storms tonight. She glanced down at her watch, 7.45 the time read, and she parked her bike in the school bicycle stand next to the assembly hall, before walking up a grassy mound which arced one of the try lines. A popular location for the female students to gather on a winter’s Saturday afternoon and cheer on their school’s first fifteen.

‘Lil, over here!’ she had heard Marnie’s excited voice yell out, her friend kneeling under a cluster of trees as she tried to unzip a small backpack that appeared to be jammed.

Lily had scampered over to meet her friend. ‘What you got there?’ she asked almost nervously, well aware Marnie had organised to meet away from her house tonight for a reason and she swept her slightly-damp hair off her neck, the increasing humidity causing it to stick unpleasantly to her skin. Marnie did not answer though, still working determinedly on the zip which didn’t want to budge.Casting her eyes across the football field as she waited for her friend to respond or to succeed in her mission, whichever happened first, Lily noticed the grey clouds in the sky inching closer accompanied by a distant rumble of thunder.

‘Bingo!’ her friend suddenly exclaimed and then, unzipping the bag ever so cautiously so as not to create any more issues with it, she opened the backpack just enough that Lily could view its contents and instantly confirming her suspicions. Inside the bag sat a rectangular glass bottle wrapped in a brown and yellow label, and containing a dark liquid, along with six neatly stacked cans of coke.

‘I stole a bottle of my parent’s rum last night!’ Marnie explained gleefully, not daring to pull it out just yet. Not until Grace had joined them also and she had triple checked that they were indeed alone. The school was always deserted after 6pm though, when sport practices had finished for the evening and the last few teachers had straggled wearily to their cars.

Lily’s eyes had widened both in fear and excitement. The three of them had talked a lot lately about what it might be like to get drunk, to have more than just a sip from their parents’ wine glasses. A conversation which had begun due to the annoying Scarlett Brown and her friends bragging about how they had gotten drunk over the summer, with Joey Hughes and some of the other boys down at the beach. Their school cohort were in year ten now, had just started back three weeks ago and Hermione had clearly decided that if Scarlett’s group were sneaking a few drinks then it was time she and her friends did the same.

‘Why here, near school?’ Lily had asked. ‘Why not down on the beach where we usually hang out, well… when dad allows me that is?’

‘Are you kidding? Charlie’s working at the gelato shop tonight and then meeting some of his mates when he knocks off, we’d be spotted for sure. This is the quietest place I could think of. No one’s ever near the school - or this end of town - after seven.’ Charlie was Marnie’s seventeen-year-old brother and although not usually one to rat on his little sister, Lily understood why Marns did not wish for him, or anyone, to spy their group tonight.

‘Next year booze will be at all the parties we go to - when we’re in year eleven - according to Charlie anyway, so I thought it best if the first time we got drunk we did it together. Just the three of us! No one else to embarrass ourselves in front of and besides, it feels special this way, an evening we’ll always remember when we’re old and grey.’

‘Hey girls, sorry I’m late, what’s the…?’ but Grace did not bother finishing her question as she joined Lily and Hermione that evening, spying the dark liquored bottle in her friend’s bag immediately. ‘Good God Marns, where on earth did you get that?’

‘My parents’ grog cupboard is so over-stocked they won’t even notice it missing, but, if they do, they’ll probably just assume one of their friends finished it off at their last dinner party.’ Hermione had then slid a hair elastic off her wrist and tied her long blonde hair up into a high ponytail, the humidity getting to her also and grinned at her two best friends. ‘I brought six cans of coke too. I figured we can tip a quarter of each can out onto the grass and top the rest up with rum. That should be about the right ratio, I think.’ Then, glancing around to make sure they were still very much alone, the sun having completely disappeared for the day and the three of them well-hidden behind a cluster of trees, Hermione set to work on her concoctions.

Lily could still remember the burning in her chest as she took her first sip, along with the slight sweetness of the beverage. It was certainly drinkable, and she had felt a shiver of excitement run through her at what they were doing. They were fifteen now, halfway through high school, surely this was what being a teenager was all about. And for the first twenty minutes as they chatted and laughed away, sipping on their cans with the sound of thunder rumbling in the distance the evening had indeed felt special, Lily’s uptight body relaxed as the alcohol filtered through her blood stream and they began discussing which boys they currently had crushes on. Grace, as always, fancying no-one but the unobtainable Joey Hughes, a stark contrast to Hermione’s long list of kissable boys in their year.

As the time had drawn closer to 9pm though, the girls now indeed quite drunk from the rum, a loud crack of thunder took them by surprise, unaware that the clouds had moved in so close. Then, seconds later, a strike of lightening illuminated both the sky and football field, revealing its terrifying proximity.

‘Far out!’ exclaimed Hermione, ‘We need to move and quickly. Let’s head down into the school and take cover there, until the storm passes by.’

The girls had held tightly to their precious red cans, Hermione shoving the bottle into her backpack and they sprinted down the mound and over to the assembly hall. Although locked, it at least offered decent shelter around the building’s exterior and the girls had been laughing as they ran, Lily still feeling carefree and reckless, for once the pressures of her strict father sliding away from her. This feeling was unfortunately short lived though as, a minute later, something occurred which sobered the girls up immediately - the sight of flames erupting from the local newsagency which neighboured the school - Grace’s dad’s newsagency.

‘Holy shit… your shop’s on fire Grace! What do we do?’ Marnie had exclaimed in panic.

The year had been 1996, Lily reflected back now, a time when high school students did not own mobile phones and they had been unable to call the fire station or anyone and seconds passed as they stared helplessly at the inferno just metres away, Grace’s face white with shock as she watched her family’s business burning down.

Marnie had suggested they try and fight it, that there must be fire extinguishers around the school they could use, but even as these words escaped her mouth the flames seemed to triple in size, the shop suddenly no longer visible at all.

‘It’s too dangerous! We can’t fight that! And we don’t even know where the extinguishers are,’ Lily had yelled back, fear coursing through her body. ‘How far to the fire station? Let’s ride there as quickly as we can… the flames might spread to the school in a minute… we need to get out of here.’

Grace, tears running down her cheeks and her body shaking, had hurriedly agreed, but Lily could see in her friend’s face that she knew it would be too late to save her dad’s business. The entire store was ablaze and, just as worryingly, looking like it might spread to the school any second.

‘Yep, we have to get out of here now! Lily, where are you going?’ Marnie had yelled as Lily began to race back towards the grassy hill they had been sitting on earlier.

‘My overnight bag, I left it up there. I need to get it, or my dad could find it in the morning!’ she had yelled back. ‘You guys start riding to the station – hurry though, you don’t have a second to spare – I’ll catch you up!’

Marnie and Grace had hopped on their bikes and taken off, indeed aware that every second counted while Lily scampered back up the hill, adrenaline tearing through her. But as she had sprinted over to the trees, the elevation of the mound providing her with a clearer view of her surroundings, she had felt a coldness wash over her as she spied a figure at the back of the newsagency and as another streak of lightening illuminated the sky, she instantly recognised the figure, sneaking quietly away into the night, now that their job of destruction was complete.

Grace

‘T his dinner is shit Grace, no offence,’ her husband commented as he pushed the well-done steak around on his plate. ‘You know the rarer the better, right? This thing is nearly black.’

Grace felt her limbs stiffen, unsure how best to reply. She knew he was stressed, it hadn’t rained in months and their property was dry and dusty, but surely it wasn’t okay to speak to your wife like that when she had spent the past hour preparing a meal for him. Even if he was grinning slightly, trying to pass the comment off as a joke rather than blatant criticism.

Grace knew she wasn’t much of a chef, in fact she was an awful cook, but then she had been raised on beans and rice or any staple her parents could afford, especially once their family business had burnt down. They had not been insured, couldn’t afford to be and her father had always assumed nothing much would affect the store anyway. The store he had built with his own blood, sweat and tears alongside his brother, determined to start his own business after flunking out of high school with no other career prospects in sight.

‘Sorry Fred,’ she replied with a light laugh, deciding to go with his attempt of joking about it, ‘there were no rump steaks in our house growing up. I can boil you some rice perfectly though.’

He grunted back at her and pushed the steak to the side, deciding to opt for the clumpy mashed potato and limp broccoli on his plate instead. Culinary items which were not quite so easy to mess up. Grace pushed her steak to one side also. Not because she didn’t like it, she had long learned to appreciate any good cut of meat on her plate no matter how it was cooked, but she simply couldn’t stomach food tonight having lost her appetite entirely since that envelope arrived in their mailbox. Because the harder she thought about it, the more convinced she became that it was time for her to face the past.

She cleared her throat and looked up at Fred. ‘I received an invite to my twenty-five-year school reunion today, and I’m thinking that I’d quite like to go… for us both to go…’ her voice trailed off.

‘Oh yeah,’ replied Fred, a little disinterestedly. ‘When is it?’

‘Not until April, so two months away still but… it’s back in Holly Bay.’

Fred instantly became more alert. ‘I thought you hated that place. That wild horses could never drag you back there if I remember your words correctly.’

Grace sighed quietly. Those were the exacts words she had uttered when they had first begun seeing each other. Fred knew she’d had a tough upbringing with very little money, that every spare cent had been put into her going to the nice Catholic school in town so she could - ‘make something of herself, unlike her father’ – a statement her dad had uttered more than once.

Grace had never understood her parents’ decision to send her to Eddington College, not when they already lived on the barest of essentials and she insisted numerous times that she was quite happy to attend the public school in town. Eddington College was not overly fancy, but it did cost something as opposed to Holly Bay High which was free. And then, when her parents had divorced not long after the fire, she had been surprised at her mother’s decision to keep her there, citing it foolish to change high schools when she only had a few years left. Although, and of this Grace had never been quite sure, she had often wondered if Lily’s dad - being school principal - had perhaps reduced or even eradicated her school fees in an act of good will. She remembered hushed conversations between her mother and Mr Downs one morning, the odd word filtering up the staircase as she brushed her teeth.

‘I know,’ she responded finally to Fred. ‘I’ve never wanted to go back. I still don’t really but, well, I feel like I should at some stage in my life and this invitation turning up has spurred on my decision.’

Her husband, who could indeed be quite moody and critical at times, now smiled empathetically across the table, his brown eyes genuinely concerned. ‘It must have been tough Gracie, seeing your father’s store burn down that night. I can’t even imagine,’ and Grace suddenly remembered why she did love Fred. Why she had married him, despite two minutes ago wanting to whack him with her cooking tongs.

But there was another reason as to why you so desperately wanted to marry him. Grace tried to ignore this guilty thought storming into her mind, but it was one which seemed to be plaguing her a lot recently. Because, like her, he hadn’t been interested in having children. But this wasn’t the main reason I married him, she told herself adamantly now. I would have wanted to anyway.

‘Will you come then? I don’t think I’d be brave enough to go on my own. I haven’t seen anyone from there for years,’ responded Grace, blinking several times in quick succession before any tears evolved. ‘My mum moved when I finished high school, so there’s never been a need to return.’

‘Of course,’ replied Fred, ‘too easy, just mark it on the calendar and remind me a few weeks beforehand. How come your school’s having a twenty-five-year one anyway? Don’t most schools just do a twenty year one, and then a thirty?’

‘There was meant to be one at the twenty mark, but then Holly Bay got caught in those awful floods up north and it took weeks, months even, for the affected areas to rebuild. I think no one felt it fitting to reunite that year and so the committee decided to hold off until we reached our twenty-five year instead,’ explained Grace, remembering the relief she had felt when the email had come through. Relief that she didn’t need ponder the decision at all. She would wait until the next one and commit to that, she had told herself firmly. Although now, now that the next one was here, it terrified her. The fire had been a horrible experience indeed, there was no doubting that, one which had shaken Grace to her very core but nothing like the events which had eventuated in 1998, her final year at Eddington when she had just turned eighteen.

‘Sorry Grace, I’m not even going to attempt this, it really is too tough to chew through. I’ll give it to the dog if you won’t be offended.’

Grace hmmm’ed back in reply, not really listening nor caring about her husband’s criticisms of her cooking, because now that she had mentioned the reunion to Fred and committed him to going with her, she had to go through with it. If she had her husband by her side then, surely, she could face everyone, could face the past from which she had spent the past two decades running.

Hermione

‘B raid my hair first mum,’ Flo demanded, placing a hairbrush in Hermione’s hand.

‘That’s not fair. You did Flo’s hair first yesterday,’ whined Rosie, attempting to push her sister out of the way and place herself directly in front of their mother.

‘Sorry girls, no time for fancy braids today. I’ve got a breakfast meeting and I’m leaving in about thirty seconds! Perhaps Meg can do it,’ and she glanced hopefully over at the nanny who had just arrived. ‘Do you braid?’

Meg shook her own head of red straggly hair woefully. ‘I don’t sorry, but I can do a normal plait?’

‘Okay great, that will have to do today then girls, thanks,’ bristled Hermione hastily, ignoring the looks of disgust her daughters were currently exchanging. As if questioning how their mum could have possibly hired a nanny who didn’t braid.

She then smacked large kisses on each of their cheeks before grabbing her laptop off the bench nearby. ‘Meg will walk you across to school in forty minutes, be good for her.’

‘Wait… mum, before you go! Did you organise piano lessons for me and Rosie this term, like you promised? You never answered me the other day.’

‘Oh, yes, sorry Flo, I did… lessons will commence next week. I forgot to tell you. Now, I’ve really got to run,’ and Hermione hightailed it towards the front door before any more queries came her way, a dull pain suddenly developing in her lower neck. A pain she was quite certain had stemmed from those two words, piano lessons.

Initially she had tried to steer her girls away from singing and music, booking them into every sport team she could find instead but, eventually, the genetics from their mother had clearly shone through and the twins had declared their interest in doing singing lessons. Hermione had tried to persuade them otherwise, insisting sport was much more fun, but they had pleaded until she had given in and besides, singing lessons weren’t piano lessons… until they had then begged to take up piano as well, so they could play and sing together like their music teacher had highly recommended and as they knew their mother had done as a child. Which was why she had finally agreed, despite the overwhelming memories of her final year of piano lessons and the drama which had ensued as result of them. The past is in the past, she had snapped to herself. If the girls want to play, let them play, and she had quickly booked them into classes before she lost her nerve or thought about it any longer, refusing to compare it