I wanted to run away.  Maybe I should have.

             The dream shook me hard.  I had spent the weekend at Ben's, reveling in the new facets of our relationship, a considerable amount of time being in either pre- or post-coital bliss.  It was incredible.  It was so far beyond anything I had ever imagined with Ben, or any other man I had ever known, that I had to keep pinching myself to make sure I hadn't fallen into some sort of coma, or slipped into the world’s most enjoyable hallucination.  Even if I had, I can't say that I would have been a real hurry to snap back into reality. 

            On Monday morning, after watching him get ready for work, and cursing the weekend for not lasting for an indefinite amount of time, I admitted defeat and decided that we had to return to the real world.  At least until he came home again.  I wanted to appear as though I too had places to go, and important things to be a part of, so I insisted that I planned to return to Gram's house for the day.  I think my real reasoning behind heading home was so that I didn't spend the day alternating between pathetically watching the clock until he returned, and walking around delighting in how much everything there seemed, felt, and even smelled, so much like him that I risked falling into some sort of obsession.  Well, more than I already had.

            He of course insisted on driving me the ridiculously short distance to the house, and as always the perfect gentleman, walking me to my door.  Our goodbye lasted a little longer than it probably should have, our kiss more involved that a normal before work morning peck would be, but even with the extensions, I was still disappointed when it ended, and he retreated to his shiny black car, and drove away.

            I will never admit to what my behavior entailed once I was safely enclosed inside my home.  I can resolutely say that at no point did I squeal like a little girl, while at the same time jumping up and down, or pumped my fists wildly around while dancing about it the living room.  Nope.  That absolutely did not happen.

            After the mini-celebration, that again, never occurred, I found myself with the inability to sit still, and began bouncing around my house, not really sure what I was intending to do no matter which room I entered.  I decided that a nice, long, hot shower was just what I needed to come down from my little high, and so retreated to the bathroom.  It worked, I felt my muscles melt under the streams of water, the giddy feelings fading as I deeply inhaled the steam.  It wasn't until I was out and drying myself off that I was suddenly slammed by an incredible feeling of exhaustion.  I mentally tabulated as best I could and realized I hadn't exactly gotten a tremendous amount of sleep over the last couple days. 

            I opted for a nap, which I would regret later.  I am not even sure how long I slept before the dream came.  I woke up, barely able to breathe, my vision blurred from tears that had started before I had even regained consciousness.  I stumbled out of bed, clutching my chest, trying to hold it together as it was torn apart by sobs, and frantic gasping for air, my mind reeling with flashes of my nightmare, and concern that I might have been having a heart attack.  I swore I could still feel the dull aches from the places I had been punched and kicked, and I dropped to my knees on the floor beside my bed, dropping my head forward until it hovered above the carpet, both of my arms wrapped tightly around myself in fear that if I were to let go, my shaking body would manage to shatter into thousands of quivering pieces.

            I tried to remind myself that it was only a dream, that I was safe and alone in the purple room, my happy place, but a very loud voice in my head informed me that while the dream had been an illusion, the events of that illusion had been real, that no matter how hard I tried to convince myself otherwise, that was a real memory.  An event I had worked very hard to forget, but was now crashing into me, over and over every time I dared close my eyes for even a second.

            I don't know how much time passed while I tried in vain to at the very least control my breathing.  Every part of me burned.  My eyes from the influx of tears, my body from the toll the shaking and hysteria were inflicting, my lungs from the pain of not being able to take a single satisfying breath for who knows how long.  I tried repeatedly, and in wain, to pull myself together, to somehow get a grip on something, but all I could see were flashes of those places I never wanted to see again.  My body, in a sudden state of fight or flight, chose for me.

            Before I knew what I was doing, I was up, staggering off the floor, each step wobbling and unsteady, but pulling me around the room with no rational thought behind them.  I was suddenly in the closet, pulling as many items out at once that I could manage, before throwing them chaotically onto the bed.  There was no rhyme or reason to my actions, but there was power behind them.  A need for survival that I hadn't felt for many years, but was stronger than any other pull in my life.  I gathered shoes from the floor, darting out of the closet and over to the dresser, pulling whatever would fit into my hands out and onto the bed with the growing pile.  Without giving myself permission to do so, I grabbed one of the very few empty boxes in the house and began stuffing anything and everything I could into it.

            This continued for an immeasurable amount of time.  Everything overlapped in an uncomfortable haze, and at certain points I felt that I was absolutely going mad, that my sanity had finally taken enough and I wasn't going to be able to come back this time. 

            I didn't know what I was doing or where I was going, all I knew was that I had to leave.  I had to get away from the source of all the hurt, and I had to go as soon as humanly possible.  I went from the bedroom to the kitchen, from the kitchen to the bathroom, and landed finally in the living room, where I had collected the overstuffed, and wildly unorganized boxes I had managed to fill.  At some point I had begun stuffing things into trash bags.  At the time, this didn't even strike me as odd.

            And then it was over.

            All at once the mania disappeared.  I stopped dead in my tracks, my eye caught by a movement that mesmerized me.  I stood in the living room, keys in hand as I was preparing to load the poorly packed items into my car, and instead stared out the window. 

            As he did every day, Ben moved smoothly about the bird feeders, his expression calm and content as he worked.  The entire day had passed in an instant for me, the nap, the nightmare, the packing had all caused hours to disappear in the blink of my red rimmed eyes.  Looking out at him, I tried to remember the feelings that had inspired the fit of insanity, the reason that would explain why my body felt as though it had just run a marathon, but I couldn't.  All I could see was him.  I scoured his features, looking for any sign on his face that might have resembled the face from the dream.  Some hint of that coldness that had been the last memory I'd had of him, but there was nothing there. 

            There was no meanness in that face.  It was the face I had seen that morning, and suddenly the idea of the hallucinatory Ben seemed so very far away.  I couldn't get my brain to connect the two of them, and now it seemed that ever confusing the real for the imagined wouldn't have ever been possible.  I couldn't stop an exasperated laugh from bouncing out of my chest, that no longer felt as if it were about to rip apart at the seams.

            Looking out at him, I heard the voice of reason, finally able to rise above the screams of panic that had overwhelmed me before, and it told me over and over that it had been a dream, just a dream, and while it was rooted deeply in a memory, that it had no place in this reality.  I couldn't let that happen.

            As I stood there watching, he turned towards the house and spotted me through the window.  I watched his face as it morphed from the peacefulness of his routine, to the smile he had for me, complimented with a casual little wave he managed even though his hands were full of giant bags of bird seed.

            And that was it.  I never mentioned the whole ordeal to Ben.  When I went outside to see him, and he happily greeted me, it took him only a second to inquire as to why my face had the look of recent tears.  I smoothly covered up by offering up a story about how I had accidentally slammed my hand in a drawer moments before.  I had never been a very good liar, it is very easy to spot when I attempt to do so, but this went as planned.  Maybe because I was in such a bizarre state anyway, or maybe because I had used up all of my nerves already, I don't know, but I refused to rehash the day, or the dream that encouraged it.

            No matter how terrifying it had been, and no matter how painful the past that inspired it, I wasn't willing to let it take this away from me. 

            We made plans to meet in an hour for dinner at Alice's and that was that.  I managed to ignore the chaos that was waiting for me back inside the house, and succeeded in regaining normalcy by the time he came for me.  By the end of our night, I had begun to wonder if the entire day had been a dream.

            In the days that followed, I carefully undid the damage that I had done in the various rooms.  I unpacked the boxes once more, and sorted through the bags that littered the living room, having been thrown in my frantic desperation.  In one bag, I found coffee mugs, a sweater, my toothbrush, and several cookbooks of Grams.  It wasn't funny to me, it was a reminder of the scary place, but I forced myself to laugh at it anyway.  I was determined to pretend that it had never happened, and the parts that I couldn't will away, I was going to misconstrue them into something else.  A moment of comedic lapse in judgment, perhaps.

            I never let myself go back to that place.  I found that when I stayed with Ben, I slept soundly and nightmare free in his arms.  I wouldn't let myself focus on that either.  I refused to let the ridiculousness of a bad dream turn me into a clinging woman who refused to be away from the man she was seeing.  I wouldn't risk letting any harm come to the relationship from this.  So I would make sure to take time to stay at my own home. And on the nights that I returned to the purple room, I would fight sleep to the point of exhaustion, so that when I did finally pass out, it would be a heavy, dreamless sleep. 

            I knew I was being overly paranoid.  In fact, the dream never returned in any form, whether I was at Gram's or Ben's, it didn't seem to matter, because I knew that his bed was a fear free zone, and I wasn't sure if I could survive it if something like that happened again.

            As one week ended, and another began, I would relax even more.  It was in fact blissful that nothing of consequence seemed to happen at all.  Everything was so pleasantly normal, it seemed very foreign to me, but this didn't make it uncomfortable, instead it made me appreciate it all the more.  I was very grateful for my time with Ben, and how smoothly things seemed to go between us once I had made the conscious effort to keep the past as such.  I was equally in love with Callie, obviously in a slightly different way, but my friendship with her had grown and become incredibly important to me.  Our time together, doing things as simple as shopping, or hanging out watching movies, was just as easy as my time spent with Ben.  Add them together on one of our frequent double dates in which Callie's Nate would join us, well, I was happier than I had been in years.

            While my intent was to keep a single nightmare from ever returning, what seemed to happen was that by refusing to acknowledge that part of myself, I ended up ignoring all the parts of me that had been twitching and living in fear since my return to Biddleton.  The energy used to keep one aspect at bay, was somehow capable of keeping it all tucked away.  I no longer had the extra strength to care where I went, or who might be there, instead, I enjoyed the company I kept while venturing out.  Everything was going swimmingly, and for once I wasn't waiting for the other shoe to drop.

            Before I knew it, spring had ended and warmer weather had taken over entirely.  The last of the frigid days disappeared and was replaced by flowers in full bloom, and trees covered with new and brightly colored green leaves.  I wasn't sure where the time had gone, but I didn't really care.   Obviously, the expression "Time flies when you are having fun!" is a cliché for a reason.  It was just nice to finally experience this phenomenon first hand.

            I had managed to become so enveloped in my little world of happy, that I had allowed myself to be swept up into town activities without even realizing it, until one Friday afternoon as I stood in my bedroom, trying to figure out what clothes I intended to wear to Biddleton's annual Start of Summer festival that Callie had managed to talk us all into.  I couldn't help but laugh at the thought of the four of us, all sashaying into the park, that would be done up, carnival style, and spending a rousing Friday night.

            When the bell rang, right on time, I ran to the door, to let Callie in.  The air conditioning at her apartment was out, and so I offered to let her spend the afternoon at my place hanging out and getting ready for when Nate and Ben arrived to take us all to the festival together.

            "Hey, sweetie!" she trilled as she bounced in past me, flinging an overstuffed backpack on the couch as she went.

            "How were classes today?" I smiled at her as she flopped down next to her bag.

            "Ugh!" she moaned.  "Just a few short months I will finally be done!"

            The subject of her graduation made me equally thrilled for her, and depressed for myself.  I couldn't have been more happy that she was about to graduate from college, but at the same time, I knew this meant that she would be looking for a job in her field of graphic design in St. Louis, and that she would be moving in with Nate then as well.  Again, I was so far beyond excited for her and this plan, but I knew that meant I would get to see less of her, which bummed me hard.  I never mentioned or showed this as I didn't want to be the wet blanket on the final leg of her long arranged plan. 

            In all fairness, it was only an hour away.  Although, saying it like that made something stick out in the back of my mind that made me wonder if I'd made up my mind to stay.  I never focused on that thought.  I had gotten very good at keeping myself in the present moments, and enjoying them for what they were.

            "Okay!" She hopped off the couch, as if her three second rest had somehow left her fully refreshed.  "We have like two hours until the boys get here, so I say we make the best of it!"  Then turning to me with a naughty glint in her eye, "Let me at your closet!"

            As always, our time together was effortless and fun.  She was hands down the most energetic and positive person I had ever come across in my life, and I never got tired of seeing her enthusiasm for every little thing.  We dug through my entire closet, at least twice, and I am certain that the outfit she selected for me was in fact the first one I had tried on.  Also, I wasn't really sure why it would take multiple hours to pick out the perfect mixture of a pair of jeans and a t-shirt, but who was I to question her genius?  Even though she was also wearing the same uniform as I was, her style, a sort of punk pixie look, was ever present.

            Before we knew it Nate arrived and a few minutes later, so did Ben.  I never got tired of his greetings to me, one of his special crooked smiles, followed by an enthusiastic kiss.  A kiss from Ben Stevens.  I wondered if it would ever stop sounding as surreal as it did?  Even with as much time had passed since we had started seeing each other, it still gave me an incredible thrill to know that when he would appear, it was with the plan of seeing me.  And for reasons that I would never understand, his face seemed to light up when he saw me as well. 

            The four of us stood in my living room, coupled off, Ben's arm around me, Nate's around Callie, everyone making the usual how do you do small talk until Callie piped up.

            "Come on!" she insisted.  "There are funnel cakes with my name on them!"

            Ben offered to drive, of course he would, and we all climbed into his Lexus, Nate and Callie riding in the back, and we all tried hard not to giggle at the tiny person who was bouncing in her seat listing off all of the various fair food she intended to eat that night.  I am pretty sure she listed off at least her body weight in suggestions.

            The one joy of living in a very small town is that it never takes very long to get wherever you need to go within it.  When we pulled into the field that had been roped off for parking, I could see that practically the whole town had turned out for the first night of the festival.  School had let out the week before for the summer, and all the kids were embracing their newfound seasonal freedom and racing around in droves together, some of the younger ones being followed by already haggard looking parents.  Our local park had been done up in full festival style, and as we made our way to a parking spot, I could see the usual trappings all ready in full swing.  The largest was the brightly lit up ferris wheel that was spinning slowly with people on board.  Below them on the grounds were dozens upon dozens of stands, some of which housed games to be played, adorned with hanging stuffed animals that wouldn't be worth nearly the amount of money you would have to spend to win them, and would almost certainly fall apart before you even got them home.  Others had giant neon colored menus that told of the culinary treats to be served at your request.  Why would someone want to fry a Twinkie?

            I could smell all the food, and the grease that it was all cooked in before we even opened the doors.  Ben was directed into an area where he quickly parked the car, and we all climbed out, none more excitedly than Callie, of course. She grabbed Nate by the hand and started prancing towards the festivities, dragging him behind her while he pretended to resist.  They were impossibly adorable together. 

            Ben and I took a more leisurely approach to heading in.  He walked beside me, wrapping his arm tightly around my waist as we went, at a more casual pace than Callie had set.

            "So, are you a rides or no rides kind of gal?" he grinned at me.

            "Oh, I am so in for the rides," I smirked.  No need to mention my irrational fear of ferris wheels...  "How about you?  Can you handle them?"

            "Heck yeah," he chuckled.  "Although, not sure if my stomach will agree after some of this stuff." He pointed at a stand that was advertising fried Spam on a stick.

            We caught up with Callie who was at the ticket booth buying just a ridiculous amount of tickets for the night.  Those little orange suckers got you everything that was available, food, rides, games, all of it, and by the looks of things, she was meaning some serious business.  She took her giant roll and twirled out of the way so Ben could take his turn for ours.

            "So, what are we going to do first?" she squealed, trying to stuff fistfuls of tickets in her pockets.  She gave up when they wouldn't all fit and started shoving the remainder into Nate's pants.  He just laughed and stuck out his arms as though he was getting frisked.  "Whadya say?  Tea cups?  Skee ball?  Oh!  Does anyone want to eat first?"

            "No!" We all rang out in perfect unison, and Callie responded by pouting out her lower lip.

            We agreed to start with a ride to make the lip go away, and her happy face returned immediately.  She grabbed my hand and started pulling me towards the spinning tea cup ride.  Another bonus to the small town events is that the lines are never more than a few people long, even with the entire population walking around.  The cups were large enough that all four of us were able to fit into one together.  I regretted this as soon as the ride started as it seemed that Callie and Nate were very much into extreme carnival rides, and he had figured out some way to use the little spinning wheel in the middle to make the cup rotate so fast that I wasn't even able to lift my arms anymore from the centripetal force.  When he took his hands off to get a better grip, we slowed just enough that Ben was able to pull me into him and we curled ourselves up in the seat together so that when Nate got us racing again, we were pushed into the cushions laughing together watching them across from us trying to pry their heads up off the back of the cup.

            This thrilled Callie to no end and as the ride slowed down she instantly suggested that we go again.  Feeling as though I might very well vomit if I were to take two runs back to back, I suggested that maybe it was time to try a game or two.  I thought I saw the lip preparing to return, but she perked up and announced, "Oh good!  The boys can win us toys!"

            Her mood was totally infectious, and it took no time at all before we were all running from booth to booth, laughing and goofing off like a bunch of fifteen year olds.  Ben, who was normally so composed was just as happily enveloped in the spirit as the rest of us.  I liked that his composure never seemed forced, like he was trying hard to seem controlled, but that he really was just that put together.  It made it that much more enjoyable to see him laughing as his repeated attempts at knocking milk bottles over fell flat, or when he and Nate got into a face off to see who could get the ping pong ball in the goldfish bowl first.  When he won, Ben threw his arms up as the champion while Callie and I cheered, and when he presented me with a stuffed purple fish, announcing he had won it in my honor, I accepted it as though it was the greatest gift any man had ever given, until we all fell upon ourselves laughing. 

            I had come to this festival several times as a child, but never had I once had a fraction of the fun I was having with them.  My mother would usually drop us off, not a fan of carnival fun apparently, and more often than not she would give the money to Gracie who was supposed to buy tickets for both of us and split them evenly.  This never happened.  And when I would mention it later, I was told that if I couldn't go without making it some sort of drama, that the next year I wouldn't be allowed to go.  Finally Grams stepped in and offered to take me each year.  Gracie would already be there, hanging out with her little group of friends, and even into my teen years, it was still just Gram's and I.  Eventually I stopped wanting to go, not being able to ignore the possibility that even with my grandmother, I would still be a potential target.  By the end of my school experience, I very rarely went into public unless practically mandated by law just to keep the opportunities for mockery at a minimum.

            This was nothing like any of my prior visits.  The only thing that could have made this night even the tiniest bit better was if Grams had been there, or at least been around to see me finally relenting and giving it all a try as she had wished so often for me to do.

            We carried on, making our way down the lines of games, and after Nate finally regained his manhood by throwing a ball through a series of tiny holes and winning an obscenely large bright pink elephant for Callie, we decided to take a small break for snacks, and Nate offered to run to the car to drop off our growing collection of stuffed critters since our arms were all getting a bit full.

            He ran off with Ben's keys, and the rest of us hopped into the line at one of the less exotic stands, no fried, canned meats on a stick at this one, just regular fair offerings, nachos, frozen lemonades and the like.  Ben offered up the first round on him, so Callie began giddily telling him what she wanted, while I laughed as his eyes grew bigger as her list went on. 

            "Hmm," she paused.  "You know, I really want to do the tea cups again, so maybe I shouldn't get all of the good stuff yet, you think?"  I wrapped my arms around Ben's waist and couldn't not laugh at the look on his face as she pondered this.  "Yeah, that's probably a good idea," she offered, even though he had said nothing.  "Okay, so one lemonade, a nachos, and a funnel cake should be good to start, I think."  I buried my face into his chest and tried to stifle my giggles.

            When we got to the window to order, Callie was still debating as to whether she should get more food this trip, while Ben just kept staring at her as though she had gone insane, and we both tried so hard not to laugh, only to fail the second she second she squealed that they had deep fried Oreo's on the menu. 

            Ben tried to order, and then had to reorder as Callie changed her mind yet again, I turned to see if Nate had made his way back yet.  The face I saw however, was not that of Nate, but of someone whose appearance scared me so badly that when I whirled around to make sure my eyes weren't playing tricks on myself, I put too much force behind it and managed to trip over my own feet and fall backwards onto the ground, landing hard on the ground next to Ben's feet with a thud that was audible, even over all the noise of the festival.

            "Max!" he dropped down beside me, his voice concerned.  "Are you okay?  What happened?"

            "Oh my gosh, what--" Callie began, grabbing onto my arm to help me up.  She stopped mid-word when she caught on to what I was looking at.

             "Oh, shit,” she summarized.

            "What?" Ben demanded, looking somewhat scared by my and Callie's expressions.  "What is going on?"

            "Ben?" A voice called.  "I thought that was you!"

            He turned to the person speaking, following my line of sight.  There she stood.  Amber Oaks, in all her post-high school glory, standing a few feet away, flashing freakishly straight teeth while smiling down at Ben.  She looked the same as all of my memories of her.  She was just a bit taller than me, five six I would guess, and sporting the same blond hair, acquired through highlights, that she had carried all throughout high school.  Her perfect makeup, as if she'd had her own makeup artist following her around since her teen years, and her impeccable clothes, she was and had always been the epitome of polished perfection.  I seriously thought I was losing it.  I started blinking manically, rubbing my eyes hard, hoping that if I did this enough that the next time I opened them, she would be gone. 

            She wasn't.  I started panicking, and the memory of my nightmare started kicking its way out of the little place in my brain that I had kept it hidden for nearly two months.  I felt Callie's grip tighten on my arm, so hard that her tiny fingers were cutting off the blood supply.  Ben looked up, his face as confused as the rest of us.  I felt like screaming, but I couldn't manage to take in a deep enough breath to do so.  The memory told me that any second he was going to stand up, embrace her, and turn back to me with that hurtful look in his eyes.  I could feel the beginnings of the hysteria in my chest again.

            But he didn't stand up.  Instead, without saying anything to her, he turned back to me, his face still concerned.

            "Are you alright?" he asked.

            My eyes popped open a little wider.  "Yeah," I whispered.  "I'm fine."

            "You're sure?"

            I nodded.

            He gave a quick glance to Callie, before taking my by the arms and pulling me up off the ground.  Once I was standing by my own power, he gave me one final look, as if to check to make sure that I wasn't about to tumble back onto the grass, and then brushed a few errant hairs from my face and giving me a quick smile.

            He took a deep breath with his eyes closed, and then turned to face Amber.

            "Oh my gosh, Ben, it is you!" she shrieked and ran towards him, throwing her arms around his neck. 

            Callie had come up on my other side, looping her arm with mine.  Ben was tightly holding my other hand in his, using his free one to give Amber a light pat on the back as she squeezed him.

            A few awkward seconds later, she finally pulled away, her face beaming at him as she studied him again.

            "You look incredible!" she declared, placing her hand on his chest and leaning into him flirtatiously. 

            I alternated between punching her in a jealous rage and feeling like I would have to turn Ben over to his rightful owner now.

            He looked very uncomfortable and just sort of looked past her as she fawned over him.

            "And Callie!" she continued, turning her attention to my other side.  "Wow, you look as cute as ever!"   With that, she brushed past me and grabbed Callie in a hug just as equally uncomfortable looking.  Callie shot Ben and I both what I perceived to be a look of death, or something similar.

            "So," Amber cooed, standing in front of the three of us again.  "How have you guys been?"

            I stood there, eyes wide, my brain racing between thoughts of rage, and waves of fear.  Rage at the fact that she was oblivious to the fact that I was standing right between the people she was speaking to, and yet hadn't so much as made eye contact with me.  And fear that she might do just that...

            Ben was giving her an awfully strange look that I couldn't make out.  It wasn't like him to not be at the very least cordial to someone, but he stood there silent for a considerable amount of time.  To the point that we all stood there looking back and forth in between each other, waiting for someone, anyone really, to speak.

            Finally, "Hello, Amber," Ben relented.  It was like he suddenly remembered that he was the most polite human in existence.  "How are you?"

            "Oh, I am great!" she declared, emphasizing the last word so hard that it made me jump a little bit.  "Well, I have been living in New York and working for a very prestigious law firm, Parker, Douglas, Taylor and Sprouse, and even though I am working on several incredible cases at the moment, I decided to take a bit of time to come back to the "old stomping grounds" since I am--” She stopped for a brief second and looked down at Ben's hand holding onto mine, and it seemed to knock her off balance a bit.  "I'm sorry, I didn't ask the name of your friend here!"  She stuck her hand out to me, inviting me into a shake and added, "I'm Amber, I went to school with Ben and Callie.  And you are?"

            I searched her face in silence.  I could think of two options.  The first that I really had been as forgettable as I had always feared, and that I had fallen from her memory as though I'd never existed.  The second was that she was a huge bitch and pretending not to know me out of spite. 

            I opened my mouth to answer her, but Ben beat me to it.

            "This is my girlfriend, Max," he smiled.  My head whipped around at the word girlfriend.  We hadn't used those words yet.  Even with all the craziness around me at that moment, I noticed the goose bumps that ran up and down my arms after he said that.  "You went to school with her too."

            My eyes shot back to Amber to judge her reaction.  If I hadn't been looking so closely, I might not have been able to catch the little twitch in her lip after Ben spoke, and how she appeared to glare ever so slightly before relaxing her face again into the picture of cool perfection that was her trademark.  That tiny slip was enough to confirm for me that she was in fact, operating under the second option. 

            "That's right," she overcompensated.  "It's so nice to see you again!"  The sharp head tilt she added after speaking told me that she indeed, felt otherwise.

            I was honestly speechless. All I could manage was a slight nod, before looking at the ground and biting my lip.  I wanted to make some sort of biting comment back to her, but my deep rooted need for invisibility and self preservation was tugging at me in an all too familiar way. 

            "Well, anyway," she segued.  "I am so glad I ran into the two of you!  I still haven't gotten your RSVP's for the reunion next week!"

            "What reunion?" Nate's voice boomed out of nowhere.  He popped up beside Ben, and then made his way over to stand behind Callie, draping his arms over her shoulders.

            "You must be Callie's..." Amber trailed off.  I assumed this was to avoid the social faux pas of incorrectly assuming someone to be a husband, when they were a boyfriend and vice versa. 

            "Boyfriend," he responded.  "And you are?"

            "This is Amber," Callie offered.  "We went to high school together."

            "So, I can mark you and plus one?" Amber winked. 

            "Actually, I hadn't really planned on going," Callie sighed.

            "You have to go!" Amber lunged forward and grabbed Callie's hands in her own.  "It is going to be amazing!  I have been putting so much work into it, I mean, that's why I am here so early, there is just so much to be done!  And you know I want it done right, so of course I need to do it myself.  I know it's a lot of me to give up so much time of my own like this, but this is going to be the first time everyone gets to be together since high school!  So, of course I want to take the time to make sure it is as special as possible!  Won't it be incredible to see how everyone has turned out!" She spoke in a rapid fire stream of pep, never really looking away from Ben as she spoke.  She made sure to throw in numerous flashy smiles that I am sure were for his benefit. 

            While I should have been feeling jealous, it felt more like the edge of defeat.

            "Okay, I will put you down, plus one, and then I'll save another seat for you Ben!" she prattled on. 

            "I hadn't actually planned on attending," he cut her off.

            "Well, of course you are going!" she insisted.  "How would it look to everyone if the class president didn't show up?  You are even supposed to say a few words to everyone when the reunion starts!" She leaned forward and coyly rubbed her hand lightly down his free arm.  "It will be just like it used to be, you and I up there together, heads of the class."  And with a coquettish laugh she reasserted, "I will make sure I have a spot saved for you at the table with all our old friends!  It is going to be so much fun!  Oh, and we should get together a few times this week to catch up, and to work out what you are going to say in your speech!"

            Ben opened his mouth to protest but she was already going again.

            "Sorry to cut this so short, but I really need to head off!  Lot's more reunion plans to finalize!  It really is such a big job!"  She leaned forward like she was about to kiss him on the cheek and added, "I will call you tomorrow and we can make plans to meet up!"

            "Are you freaking kidding me!"

            I didn't mean to scream that.  I had been so focused on watching the madness unfold that I had been completely unaware of the fact that I was standing there seething.  And while I hadn't meant to scream, I was pleased that I had, and even more pleased that the sudden sound caused her to jump back from Ben, and stare at me.

            "Excuse me?" she shook her head quickly.

            "You are seriously going to stand here, right in front of me, and invite the two of them to our class reunion, and you aren't going to invite me?"  I snapped at her.  "Are you honestly that fucking childish?" 

            Out of the corners of my eyes, I saw Ben's eyebrows shoot up, and Callie's mouth jump into a big smile.

            Amber on the other hand started to glare.

            "Honestly, how ridiculously petty does a person have to be to try and maintain some bizarre high school social hierarchy for a stupid ten year reunion?" I dropped Ben's hand, and took a step towards her.  "You don't even know me, you only think you have some idea of who I was back in high school.  And you are probably right that the teenage me would have just rolled over and taken that, but the almost thirty year old version that is standing here in front of your snobby ass isn't going to put up with that crap."  By now, her eyes had become tiny slits.  "Despite the fact that you think you've owned that entire school since the day you first graced it with your presence, guess what?  And I really hate to break this to you, but you don't own anything.  You don't get to decide who gets to be a part of this."

            "Actually, I d--" she started to growl, but then seemed to remember that Ben and Callie were still standing there.  She shook her head again, as if she were trying to shake off the vile things she was wishing she could say back to me.  "Well, of course you were invited." she purred, her eyes still sharp.  "But since you never RSVP'd to your invitation we mailed out, I don't think there will be any extra tickets."

            "I didn't get any mailed invitation," I replied through clenched teeth.

            "Well, you know how the post office can be." she smirked.

            "No extra tickets? I never RSVP'd, and yet you were just able to secure a seat for me and even Nate here," Callie piped in, patting him on the arm as she spoke.

            "Well, that is different," Amber stumbled over her words a bit, "I went ahead and put seats in for you because I knew you would want to be there, and we automatically leave room for a plus one for any significant others!" 

            I had to admit, even though she was bullshitting with the best of them, and tripping all over herself trying to keep it going, she still managed to pull it off as somewhat believable.

            "Well, in that case," Ben joined in, "You can just add her as my plus one.  Since she is very much my significant other and all."

            Ambers mouth popped open, and a little noise escaped her. 

            "And gosh, this isn't a very good week for me," he went on.  "Really, very busy, lots of appointments already in place, so I don't think I am going to be able to free up any spare minutes for the reunion committee this time around." He paused to loop his arm around my waist again, pulling himself closer to me.  "But that is really not my area of expertise like it is for you, so I am sure I would have just done more harm than good."

            "Also, we are going to have to check and make sure we don't already have plans for the night of the reunion," Callie's voice twinkled.  "If we are all free though, I am sure we would try and show up."

            "But I'll tell you what," I added, trying not to sound as smug as I felt.  "Why don't you go ahead and save all our seats for us.  You know, just in case."

            It was a loaded silence that followed.  The four of us stood, calm, smiling, and casual together.  In all fairness, I was sporting more of a smirk than a smile, but that couldn't be helped.  I was just pleased to not be squealing with glee. 

            Amber's face started in a position that looked like the beginnings of a snarl, then softness slightly into sneer directed at me, before she finally pulled it together into her patented look of calm, prim, collection.  No matter how hard she tried however, she wasn't able to wipe every drop of anger from her eyes. 

            "Well, I hope to see you all there," she said evenly, as though she were working very carefully to control her voice.

            She stared at me a second longer before slowly turning and walking away.

            "Who.  The hell.  Was that?" Nate wondered, breaking our collective silence.

            "Ugh," Callie groaned, "She is awful!"

            "Was she a friend of yours in school?" he asked in disbelief.

            "Hey, don't blame me," she threw her arms up defensively.  "Ben's the one that dated her!"

            Our three heads whipped around in unison to stare at Ben. 

            "So," he inhaled deeply and pretended not to notice our inquisitive looks.  "Who wants to ride the tea cups again?"

            "Oooh, me!" Callie jumped excitedly and waved her hand in the air.

            Nate grinned mischievously and locked his arms around her stomach before hoisting her into the air over his shoulder, which set the rest of us off laughing uncontrollably.  He turned and headed towards the ride, with Callie facing us and motioning that we should follow.

            Just as I prepared to take my first step to follow, Ben caught me by using his hands to cradle my face in front of him.  He looked at me smiling that beautiful half smile that always left me a little breathless, and it seemed like he was trying to find the right words for what he needed to say.  Maybe he couldn't find them because instead of speaking, he leaned down and kissed me, deeply, until my head started to feel a bit hazy.  He pulled back slightly, and pressed his lips to my forehead.

            "Hey!" Callie yelled back to us, "I never got my fried Oreo!" 

            After one more quick peck, Ben took my hand in his and led the way after them, following the sound of Callie's pleas.

            "Guys? Seriously?  What about my Oreo!?”