The Ones That Got Away Read online

  Scott instinctively covered his erection with his hands. Melanie’s long brunette hair fell carelessly, caressing her freckled shoulders. Her eyes shone brightly, crinkling up when she smiled, a dimple revealed on just one side of her lovely face. She was so sexy, but she was twenty years younger than him. He couldn’t have sex with her. Plus, he was a married man. “I don’t feel so great.”

  “Suit yourself. We’ll save it for tonight.” She stood, her naked body silhouetted by the light filtering through the blinds.

  He fondly remembered her body, long and shapely, with curves in all the right places. She had shared that body with him during languorous afternoons after class, and drunken nights when all they wanted was each other, in her room, in his apartment, and in the back seat of his car. He remembered one time when they fell out of bed and he cut his elbow, leaving a scar. He looked at his elbow. The scar was red and fresh looking.

  Melanie pulled her pants up and fastened her bra. She slipped a T-shirt over her head and fixed her hair in the mirror. “I need to borrow a hat.” She grabbed a baseball cap from his closet, pulled her hair back, and put it on. “Do I look okay?”

  “You look fantastic,” he said. And she did. The hat held back her hair, exposing her long, sumptuous neck. He felt a stirring he hadn’t felt in a long time.

  “You’re sweet, but you had your chance. What time are you picking me up?”

  “Picking you up for what?

  “The bonfire.” Melanie laughed. “You’d better get some sleep today. You need it.” She leaned over and kissed him, lingering on his lips. “See you tonight.” She reached down and squeezed his erection. He gasped, and she threw her head back, laughing.

  He watched her leave and waited for the apartment door to close. What the hell was going on? This didn’t feel like a dream. The kiss felt real. Her grabbing him felt real. He tried closing and opening his eyes again, but nothing changed.

  His head ached and his body demanded more sleep. If this was a dream, maybe going back to sleep would wake him from it. That didn’t make any sense, but none of this made any sense. He pulled the blanket over his face. He wasn’t sure what was going on, but he hoped it would be over when he woke up.

  *

  The good news was, when he woke, his headache was gone. The bad news was that he was still in his college apartment. He had the urge to run, to scream, to do whatever he could do to get back to his old life. He rolled over. The clock’s red digital numbers said 2:32. Sunlight poured in his window.

  When he stood, he half expected the floor to give way. He walked to where he remembered the bathroom being, and there it was. He stood in front of the toilet and unleashed a stream of urine that was stronger than any in recent memory. When he raised his head, he caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror. He knew the reflection was him, but it wasn’t. This guy was younger and thinner, with longer, thicker hair. He leaned toward the mirror. His eyes were red from drinking too much, but they were bright, the lashes long and dark. Last time he’d looked in the mirror, he’d seen a dullness to his eyes, dark circles under them.

  He looked at his gut. Long hours at a desk, fast food on the run, too many sweets, and no exercise had produced a noticeable paunch. But that paunch was gone. He was thin with a flat stomach. He stepped back from the mirror and stared at the former version of himself. My God, he was twenty-two again.

  He wandered into the kitchen and pulled a piece of bologna and an American cheese slice from the fridge. He folded the meat around the cheese and ate the entire thing in two bites. Then he fished out a Diet Pepsi and sat on the ugly brown and yellow couch the apartment complex had provided. The cushion sank under his weight. Had it always been this uncomfortable?

  The small black and white television that belonged to his parents sat on an old bedroom nightstand. He had watched countless episodes of Magnum PI and Family Ties and Taxi on that TV. It seemed ridiculously small and outdated to him now.

  The shelves that held his stereo system were made with concrete blocks and one-by-six wooden planks. The shelves bowed in the middle from the weight of the receiver, turntable, and cassette tape deck, as well as his and Dean’s textbooks. A plastic milk crate underneath the shelf helped support the weight.

  A poster for Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon hung on one wall. The Eagle’s Hotel California on another.

  He remembered all of this, but was it real or was it just his memory playing tricks on him? In the dream, his father asked, “Wouldn’t it be nice to have a do-over?” Was that even possible? He refused to believe what his eyes were telling him.

  The door opened and Dean walked in. “Hey, Slacker,” he said in his usual deadpan voice. “I thought you were going to meet me at the library.”

  Scott wanted to jump off the couch and hug him. After college, when Dean moved to California, they had talked less and less often, until they didn’t talk at all. Scott had made the excuse that he was too busy. He planned to reach out to Dean when things slowed down, but slowing down never happened.

  “Dino, you magnificent bastard.”

  Dean smiled. His sarcastic, overly critical, always goofing around roommate was just as he remembered. “You know, just because you’ve already been accepted into law school, that doesn’t mean you don’t have to study for finals.”

  Dean’s comment jolted Scott’s memory. He was supposed to start law school at the University of Chicago later that year. How the hell was he going to pass tests for classes he hadn’t attended in more than twenty years?

  “Are you okay?”

  Scott stared, open-mouthed, at Dean while he thought about his exams and law school. “Sorry, I’m a little hungover.”

  “If you’re not going to study, then maybe we should head uptown for a drink.”

  Scott blinked, then smiled. “I think I could use one.”

  Chapter 3

  April 1983

  As Scott and Dean walked out into the bright afternoon sun, Dean stopped suddenly.

  “What are you doing?” Dean asked.

  Scott didn’t know what he was he doing. He was just following Dean. “What do you mean?”

  “Where’s your car?”

  Scott drove an older Pontiac Grand Prix in college. It was black with a tan landau roof and interior. He and his dad had bought it during Scott’s sophomore year. That old Pontiac had taken him back and forth to see his family, to Daytona Beach for spring break, and its backseat had served as a private, albeit cramped, oasis when he and Melanie needed it most. But he had no idea where it might be now.

  “Did you lose your car again?”

  Scott had a habit of drinking too much and forgetting where he had parked. He shrugged.

  “There it is.” Dean pointed across the parking lot. “Did you remember the keys?”

  Scott had no idea where the keys might be. He reflexively reached into the pocket of his jeans and felt several keys. He pulled them out and sighed.

  When the old car roared to life, Scott remembered that he had driven the beast for two years with a hole in the muffler. The aggressive, throaty sound made him smile.

  “I need to get some money,” Dean said.

  “Where’s the closest ATM?”

  “The what?” Dean’s brow furrowed and he looked quizzically at Scott.

  There were no ATMs when he was in college. When he needed money, he’d go to the student union, write a check, and they’d give him cash. He checked his wallet. Four singles, but no blank check. “I need to get my checkbook.”

  Dean opened the glovebox and pulled out a blue-covered checkbook. “You mean this checkbook? The one that’s always in your glovebox?”

  “Yeah, that’s the one.”

  Dean rolled his eyes.

  Scott leaned over and stuffed the checkbook into his back pocket. He backed out of the parking spot, then paused. Where was the student union? When he got to the street, he put on his left blinker.

  “Why are you going that way?”

  “I mu
st be more hungover than I thought,” Scott said. “I’m all discombobulated.”

  “That’s a hell of a word.” Dean laughed. “Turn right.” Dean continued to give directions, as if Scott was an out-of-towner. Scott played along, laughing at Dean’s directions, but secretly grateful.

  “Don’t forget, you’re going to need at least five bucks for cover charge at the bonfire tonight,” Dean said once they were in the student union. “You’re still going, aren’t you?”

  “I told Melanie I’d take her,” he said.

  “Then you’ll need ten bucks.”

  Scott wrote his check for thirty dollars. Man, how things had changed. Happy hour and a bonfire for only thirty bucks. Dinner with Kathy was almost always a hundred bucks or more.

  Scott started to remember the area around campus. Dean had to help him once or twice on the way to the Gin Mill, but even on the way uptown, Scott generally remembered the way. He recognized buildings where he had classes, a fraternity house where he had gotten drunk and puked, and the Hy-Vee where he and Dean shopped.

  “I’ll get the first round,” Scott said. Buying drinks put him on familiar ground. He knew how to do that.

  The bartender set the drinks in front of them. “A dollar fifty,” he said.

  “How much?” Scott asked.

  “Buck fifty.”

  He looked at Dean, who raised his eyebrows, smiled, and downed half of his beer. God, things had changed so much since he last sat at this bar. Back then, he was so full of hope and expectation. He was going to do great things, but what those things were, he couldn’t recall. Becoming a lawyer was part of it. He wanted to help people. But the only thing he had really done was help rich people get richer, making a good living in the process. He used to think there was more to life than making money and buying nice things, but now he wasn’t so sure.

  He didn’t think about it a lot back then, but he knew he wanted to get married. And he assumed he’d have some kids. But he never dreamed that he’d end up with the kind of energy-draining marriage he had with Kathy. He used to think he could fix or avoid just about any problem that might arise. When it came to relationships, he was the kind of guy who liked to joke around and have fun. He wasn’t into power plays or constant arguing, yet that’s exactly what he got with Kathy. How had things gone so wrong?

  “You ready for another one?” Dean asked.

  Scott looked at Dean’s empty glass and then at his half-full one. “Sure, why not?”

  The bartender brought the beers and Dean paid.

  “You ready to play?” Dean asked.

  “Play what?”

  “What a dufus,” Dean said under his breath. “Pinball.” He pointed to the game in the corner.

  “I need to finish.” Scott nodded toward his two glasses of beer sitting on the bar.

  “Hurry up.” Dean walked to the pinball machine.

  Scott sipped the beer, but when Dean scowled at him from across the room, he drank down what was left of his first beer and carried the fresh one with him to the pinball machine.

  Dean pointed at Scott’s beer. “Try to keep up.”

  He and Dean used to play these games all the time. There was Big Flipper, Black Hole, Captain Fantastic, and Kiss, along with video games like Pac-Man, Ms. Pac-Man and Galaga. But they played this Playboy pinball machine the most.

  Dean put two quarters into the game. “You go first.”

  Scott stepped up. Hugh Hefner was on the back glass in his customary pajamas, smoking a pipe. Two Playboy Bunnies, one in a bikini and one in a negligee, flanked him on either side. Scott pulled the plunger back and launched the ball. It jumped off the bumpers and ricocheted around. The flippers felt loose and energetic to Scott’s touch. He waited for the ball to roll down toward the flippers, but his timing was slightly off. The ball rolled back toward the flippers. He was late again. The ball hit a bumper and rolled right back. Scott hit the buttons for both flippers, but the ball snuck through, draining between them.

  “That was pathetic.” Dean pulled the plunger back and let loose. The ball bounced off bumpers and lit up the playmates from March, May, January, July, and September. He knocked the ball right back toward the top. He deftly caught it in preparation for a shot. He knew the machine inside and out. When he finished his first ball, he smiled wryly at Scott and walked away.

  Scott’s second ball was little better than his first. His timing was barely off, but it was enough to make a difference.

  On his second ball, Dean put on a clinic. He wasn’t so much playing the game as dancing with it, allowing it to lead, but reacting to its every move. He was right on time with the flippers, and he had his hips in the game too. He moved as the ball moved, occasionally nudging the machine to control the ball.

  Scott followed Dean’s lead. He relaxed and let the game come to him. Slowly, the muscle memory from so many years ago came back. It had been there all along, deep inside him. Whatever this was he was going through, whether a dream or a second chance to live a happy life, maybe he’d be okay.

  He lost concentration on the game, and the ball drained. But for a moment, the old Scott was back. He needed that old Scott now.

  “That was almost good,” Dean said.

  Scott chugged his beer and smiled. “My turn to buy.”

  Chapter 4

  April 1983

  The phone rang. Scott tossed a half-eaten slice of pizza into the box and got up from the table to answer it. Dean bit into another slice as though he didn’t hear the ringing. It was Melanie. She said that a few of her sorority sisters were going to the bonfire and she could just meet Scott there.

  “Sure, sounds good,” he said. “See you soon.” He hung up, thinking he had dodged a bullet. He knew that Melanie lived in the sorority house, but he couldn’t remember how to get there.

  The beer at happy hour had loosened him up, but Scott was still on edge. If this wasn’t a dream, what was it? Was his life with Kathy a dream? Or had he really traveled back in time? If so, why?

  “What’s wrong?” Dean asked.

  “What?”

  “Why are you staring at the phone?”

  Scott brought his focus back to the moment. “That was Melanie,” he said.

  “And?”

  “Oh, she’s going to meet us at the bonfire.”

  “And?”

  “That’s all.” Scott sat back at the table and grabbed the slice of pizza he had been working on.

  Dean eyed him suspiciously. “Is everything okay with you two? It sure sounded like you were getting along last night.”

  Scott blushed, remembering Melanie’s naked silhouetted body that morning. “Everything’s fine.”

  Dean grunted, and the two roommates finished what was left of the pizza.

  *

  The party was in full swing. The fire raged. The beer flowed from four kegs. “Always Something There to Remind Me” by Naked Eyes blared over speakers.

  A skinny guy with long, shaggy hair and wearing a fraternity shirt stopped Scott and Dean at the kegs.

  “Five bucks per cup.”

  After they paid, as Scott filled his cup, someone jumped on his back. The person spilled beer onto the front of Scott’s shirt. He turned and Melanie hopped off.

  “Were you trying to hug me or tackle me?” Scott wiped at the front of his shirt.

  “Maybe both.” Her words were slurred and her eyes were glassy. She seemed oblivious that she spilled beer on him.

  “How much have you had to drink?” Scott asked.

  “My second.” Melanie held up a red solo cup. “Now shut up and kiss me.” She put her arms around his neck and kissed him long and deep. Melanie kept her eyes closed a moment too long, and, when they parted, stumbled backwards.

  Scott caught her before she could fall. “Maybe we should sit.” He led her to a log near the tree line, away from the crowd. They sat for a moment, and Melanie suddenly became serious.

  “I don’t think your parents like me.” She sat slump-sho
uldered and cried.

  Did they like her? As far as he remembered, they did. “Of course, they like you.”

  “I don’t think they do.” She hung her head and pouted.

  Scott hugged her and she wiped tears from her eyes. Her mascara smeared. Scott tried to wipe it away, but just made it worse.

  “What if I can’t get a job in Chicago?” Tears rolled down her cheeks again.

  “What?” He wasn’t sure what she was talking about.

  “What if I can’t get a job in Chicago?” she repeated. “What if you’re in law school and I have to live with my parents?”

  “We’ll find a way to make it work. You can drive up to see me one weekend and I’ll drive down to see you the next.”

  She began crying again. She raised her hand to wipe away the tears, and when she did, she dropped her cup of beer. Spilling the beer made her cry even harder.

  “Don’t worry, I’ll get you another one.” Scott picked up her cup. He felt guilty leaving her on the log, crying by herself, but he didn’t want to stay with her in that condition.

  Melanie could get emotional when she was drinking. She could be very loving or very angry. It was a mixed bag.

  Scott saw Dean near the keg. He raised both red Solo cups in Dean’s direction and smiled.

  “How’s it going?” Dean asked.

  “Melanie is drunk and upset.”

  “Oh, oh. I hope The Volcano doesn’t blow.” Dean laughed.

  Dean had nicknamed Melanie “The Volcano.” Watching Scott deal with her when she was drinking had been a source of amusement for him.

  “Hi, Dean,” a short, thin woman wearing a jean jacket hugged Dean.

  “This is Gail Freese,” Dean said to Scott, then pointed to a good-looking blond. “And this is Ashley Drake.” Dean nodded at Ashley. “Ashley’s the singer I told you about.”

  Scott didn’t remember what Dean had told him about Ashley, but he remembered her, nonetheless. She played gigs around campus for a couple of years, then went on to have a career in Nashville. A few years after graduation, Ashley had a song on the radio.

  “Dean says you’re really talented,” he said to Ashley. “I’d like to hear you play sometime.”