"Who says you can't go home, There's only one place that call me one of their own, Just a hometown boy, born a rolling stone, who says you can't go home?" -- Bon Jovi 'Who Says You Can't Go Home?'
Part Three: Who Says You Can't Go Home?
1
The sun was hot. Even hotter than she remembered, but it was a much welcomed change. She smiled as she stepped out of the airport, squinting her eyes as she dug for her sunglasses in her purse. Marshall was picking her up, because he was the only one who could be trusted not to give away that she was arriving today. He had also managed to get all of her things back into her old bedroom without anyone but her parents noticing.
Of course, in a few days, she would have an even bigger surprise for everyone. They wouldn't see it coming. She smiled as she pulled her darker - but still blond - hair back into a messy bun and took off the light jacket she had been wearing on the plane to reveal the navy blue tank top she had laid out the night before because she knew it would be exactly the right amount of clothing when she landed.
"You ready?" Marshall asked as he met her at the front door and held out his hand for the extra large duffel slung over her shoulder. Somehow, she had managed to collect more stuff than she had left with, and she had been forced to make a trip to Wal-Mart to buy more luggage.
"I am so ready," she smiled as him as the two of them maid their way to his car, parked in the maze of the Atlanta airport.
"So how was the flight?"
"Eh, pretty good. We hit some turbulence when we first took off, but after that it was pretty good," she said as they passed a family of four, decked out in Disney paraphernalia.
"So did you get you a hot little outfit for the wedding?" He laughed. "I can't believe you didn't tell him you were coming back. Of course, you can trust that all of us have kept it secret."
"I told him I was going to be on vacation in Canada with Blake that week and that it had been planned for months, so I couldn't back out. He wasn't too happy."
Marshall let out a laugh. "You are pure evil."
"You know you love it," she smirked and laughed along as they finally came upon his car.
"I swear it was closer when I parked it," he laughed as he slid everything into the back seat and they began their journey home. "Are you hungry?"
"I could definitely eat something fattening right now!" She laughed. "I've totally missed the food here."
"Forget about your closest friends and family, right? Its all about the food," Marshall joked as she playfully punched his shoulder. He had left the top down on his Jeep and it felt awesome as the warm wind blew all around her.
"I just realized that you, me, Ty, and Jake all have Jeeps," she laughed. "Or well, I don't anymore, but still..." In an effort to make moving as easy as possible, she had sold her Jeep to one of her students who had just saved up enough money to buy himself his first car. She even knocked off a little bit of the price for him since he was one of her most talented students.
"Wow, that only took a few years," the two of them laughed together. "Are you sure you're qualified to teach high school?"
"Shut up or I'll go back to Vermont," she joked as she continued to laugh hysterically.
"No, we can't have any of that," he said seriously as he patted her knee.
They really couldn't have any of that. Her life needed the old friends she had once spent every waking hour with, and it was sad that it had taken several hundred miles between them for her to realize it. But she was younger, and more naive, and most of all selfish back then. Those days didn't matter; All that mattered was that she was back and she was going to do everything she could to make up for it.
- - - -
Her homecoming was well-received. She had never seen her parents so happy. They nearly choked her with hugs the moment she walked in the door with her bags. But she didn't care. She was home. Her parents were together again, like they should have been all along.
"Your sisters are coming over tonight for dinner. I ordered pizzas," her dad told her as her mom answered the phone.
She nodded. "How are they?"
"They've been asking about you, actually. They told me about everything they did, and I was mad, but they regret it now. I think they wanted me to pass along the apology for them, but I told them they had to do it themselves."
She smiled and waved her hand in the air. "Its all water under the bridge now."
Her dad hooked his arm around her neck and pulled her close, "You always were my favorite."
She laughed as she wrestled her way free, "Dad, I have to take my stuff up stairs."
"Oh yeah, I painted your room for you," he called after her as she attempted to take the stairs with the duffel slung across her body and the large suitcase trailing behind her.
The walls were a dark slate blue - her favorite color - except for one wall that had a diamond pattern painted on it in a lighter shade of blue.
"Thanks dad. It looks great."
"Well, I needed something to do one weekend, so this was what became of my boredom," he laughed as he patted her shoulder and then told her he would let her unpack.
Marshall had organized her room exactly as it had been when she left. The low bookshelf under the window held all her photo albums, along with all of her favorite books. He stacked her CDs in alphabetical order on top - because Marshall couldn't stand it when CDs weren't in alphabetical order - and all her picture frames were hung creatively on the wall with the diamond shapes painted on it.
All she really had to do was put her clothes away. She turned the lamp on her headboard on, along with the radio on her alarm clock and began her work.
- - - -
Her sisters had apologized for what seemed like a million times, and each time she said the same thing: "I know you didn't really mean it." She wasn't sure when she had became so understanding, but she had, and she liked it. She felt like she was calmer than she had once been, like her mind and soul were at peace.
"So I have a ton of pictures," she started as she took a bite, "Of the snow. I'm telling you its amazing how much snow they get." She pointed to a stack of ten paper envelopes, the kind you get when you get your pictures developed at Wal-Mart.
"You and your pictures," Janie laughed as she grabbed the first one and began looking through them. "Who are these people?"
"Oh those are my friends, Nate, Blake and Jarrett. They all teach at Lakeside."
"Wait - whats the girl's name?" Janie laughed.
"Blake." Tessa laughed. "Her dad wanted a boy but never got one, so she was the youngest and therefore ended up with a boy's name. She's from Canada. Nate and Jarrett are from New York. I got made fun of a lot when I said ya'll and stuff like that."
They all laughed as they flipped through the pictures and Tessa explained each and every one of them, because she wanted them all to know what had gone on in her life for the year she was gone. There were even a few pictures of Jason in there, and while everyone else thought it would make her feel awkward, she brushed it off and told them how they were friends now.
"You're possibly the weirdest person I've ever met," Ellie laughed. "If it was me, I would want to scoop his eyeballs out with a sthingy and then take a cheese grater to his skin."
Everyone laughed as they sat around the big round wooden table that was finally being used for what it was supposed to be used for after so many years of not being used for family dinners or homework or card games. As everyone flipped through the pictures of the snow, she looked up to the one empty seat, directly across from her and pictured her sister as she was now and smiled faintly.
- - - -
"Hey Mom," she said as she found her mom in the front yard the next morning, watering her rose bushes. "Do you care if Blake stays here for a few days?"
"Sure, she can stay in Kacie's room," her mom suggested, which caught her off guard, and it showed on her face. "I re-decorated a little in there. The walls are still that sea foam green you two loved insisted on, but I bought new bedding. I figured that if Kacie was getting older, so should her bedroom."
Tessa still held a confused look on her face.
"It helped me reach closure," her mom was chuckling at her now. "I've got her in my heart, in pictures, in my memories. I don't need to keep holding on to her old bedroom anymore."
Tessa smiled and nodded as she stepped forward and gave her mom a hug.
"So when will Blake be here?"
"Tomorrow, actually," Tessa grinned sheepishly as her mom playfully spanked her like she was still a little child.
"Well get up there and change the sheets then," her mom laughed as she spanked her with her gardening gloves and she hopped back up the brick stairs and onto the porch, and into the house.
If only her mom knew who was really coming to stay with them.
"Hello?" she answered her ringing phone as she climbed the stairs.
"Hey. Whats up?" It was Teddy. How could he act so calm?
"I'm changing my sheets." She told him. It wasn't a complete lie.
"That sounds like fun. So are you sure you can't make it?"
"I'm sorry. If it was any other week but that week, I could do it." She told him.
"Next week," he told her. "Next Saturday. Just in case you change your mind. I really wish you would be there, Tess."
"There? Are you not in Georgia?" She asked curiously.
"No, I came to New York for a little bit to work on some new songs. I hung out with Nate last night and went to Jarrett's wedding last weekend." Jarrett's wedding. She had sat in front, and she hadn't seen Teddy there at all. He definitely wasn't at the reception. She would've known.
"Oh yeah? I didn't see you there."
"I sat in the very back and I didn't go to the reception." He told her. "I saw you there."
"Yeah," it was one of those statements that don't need a reply, but feel like they need one, and she didn't really know what to say next. "Well, I need to go because I've got to change these sheets and do some cleaning and packing, so I'll talk to you later."
"Ok," he sounded frustrated, which was exactly how she wanted him to be. "See ya."
She let out a sigh as she hung up and let out a mischievous laugh as she finished changing the sheets, then got ready to go out for lunch with all of her friends.
- - - -
The sun was setting as they all sat in the grass of the baseball field on blankets with milkshakes in hand. Tessa had insisted that she play with Sam all night, because he needed to know who she was.
"He's my godson, and I've never met him," she said defensively when Marshall tried to play with him as well.
"Well he's mine too, so it looks like we're going to have to fight over him if something happens to those two," Marshall joked as she looked at Hailey.
"I didn't know that," she said and Hailey shrugged. "We figured that you two would make the best parents, even if you don't marry each other."
"Aww, that's sweet," Tessa said, teary eyed, as she looked around at all her friends. She turned to Marshall, "Speaking of relationships, where is your woman? Leighanne?"
"We broke up. Or well, she broke up with me." He said. "She said she couldn't handle dating me because I'm in a band. But then the band kind of died, but she had moved on."
"Why didn't you tell me?" She punched his shoulder.
"It wasn't a big deal."
"You're supposed to tell your friends things like that," she laughed.
"I didn't want to tell you because I was kind of mad at you," he confessed. "I went through a phase where I was mad at you for leaving. But I got over it."
"I'm sorry," she said as she gave him a hug.
Everyone else had went back to their own conversations, talking about hair or clothes or music or even when they had been in high school.
"Let's make a promise," he said, and she turned to face him. "If neither of us finds someone dumb enough to marry us and all our crazy friends by the time we're, ohh... let's say, seventy-seven, you and I will get married."
"You and me?" She asked, but it was more of a statement. She could definitely see herself spending the rest of her life with him, even if she really wanted Teddy. He nodded and she smiled, "I promise. But we can't tell anyone until then."
They laughed loudly and everyone looked at them curiously. "What's so funny?" Lauren asked curiously.
They looked at each other and started giggling like little kids again, "We were just talking about when we were younger."
"Tell us about it. I'm sure we'll laugh as much now as we did then."
But that wasn't what they had been talking about, so she threw out the only memory she had that they didn't know about. "Well, I lost my virginity at fifteen, not twenty-one," she laughed.
"And you two were laughing about it together?" Cooper was confused. "No! You two?"
Marshall was embarrassed now, because he never talked about his sex life with his friends. That was more personal to him.
"When?!" They all shouted together, followed by a curious coo from Sammy.
"Well, everyone was on vacation except for our two families," she began. "And we were bored, so we went for a walk on that old dirt road that used to be behind our houses... And we started talking about different stuff, and somehow it came up that we had never really, really kissed someone, so we kissed... And then things went on from there."
Everyone was staring at them in disbelief. "You're lying!" Ty shouted but Marshall shook his head.
Everyone started laughing hysterically, but she couldn't tell if it was because they thought she had just come up with the best lie ever, or if it was because it sounded like something she would keep secret. Either way, she didn't care.
This was her life, as it was supposed to be. And she realize she was happy; That she had always been happy here, and she would never leave again.
