“Everyone does summer school now,” Jo Ellen mused, proving that her thoughts mirrored Maggie’s. “Straight for sorority row, Mags.”
“Why not?”
Maggie took a turn, driving from memory, and slowed the car as they meandered down Millidge Avenue. When they reached the cream-colored mansion with three triangles over the front door, both of them gasped softly.
“There it is,” Jo Ellen whispered.
Pulling to the curb across the street from the house, Maggie felt a sudden, unexpected rush of gratitude. It was still here! Yep,Jo was right. It was definitely a Scarlett O’Hara “pulls up to Tara after the war” moment.
The bones were the same. Updated, yes. Fresh paint, new windows, lovely black shutters, beautiful landscaping. But it was unmistakablytheirhouse.
“It looks…good,” Maggie sighed.
“Better than it did back then, even,” Jo Ellen said. “But it looks smaller than I remembered.”
“Nah. We’re just…bigger.”
They laughed, memories spilling out easily now as they stared.
Maggie suddenly saw herself sitting on the front steps until they unlocked the door, because she’d stayed out after curfew on a date with Roger…the night he told her he loved her.
She let her gaze move up to a small window on the side, knowing her bed had been in that room. There, she and Jo studied and laughed and shared clothes and experimented with rouge and confessed everything to each other.
“Remember rush weeks?” Jo Ellen mused. “All stress and drama.”
“And finals week,” Maggie countered. “More stress and drama.”
Jo Ellen leaned closer. “And the time we smoked a joint?”
Maggie snorted. “No stress, but plenty of drama.”
Sighing together, they sat quietly and looked at the house.
“You know, Jo, I don’t really care about getting old.”
“Good thing, hon, because that ship has left the port and could sink any day.”
“But I don’t want to…fritter the last chapter of our life,” Maggie finished in a serious tone that made Jo Ellen turn and look at her.
“No one’s frittering,” she said. “But I do like that you call it ‘our’ life.”
Maggie smiled, not even realizing she’d said that. “Are we going to look around?” she asked.
“You want to go in the house?” Jo Ellen’s eyes flashed. “They love it when legacy alums show up.”
“No, I don’t need to go in the house, but let’s go to campus and see Lyndon Hall.”
“Where we met! Ooh, good call.”
Maggie pulled out and made her way toward the heart of campus, finding a public lot, anticipation building as they walked in the shadow of the splendid old dorm where they’d met.
They walked toward the dozen stone steps that led to the main door, then up to the window on the second floor.
“That’s where it all began,” Jo Ellen whispered with nothing but love. “Mags and Jo, inseparable from the day I walked in and announced I was your randomly selected roommate.”
The front door popped open and two girls came out, looking…twelve. Maybe fifteen.
They wore shiny, tiny black shorts that could double as decent underwear and what looked like halter tops, but Maggie knew that garment was technically considered a “sports” bra.
