Flash Fiction: The Invite

“I got invited,” Jack said.
“To what?” Amanda asked.
“To Clearview’s reunion. Rick invited me.”
“Okay,” Amanda said. “So are you going?”
“Of course!” Jack shouted.

Clearview Prep was Jack’s high school. It was the most prestigious high school in the city he grew up in. The city wasn’t large, but still, you were almost guaranteed access to top colleges in the state if you graduated from there.

“I thought you weren’t all that excited about school?” Amanda countered.
“I am now. I have a business. I have you. We have a baby on the way. Gotta show my peers that I’m at least as successful as they are.”

Amanda wasn’t sure what to think of it. Even though she was Jack’s wife and supposedly his biggest supporter, deep down she had her reservations. Not about loving him, but he could be a little arrogant. She liked him for it, but she wasn’t so sure his high school peers would. And then there was the other thing.

“What will you say about those fifteen months you…”
“Don’t talk about that,” Jack cut her short. “That’s in the past.”
“So is Clearview Prep,” Amanda said.

Jack knew. He knew that, if he were to revisit that bit of his past, he’d have to revisit the rest. Rick knew, but apart from him, no-one in his class knew why he’d left Clearview just a few months before graduation.

This piece of flash fiction was inspired by Sandman’s Writing Challenge #5.