Free Heart-Shaped Box (Claire Montrose Series) by April Henry Page A

restroom.
    As she cut past Richard’s table, he looked up from the woman he was talking to and gave her a smile. Claire was still mad at herself for being pleased that he remembered her. Would she have felt the same way if he worked in a factory instead of being responsible for employing thousands of people who worked in factories?
    “ Hi, Claire - long-time no-see. Say, do you know Martha?” Claire vaguely remembered Martha Masterson, a quiet woman who had sat behind Claire in advanced English. She had always worn a white plastic headband that pulled her hair back from her high forehead. Now her thick dark blond hair was cut in a flattering pageboy and her large gray eyes were no longer hidden by glasses. “She and I are both refugees from the Bi-Phy-Chem Club, only neither of us got too far away. She does” - he turned back to her, a theatrically quizzical expression on his face -” what is it - organic chemistry research? Anyway, something I barely understand.”
    Martha gave his arm a playful push. “Don’t tell me you don’t understand it. If you hadn’t tutored me, I wouldn’t have done so well on my chemistry advance placement exam. Thanks to your help, I got enough credits to enter college as a sophomore.”
    “ That’s the thing, though. I only understand chemistry up through the college freshman level. Not the post-doc work you’re doing.” He turned back to Claire. “What about you, Claire? What are you doing?”
    Her answer felt inadequate. “I volunteer with the SMART program. It’s a program to teach at-risk kids to read.”
    “ Hmm. Very noble. Do you have any children yourself?” She saw him glance at her left hand.
    “ No, at least not yet.” Her bladder sent up another distress signal. “Say, would you excuse me for a second?”
    As she continued to pass through the crowd, Claire heard scraps of conversation from combinations of people she would never have imagined together. Cindy was telling a table full of people Claire recognized as former hoods about her career “in the spirit industry.” Wade seemed to be putting the moves on Jessica, and her face was alight as if the whole thing wasn’t fueled by a half-dozen vodka tonics. And Tyler was talking to a restless-looking Rebecca. Claire caught a snatch of his monologue. “So I drew my gun and I said, ‘Do you want to bet who is gonna to fire first? Because I shoot to kill, buddy!’”
    “ Hey, Clairice! It’s been a long time.”
    She turned. Sawyer Fairchild. He was clean-shaven now, his dark hair gone silver at the temples in the way that seemed only to happen to men.
    “ I guess since I’ve been following your career, it doesn’t seem as long to me.” She had forgotten how he had used to call her Clairice. Like the other kids, she had preened at any sign that Sawyer had singled her out.
    “ I’m flattered. I hope I’ve made the kind of decisions you can support.”
    “ I’m a dyed-in-the-wool liberal. The worst kind. So I’m all for the Portland urban growth boundary, better schools and gay rights.”
    Making a face, Sawyer slapped himself on the cheek. “I’m doing it again, aren’t I? Running for office. And tonight’s supposed to be about seeing old friends. Have the last twenty years been good to you?”
    She nodded. “The last few years, especially. I’m definitely having more fun than when I was seventeen.”
    Sawyer opened his mouth to reply, but just then a half-dozen women waving cocktail napkins descended on them, asking “the future governor” for his autograph.
    Claire mouthed a good-bye in his direction, then again made her way toward the bathrooms, which were behind a partition that held a payphone. The women’s restroom door was labeled the She-Pee Room and featuring a cartoony-illustration of an Indian (or should she say Native American?) woman sneaking behind a teepee. She took her place in the long line for one of the four stalls. Nina, one of her old circle of friends, fell in behind