Chapter 1: The First Wedding

It was the final weekend of September. The weather was sunny and warm during the day, but after nightfall it would turn quite brisk. On Saturday morning, Denise sat on Thomas’s bed with a rubber ball. She tossed it against the dorm room trying to hit the boobs of the women whose posters decorated the walls on Matt’s side of the room.

Thomas shut his textbook with triumph and looked up to see the ball squarely bounce off a brunette woman’s breast in a dark blue suit whose nipples were clearly poking through the thin fabric.

“Bullseye,” he said.

Denise caught the ball and flicked it toward Thomas, bouncing it off his crotch.

“Two-for-two,” she said with a grin.

She reached for the zipper on his pants, but Thomas flopped down next to Denise and tossed the ball at a young-looking Pamela Anderson.

“Matt will be here in sec,” he said even though he was clearly sporting a bulge in his pants.

Thomas and Denise took turns tossing the ball and letting the other catch it. They were hitting a boob more than half the time. Thomas was lost in thought as he caught and tossed the small ball. Ten months earlier he went to bed a fifty-something year old man dreading spending Thanksgiving day alone. He awoke in the bedroom of his mom’s house during his senior year of high school.

He took advantage of his do-over and his life was completely different this time. For starters, the beautiful lady sitting next to him was his high school crush that he never spoke to as his younger self. Now, he dated her through his second semester of high school, even co-starring with her in the musical Grease before his uncontrolled lust blew up the relationship. After the break up, she spent a month on the wild side. She eventually decided she wanted to stay in town for university, and then by chance ran into Thomas at a frat party where she was being unceremoniously groped by a frat guy she thought was going to be different.

Matt entered as the ball hit Pamela in the left boob and careened right back to Denise.

“Hey!” he called. “You’re going to ruin my posters.”

“No we’re not,” countered Denise. “We’re just making the nipples stand at attention.”

Thomas laughed while Matt scowled at Denise.

“Do you have plans tonight?” Denise asked Matt.

He paused, then shrugged. “I guess not.”

“What do you mean, I guess not?” asked Denise.

“Well, going out with you two plus Cindi is always a lot of fun, but she’s engaged and will be married in a month or two. It really puts a cramp in the odds I’ll meet someone when I’m already with a girl, even though I’m really not with her.”

“We know,” said Denise. “And Cindi has been asking around. She’s got a friend that she’s going to set you up with in a few weeks.”

“Really?” asked Matt getting interested.

“Really,” said Denise. “But you didn’t hear anything. Certainly not from me. Don’t be a douche when she tells you.”

Thomas piled on, “That may be too much of an ask.”

Matt flipped off his roommate and turned to his desk. Sitting prominently on top of the desk was a large book of all Shakespeare’s plays. Matt was supposed to have already read half of it, but he was lagging behind. He started the semester as a computer science major, but then realized that he could not handle Calculus 101 and Intro to Programming, so with a special exception from the dean, he changed his major to English Composition. He was now scrambling to get caught up in his new classes

The phone rang. Matt was at his desk and could easily reach the shared phone that hung between their desks.

“Hello? Oh, hi, Ms. Sandy. Yeah, he’s here, just a sec.”

Matt tossed the phone to Thomas. The long cord caught on Thomas’s desk chair, but he was still able to hold it to his ear.

“Hey, mom, what’s up?”

He listened for a minute, then said, “Sure, of course. See you later.”

Matt and Denise looked at him for clarification. “Our plans may need to change a bit. Mom asked me if I can come over before going out tonight.”

“That’s odd,” said Matt. “What does she want?”

“She didn’t say. All she said was to come over at 7:00, and if I had plans you and Denise were also welcome. I’m sure it won’t be a problem to also bring Cindi.”

At 6:30, Matt and Thomas headed downstairs to meet Cindi and Denise in their room. Cindi had offered to drive since they all could not fit into Thomas’s Corvette and there was no need to take two cars.

Matt knocked on the partially opened door. He pushed it opened as he called out, “You two ready?” Matt and Thomas walked into Room 401.

Cindi was standing in front of her closet, pulling a shirt over her head. Matt and Thomas got a quick peek at a lacy black bra before it was hidden by a polo with the school’s logo on one arm.

“Black lace?” asked Matt. “You’re engaged and your fiance isn’t even in town.”

“It makes me feel sexy,” said Cindi with a smile.

“It gives me blue-balls,” muttered Matt.

“I’m sure you’ll find someone soon,” said Cindi with a hint of what may be to come. Matt tried to play off the comment, but by his reaction Cindi knew that Denise had told him about a possible introduction to one of her friends.

“I’m ready,” said Denise as she came out of the bathroom. Like Cindi, she was wearing a school polo with blue jeans and sneakers. Both had their hair back in a ponytail, but Cindi’s red hair hung much lower than Denise’s dark braid.

“Yep, let’s go see what Ms. Sandy is up to,” said Matt.

They found Cindi’s BMW parked along the building in a unique spot. It had the brick wall of the dorm on one side, then a large pathway for the dorm workers to wheel garbage out to the dumpster. It was so wide she didn’t have to worry about door-dings from other cars, but it also meant she had to trust that the dorm workers would not to let go of a wheeled trash can full of who-knows-what causing it to crash into her car.

There were several cars parked at Thomas’s mom’s house when they arrived. Cindi pulled into a space on the street a few doors up the block and they walked back to the house.

“There he is!” cried Sandy, when he entered the kitchen.

There were over a dozen people squeezed into the small room. Sitting on the table was a large sheet cake with the word, “Congratulations” spelled across the top in a fancy script.

“I’m sure you all know why you are here, but to make it official,” Sandy paused for effect, “we have set a date for the wedding!”

There was clapping and cheers from around the room.

“Don’t keep us in suspense, when is the big day?” called someone standing near the fridge.

“The Saturday before Thanksgiving. Eddie will have family in town and it seemed like a good way to get them to attend without asking them to make a separate trip.”

Eddie added, “It also means early the next morning we are leaving town to go on a two-week cruise over Thanksgiving!”