The bus pulled through the gates of The Meadows, past a security hut and gatehouse, and up a long tree-lined driveway and stopped on a large circle in...front of the huge mansion. A crowd of welcomers had been milling around in front, and as each person from the Circle got off the bus they were swept up in a knock-your-socks-off kiss and hug, by at least one person of the opposite sex in the ‘family’.A handsome man named Wes welcomed Alice. She’d dressed as an Indian maiden, and she was sure that. She lived for moments like that.Tonight was going to be far more mundane though. There was going to be no midnight swim or sunrise landscape. Tonight was going to be filled with dirty knickers.Well, not dirty knickers exclusively but all manner of dirty clothes which needed laundering. It was roughly nine in the evening when she decided to climb out from under her bed covers, avoiding various cans and pizza boxes as she did, and jump in for a quick shower. A few minutes was all it took and she. ”“You’re not old ... Wendy.” I didn’t go any further in case I dropped myself in it, which left a silence hanging between us.Ann chuckled, “You’d better use my proper name too,” she said. “And you, you rascal,” she continued eyeing her son, “can do so as well.”Andy’s eyebrows rose as his mum giggled and she took a sip of her drink. I smiled; it looked like the wine the two of them had been drinking was starting to take hold.I slid into a seat as far from my mom as I could without going to a. I just haven’t gotten over there yet,” I said.“Ari, that reminds me of something. Please don’t be offended.”“What?” I looked down at her and she raised her eyes to meet mine. I almost kissed her, but we were on a dance floor and even if no one remembered me, everyone knew Cassie.“Uh ... It wouldn’t be a good idea for you to contact Hannah right now. She might think it was...”“Oh, Cassie, please don’t tell me Hannah has been reading Heaven. You didn’t.”“She hasn’t read it. But I sort of told her.