March 23 - The Conference

The speaker droned on for hours.
Inside the filled-to-capacity conference room, the AC was broken and the temperature was in the upper 80s, possibly 90s. Jeremy shifted in his seat again and pulled his socks down. His shins were sweating. His brow was sweating, and so were his back and upper lip. Hell, everything was sweating, but he was trapped in the back of the room.
He looked out the window again and the scene couldn't have been more crushing. Years from now, the town's historians would look back on that day as the most perfect spring day in history and he was stuck in the Most Boring Conference Session Ever. Liberation was just on the other side of a first story window, but it may as well have been worlds away.
"Blah, blah, blah," said the speaker. He was almost certain he actually heard him say blah, blah, blah.
Jeremy looked out the window again: A brunette in a sundress put a couple of bags in the back of a red convertible and looked through the window of the conference room. Made eye contact with Jeremy.
Smiled.
For once in his life, Jeremy was cool about it. He didn't reflexively look down, he didn't look over his shoulders to make sure she wasn't smiling at someone else, and he didn't panic. He smiled back and held the eye contact as long as she did.
And then she squinted her eyes a bit and mouthed, "Je-re-my?"
He perked up and strained his eyes to get a better look at her.
"Su-sie?" he mouthed back.
And she nodded, Susie Jenkins from high school nodded. Susie Jenkins, the girl Jeremy should've asked to the prom but didn't for reasons escaped him right now, nodded, and then motioned for him to wait a minute while she went through her purse and came up with a cell phone.
"Text me," she mouthed and then used her fingers to communicate her phone number.
The speaker rambled his way closer to the title of World's Most Boring Speaker as Jeremy texted, "Hey!" and then sent it to her number.
Outside the window, Susie showed him her phone as if to say got it, and then started working on a response.
Jeremy looked at the speaker who was obviously oblivious to what was going on and then checked his settings to make sure his message signal was off.
The reply came.
"Holy (emoticon for poop)! Long time, no C. What R U doing?"
Jeremy thumbed furiously: "Besides dying of boredom, not much."
Moments later, the answer: "LOL. Meeting? Class? Inquiring minds want 2 know."
"Conference. Insurance law. Snore."
"Ouch. Can U escape? Wanna hang out?"
"God, I wish."
"Come on then."
"Kind of hard to just leave."
"(emoticon for chicken)."
And that was it Being called a chicken was what did it. Peer pressure was what made him slide the window open and toss his things out before stepping through the opening with one leg, saluting the conference attendees staying behind, and then stepping the rest of the way through and hopping down. The other attendees followed them with their eyes as far as they could. The speaker never seemed to notice. Jeremy and Susie were laughing as they drove away.
And it was great. They drove with the top down and talked and laughed. Susie was single and looked even better than she had in high school. She'd just moved back to the area and was excited to be back and excited that Jeremy was still there. They caught each other up on mutual acquaintances, and filled each other in on what they'd been doing since graduation, and it was completely natural and effortless.
They had dinner and laughed about how they totally should have gone to the prom together and, yeah, what had they been thinking? They flirted more openly as the wine flowed. There was sustained eye contact. Smiles. The rest of the restaurant faded into the background.
More wine, more laughing.
Night swimming in the ocean.
More wine on the beach. Laughter. Truth or dare and it was just like they were in high school again.
Back to the car.
Kissing.
Then more than kissing.
Then lots more.
Then sleep.
They woke up to the sounds of applause. A group of spring breakers who had happened upon them hooted and cheered and roused them from their slumber. They covered themselves with blankets and squinted into the sun.
Jeremy laughed a bit and looked over at Susie, but she was gone, replaced by the business suit clad conference attendee who'd been sitting next to him when he'd started daydreaming. She was clapping, as was everyone else. Jeremy looked out the window. If the convertible had ever been there in the first place, it was gone now. The speaker chatted with a few conference attendees at the front of the room while everyone else closed their laptops and put away their things. Jeremy rubbed his eyes, pulled up his socks, and got ready for the next session.