A New Year
After Eric and Donna shared a passionate New Years kiss at midnight on New Years Eve at the end of 1979 Donna said. "We need to talk and I'm leaving for college in Madison tomorrow morning."
"Funny that, so am I, the scholarship has arranged for me to enroll at WC tomorrow.
"So we get to go to college together, good that will give you time to explain why you broke up with me and by freaking letter. Don't get me wrong Eric I still love you but that's not enough to separate me from my panties anymore. you have a lot of serious explaining, apologizing and a lot of romancing to be done before I will allow you anywhere near the twins again. And oh yeah welcome home."
"If the Vista Cruisers' in good condition we can use that and talk on the way."
"Red has kept it maintained to within an inch of it being as new, but wouldn't let anyone drive it so it should be ok but ask Red, he was a little obsessive about it."
Looking away from Eric for the first time in about twenty minutes she saw her best friend Jackie with her arms and lips wrapped around Hyde who seems to have lost his glasses somewhere. She elbows Eric in the ribs and says, "Would you believe that."
"What's the matter with that when I left Hyde was going to propose to Jackie. I know that things got mixed up and somehow Hyde ended up married to a stripper."
"Oh Eric you've got a lot of catching up to do laughing as Eric reaches to pull her in for a hug, and I don't mean that."
"Yeh Hyde, Jackie, Fez and Randy."
"Randy was the rebound guy who helped me when you broke up with me by freaking letter. But though we kissed and stuff nothing beyond that happened, it was just too weird and I broke up with him so that I could re-start my life by going to college."
Eric's heart started again after Donnas' dismissal of Randy as a passing fancy who had been dismissed before anything happened.
Eric said that after he enrolled he had to go look for somewhere cheap to stay.
"Oh I've got a spare room you can have, Bob found, and bought me a large flat in Madison. Don't get any ideas though your still well in the doghouse. I need to go talk to Jackie she's got the third bedroom in the flat."
"Jackie, Eric's enrolling at college tomorrow and needs somewhere to stay. I've offered him the other bedroom with us and he's going to give me a ride in the Vista Cruiser so we can really talk in private. Can you take the bus on your own, I really need to talk to him and set some ground rules for us."
"So Donna you've still got the hots for him?"
"If by that you mean I still love him? Yes but he's got some serious groveling to do before I let him back into my bed."
Hyde leans over and says. "Jackie it sounds like you need a lift to Madison tomorrow? I can drive you over, the record stores closed tomorrow."
"Well ok we need to talk anyway after the kissing this evening."
Hyde says, "I think Eric needs some more circle time. He needs to tell us why he's home earlier. There's' more there than he's been saying, I can see it in his eyes."
In the basement the circle had formed and Hyde was asking Eric why he was home early.
At first he said he was home for Donna because he was so lonely he even broke up with her to stop the pain of her being so far away from him. But gradually the story came out. He was at his school teaching when a UN Peace Keeping Force drove in to the village and told the teachers to pack up and board the bus as the rebels were about to attack the village and they didn't have enough men to fight them off.
Rockets and mortar bombs start to land in the village especially around the school where the pupils were waiting to board trucks that would evacuate them. They were taking casualties when some helicopters flew over to drive back the rebels. Eric was trying to save the life of a badly wound child from his class. he was only nine and would never see another birthday as he died while Eric was suppressing the bleeding. The troops has orders to ensure that the teachers were rescued and not taken hostage so Eric was forced onto the bus and was driven away as the rockets and mortars began to fall again.
Eric ended up on a beach awaiting a helicopter that would take him to a Royal Navy destroyer that was to take him to Lagos in Nigeria where he would meet the scholarship administrators.
It was decided that Eric would go to college in Madison paid for by the scholarship and complete his teaching assignment after graduation.
Eric's dreams were now filled with children dying in his arms. He would see each of his students faces full of blood and shrapnel and he was finding it very difficult to sleep.
Donna had tears in her eyes and was holding him very tightly. The rest of the circle was listening in stunned silence.
Red who had been listening at the top of the stairs knew exactly how Eric was feeling and came downstairs to see if Eric was all right.
"Dad I couldn't stop them dying we had nothing to stop the bleeding with and then we had to leave them behind. I'll never know how many of them survived. Was it like this when you went to war?"
"Yes except that we would find out what had happened to our comrades after the battle. You don't even have the comfort of at least knowing your pupils fates." said Red proud of Eric's behavior under heavy fire.
"Donna I know I shouldn't ask this but from experience he shouldn't be on his own, can you stay with him at least till he stops crying."
Donna who was crying herself at the horrors Eric had seen and described, nodded and pulling Eric to his feet guided him upstairs to his old room where she helped him undress and into bed. Donna crying gently came to a decision and undressed and got into bed holding Eric very tightly while he cried himself to sleep.
Donna was finding it much harder to go to sleep thinking of everything that Eric had said especially about how lonely he had been and how in desperation to stop the hurt had broken up with her and how it had only made it worse.
She hugged him even tighter thinking of all the times he had done this for her when she was lonely and missing her mother, about how he always found ways to make her happy when she was sad and blue.
Somehow she was, even with tears flowing from her eyes, feeling happier than she'd been since he left, just holding him while he slept and she felt the love that she had held onto tightly all these months, hidden deep in her heart, flooding back through her body setting her mind at peace knowing that her Eric was back home and in her arms where he belonged.
Eric woke up slowly realizing that he was home and that he was in his old bed and that someone was holding him very tightly and from the faint smell of perfume mixing with Donnas' own natural odors he knew that it was Donna holding him.
He turned around slowly to find himself gazing deeply into Donnas' loving eyes.
Donna leaned forward to kiss Eric deeply with everything she had to let him know he wasn't alone anymore shifting her arms so that she was pressing him to her body and was holding his head with her hand buried in his hair.
Eric got the message and his hands were stroking Donna in ways that were very pleasurable. Donna reached down between them to take hold of Eric rapidly hardening core and was stroking it even harder.
Eric's hand had found the twins and were working on Donnas' nipples which were now erect enough for his mouth to suck and lick with his tongue gently driving her mad while his hand slid down her body and under her panties gently making her very wet and when he starting stroking her clitoris she was almost coming. She pushed Eric down onto the bed and impatiently pulling her panties off and holding Eric in position she mounted him and drive both of them to their climax quickly.
Later in the shower Donna said "my bedroom in Madison is big enough for the two of us but Jackie's going to need earmuffs for when we make love.
Still I can't throw her out we're best friends and she kept me from going mad when you left. There was a point when I became best friends with Sam, Hyde's stripper ex wife but Jackie forgave me for that the same night and we are nearly sisters now. Lets go get some breakfast and get going we need to register for college today. Red, Bob Fez and Hyde are going to drive over the bulk of Jackie's' and my stuff at the weekend and I guess yours though no star wars or GI Joes allowed so just repack your duffle bag and we're out of here.
Red looked up from his breakfast to seeing the couple standing before him, the love for each other shining from their eyes while Donna said "thank you". They sat down to breakfast. Red said. " How are you now Eric"
"Better"
"You know it doesn't go away your going to have to live it in your dreams for some time to come. Kitty helped me get through it and I'm sure Donnas' going to help you get though it as well."
They finished off one of Kitty's breakfast specials before they ran from the house to drive to Madison.
They married before the end of the week with only Jackie and Steven standing as witness for them.
Over the years Donna became a professor of creative writing with several successful books to her name.
Eric taught at the local high school becoming its principal
Somehow they managed to raise three children who had all graduated as medical doctors.
Twenty-eight years later to the day that Eric flew out from the beach his family stepped off the jet at Freetown Airport to fulfill his obligation to teach in Africa while Donna taught at the university and the children worked at the hospital.
They visited Eric's original school where some of his pupils' grandchildren were taught. They stood together at the graves of the children who died and prayed for the soles of those who had disappeared and were never found.