Winged dagger with watercolour splashes on upper back

I nearly didn't go to the reunion, but you know me, I can't leave a hall full of folding chairs alone. The gym smelled exactly as it did in 1994, all floor polish and damp coats. Mr Okafor was still there with his clipboard, pretending he remembered our names, and he asked after the prop cupboard as if it were a long-lost relative.

You'll remember the Dracula production, the year Gareth fell off the balcony. The bat-winged dagger was ours, the one Mrs Pryce made us paint in the art room with those dirty water jars. We were meant to wash it in turquoise and violet for the stage lights, and instead we flicked and splashed until the colour ran in blue clouds down the blade. She said it looked like a storm had got into a sword. Nobody ever threw it out.

At the bar, Owen Bevan showed me his phone. Someone had posted a tattoo of that dagger online, bat wings and all, washed in the same blue and purple we'd fought over. Somebody had carried our storm around for years without ever meeting us. I stood there holding my warm lager, trying to work out whether that was the strangest or the best thing I'd heard all night.

I've decided to write to the artist, though I can't think what to say. Perhaps only thank you for keeping Mrs Pryce's wonky paintbrush strokes alive. Come round when you're back and bring the photos from the Dracula night. I still owe you a dance.

Love, Sian