Back in High School

Back in High School

Synopsis
A mother of two passes out at her high school reunion, then wakes up in 2002 in high school.

Plot
In 20-, wearing a dress she wore in high school in 2002, Leslie Baldwin sets off for her high school reunion. Although she has some reservations, she attends anyway, accompanied by her daughter Peyton instead of her high-school sweetheart husband Drew, since the two are separated because of his infidelity. She and Drew were married right after graduation, when Leslie got pregnant, and because of this she is afraid of being questioned about his absence.

When she arrives at the reunion, she is happy at having the chance to reconnect with Callie and Hannah, her old best friends. However, an awkward scene begins to play out as Drew arrives unexpectedly and Leslie proceeds to ignore him. This awkwardness continues until the moment ends when the event MC announces the reunions “king & queen”—Richard Norvik, the former class geek turned billionaire inventor, and Leslie. Leslie’s demeanor is quite normal until they wheel out the reunion cake, at which time she promptly faints.

Leslie awakens to find herself still in the same location (the high school gym where the reunion was taking place) but 25 years in the past. It is now 2002, during her senior year of high school, where she’s just passed out after having donated blood. She wakes up stunned to find that all her middle-aged friends, whom she was just with at the reunion, are now their younger, teenaged selves. Still in shock, she allows herself to be taken home, all the while noticing that things aren’t how she knows them to be in 20-, but how she knew them to be 15 years prior. After a rough first night, she decides to accept her circumstances, behave as if everything is normal and have some fun while she’s at it. The only difference is that since she knows how she and Drew will end, when given the chance to break up with him she thinks it might be best.

Hoping that Richard Norvik might be able to shed light on her situation, she befriends him. At lunch she ignores Drew, causing him to become jealous, and instead uses the time to arrange a meeting with Richard after school to discuss time travel. She chooses to tell Richard her secret, which he at first doesn’t believe, until he realizes that only someone from the future could know what she knows about him and the world at large. It is around this time that Leslie makes the decision to break up with Drew, surely knowing that between them she’s the only one who wants that outcome.

Even with that decision made, she decides to sleep with Charlie one night after a party, but he flips out and reminds her of how she rebuffed him the weekend before. Thinking that she’s playing mind games with him, he abruptly takes her home but instead of going inside, she walks to an all-night café. As she walks past the café, she looks in and sees Michael Fitzsimmons, the artsy loner at school she always wished she’d slept with, and goes inside to talk to him. During the conversation she learns that they have much more in common than she originally thought and so she decides to leave with him. They ride off on his motorcycle, eventually stopping in a field, where they smoke marijuana and discover more about each other. At one point, Michael asks if she’s going to marry Charlie, to which she replies that she’s already done that and will not be doing it again. After talking and smoking, he recites some of his poetry for her and the two end up having sex.

Some time later, Michael reveals that he wants Peggy Sue to go to Utah with him and another woman to join them in a polygamous marriage, where the two women can support him while he writes. She tells him that he should go to Utah and that he should use their night together as the topic he writes about. During their conversation she hears someone singing and, recognizing the voice, she looks towards the stage to find that it’s Charlie. It’s at that moment that she realizes there is more to Charlie than she thought there was. Michael notices where her attention is drawn, becomes upset and, thinking that this means she is declining his offer so she can be with Charlie, is ready to leave.

After Peggy Sue and Michael leave, Charlie auditions for a music agent and is rejected outright. The next day, when Peggy Sue tries to talk to him he lashes out at her, but ignoring his anger, she gives him a song she “wrote” for him (which is actually the song “She Loves You” by the Beatles). She leaves and goes to say goodbye to Richard, stating that she wants to stop messing up her own life as well as everyone’s around her, especially Charlie’s since the reason he stopped singing is because she got pregnant with their daughter. Richard then proposes, but she refuses his proposal, thinking about how she doesn’t want to marry anyone at this point and knowing he must become valedictorian. Confused, she visits her grandparents for her birthday and, upon learning that her grandmother can see the future, she tells them her story. Her grandfather takes her to meet with his lodge buddies, where they perform a strange séance ritual to send her back to the year 1985. Peggy Sue is then picked up and carried away by Charlie, leaving everyone at the lodge thinking that the séance has worked. He tells her that he told his dad that he gave up singing and was given 10% of the business so he can support her. He then proposes and gives her the locket she is seen wearing at the beginning of the film. When she looks inside the locket, she sees baby pictures of her and Charlie, which resemble their children. At this moment, Peggy Sue realizes just how much he truly loves her, and she him, and they kiss. They start to make love, which will ultimately lead to Peggy becoming pregnant and marrying Charlie. In the next instant, Peggy Sue is transported back to 1985. Peggy Sue awakens in a hospital, with Charlie by her side. He feels deeply regretful for his adultery and tells her he wants her back. When she questions him about his girlfriend Janet, he swears to her that it’s over. It seems there is hope for a happy reconciliation when Peggy Sue looks at Charlie with new eyes and, citing a reference from her grandfather who claimed it was her grandmother’s strudel that kept the family together, tells him “I’d like to invite you over to your house for dinner on Sunday with your kids. I’ll make a strudel.”