The King of Jam Sandwiches

by Eric Walters

  And then I thought of where she might be instead.

  I went around the side of the house and to the shed. I pulled open the door. My pack was gone.

  Coming up to the railroad tracks, I saw that one of the clips for holding the mesh to the fence was on the ground. I picked it up as I looked around to see if I was being watched. There was nobody. I took off the second clip, peeled away the mesh and stepped through the opening. As quickly as possible I sealed up the fence and then ran along the embankment. I retraced the steps I’d taken dozens of times. Approaching the forest, I hesitated for a second at the path that led into the clearing. I listened as I continued to walk. I could hear birds, some traffic in the distance, but nothing else. I stepped into the clearing. There was my tent, and there was Harmony, sitting in the camping chair. She gave me a little wave.

  “I was wondering when you’d show up.”

  “How did you know I’d think to look here?” I asked.

  “You’re smart. I thought you might have even come last night.”

  “I didn’t know you were missing until this morning when Mrs. Watson called. She wanted to know if I knew where you were.”

  “And what did you tell her?”

  “I told her I didn’t know.”

  “Thanks for not telling.”

  “When she called, I didn’t know. It wasn’t until I started walking to school that it came to me, and I checked the shed.”

  “I didn’t think you’d mind if I borrowed your stuff. Besides, it wasn’t like I could knock on your door in the middle of the night and tell your father I wanted to borrow your camping stuff.”

  “Okay, probably better you didn’t.”

  “If I had asked you, would you have said yes?” she asked.

  I shrugged. “I would have tried to talk you into going home.”

  “I don’t have a home.”

  “Your foster home. They’re pretty worried about you.”

  “I don’t care.”

  “I was worried too,” I said.

  “Sorry.”

  I sat down on the ground right beside her. I was waiting for her to say something, and I figured she was waiting for me to say something. I knew she was more stubborn than me, so I’d have to break the silence.

  “What was it like sleeping here last night?”

  “I didn’t really get a lot of sleep. It was late when I left, later when I figured out to grab your stuff, and then setting up in the dark with just the lamp for light wasn’t easy. And it’s, well, a little spooky being out here.”

  “The first time was for me too. I started bringing Candy with me after that.”

  “I guess I should have borrowed your dog as well,” she joked.

  “Yeah, that would have helped. Look, I heard about your mother.”

  She didn’t say anything.

  “So what happens from here?” I asked.

  “She’s in jail until the trial and will probably be in jail after the trial.”

  “I meant about you. What happens to you?”

  “This is what happens to me,” she said.

  “You’re going to stay here, in this tent?

  “Isn’t that what you were going to do? Isn’t this your plan?”

  “First off, it’s my backup backup plan, and we’ve both agreed it’s not a great plan,” I said. “Come on, you have to go to the Watsons’.”

  “No I don’t, and you can’t make me.”

  “You’re right. I can’t make you, but you can’t stop me from going there and telling them where you are,” I said.

  “If you do that, by the time you get back I’ll have left, and it won’t just be me that’s gone. I’ll take some of your camping stuff with me.”

  “I hope you won’t do that,” I said.

  “Because you don’t want to lose your precious stuff?”

  “Because I don’t want to lose you, you idiot!”

  I think we both were surprised by what I’d said. Me, not that I wasn’t thinking it but that I’d actually said it out loud.

  “Besides, this camping stuff isn’t even my backup backup plan anymore.”

  “It’s not? Then what is?”

  “You are,” I said.

  “Me?”

  “You. I’m counting on you to help me when things get rough.”

  She chuckled. “I thought you were slightly crazy when this was your backup plan, but it isn’t as crazy as relying on me.”

  “No, I do rely on you.”

  “Rely on me to screw up or run away or punch you in the face or say the wrong thing. Those things you can rely on me for.”

  “You’re wrong,” I said, trying to sound as convincing as I could.

  “How am I wrong?”

  “You just are—” I stopped.

  “Well, go ahead and tell me how.”

  “Not today.”

  “What?” she demanded.

  “Tomorrow. I’ll explain it, but not until tomorrow.”

  “That is so pathetic. Do you think you can get me to go back by offering some stupid lie?” she asked.

  “It’s not stupid and it isn’t a lie. It’s a promise.” I paused. “Look, if I can’t give you a reason, a really good reason, to stay, then you can run away the day after that.”

  She didn’t look completely convinced, but she was softening.

  “Okay, I’ll give you twenty-four hours to convince me to stay,” she said.

  “And if I can give you a good reason, you have to promise not to run. Not tomorrow or the next day or the week after that. You’ll stay put, right?”

  “Okay, but you need to explain one more thing to me.”

  “Okay, I’ll try,” I said

  “What makes you think you can get out of here when everything says you can’t make it?”

  I shook my head. “I don’t know. I just know I can.”

  “That’s not good enough. If you can explain to me why you’re so positive you can make it, then maybe I can make it too.”

  “I just don’t know.”

  “Then you better start thinking about it. You can start when you’re walking me back to the foster home.”

  Harmony got up. She bent over, picked up the camping chair and started to fold it up.

  “Do you think you could come inside with me when we get there to talk to Mrs. Watson?” she asked.

  “If you want me to be there, then I’m there.”

  “She’ll probably call the social worker or even the police, and they might all come over,” Harmony said.

  “I’ll be there when you talk to all of them, if that’s what you want.”

  “That’s what I want.”

  I started to fold up the tent and she started to put things in the backpack.

  “Robert, do you know the real reason you can’t be my boyfriend?”

  “Because I’m funny, I remind you of your grandmother, most relationships don’t work, and you can’t afford to lose me. Does that just about cover it?” I asked without stopping my task.

  “There’s one more. You can do better than me.”

  I put the tent in the pack and looked at her. “Don’t put yourself down.”

  “I’m not. You deserve somebody who’ll treat you right, who’ll be a good wife and a good mother to your kids someday. Somebody who doesn’t have a bad temper and who went to university…that’s probably where you’ll meet her.”

  “Stop talking like that.”

  “And her family will be really normal—she’ll have two parents, and they’ll really love each other.”

  “Just stop.”

  “She’ll be somebody who’s completely different from my mother and—”

  “Stop now!” I yelled at the top of my lungs.

  To my surprise she did.

  “For now, let’s just make sure we don’t lose the one friend who actually understands the other. Okay?”

  She nodded.

  “Good,” I said. “And just for your information, I don’t have to be th
e only one in this neighborhood who makes it out.” I paused. “There could be two.”

  TWENTY–TWO

  I stood just inside the Watsons’ front door as Mrs. Watson talked with Harmony. At least this morning I could be off to the side. The previous day, when I’d brought her home, I’d had to talk to her foster parents, the social worker and the police. We’d told them all that I’d run into her on the way to school. I hadn’t thought any of them believed me at first. We hadn’t told them anything about where we had talked or my camping stuff or where she’d spent the night.

  Mrs. Watson was telling Harmony a lot of the same things she’d said the day before—that she cared for her, that they wanted her to stay, that everybody makes mistakes. Harmony was grounded for the rest of the week and the weekend coming up, but Mrs. Watson wanted her to know they were doing this because they cared for her. Harmony wasn’t talking much, but she wasn’t arguing at all.

  Anxiously I looked at my watch. I didn’t want to be late today. Harmony’s social worker and foster mother had called the school the day before to explain what had happened, why I’d been away all morning. When I’d shown up in the afternoon, Mr. Yeoman had told me he was proud of me, and Mr. Arseneau had called me down to the office and said he always expected me to do the right thing—that I was a leader, and he knew I’d go far in life. It felt good to have people believe in me.

  The bad part was that they’d had to call my father at work to let him know what had happened. I’d thought he might mention it to me when he got home—tell me I’d done something good or that I shouldn’t have done it or something—but he didn’t. I hadn’t been surprised, but I was still disappointed. Somehow even expecting to be disappointed didn’t completely stop the disappointment when it happened.

  Harmony and her foster mom came into the hall. “Sorry to keep you waiting,” Mrs. Watson said.

  “That’s okay. We have time.”

  “Thank you for walking with her to school. And thank you again for bringing Harmony back to us yesterday.”

  “I just walked her here. It was her decision.”

  Mrs. Watson reached out and gave Harmony a big hug. To my surprise, Harmony hugged her back.

  Then Mrs. Watson hugged me. At first my arms just hung at my sides, and then I brought up my right arm and placed it around her.

  “You two better get going.”

  We did. We didn’t just have to walk to school. Harmony and I had to have time to talk.

  I grabbed my pack off the floor and slung it over one shoulder. We were off. This could be like every other school day for the past two months.

  “I packed a jam sandwich and a peanut-butter sandwich,” I said.

  “You’re pretty confident.”

  “Don’t we always trade lunches?”

  “Confident that I’m going to be there for lunch. Twenty-four hours is almost up. You have the rest of the walk to convince me not to take off.”

  “Didn’t you just promise Mrs. Watson that you’d go to school?”

  “You promised me you’d give me a reason to stick around. Are you going to keep your promise?”

  I reached into my pocket. “I have something for you. Hold out your hand.”

  She did, and I pulled it out and placed it in her palm.

  “You’re giving me a piece of broken crayon?” she asked.

  “I’ve giving you back the piece you gave me on the streetcar.”

  “You kept it?”

  “You gave it to me.”

  “And you said it was stupid.”

  “It sounded stupid, but it wasn’t. There are lots of broken crayons out there.”

  “All I see are broken crayons,” Harmony said.

  “Or crayons that are worn down from being used too long or too hard or because a new package of crayons is too expensive or—”

  “Could you stop with the crayons?”

  I shrugged. “You and I know we’re broken. Most people don’t see that in themselves or don’t find out until it’s too late, or they’re too old, or they’ve already made so many bad decisions that there’s no way back. If you’re broken and you know it, you have to get up every day and work harder and longer than everybody else if you want to get anywhere.”

  “Which is what you do.”

  “What you need to do too. And even then, doing all of that, there’s no guarantee of success.”

  “Then why bother if you’re just going to lose anyway?”

  “Because there’s a chance. And if you don’t try, there’s no chance,” I said.

  “Don’t you ever want to just give up?”

  I laughed. “Sometimes I don’t even want to get out of bed in the morning. I want to run away or disappear or quit.”

  “But you don’t.”

  I nodded. “But I don’t.”

  “We could run away together,” said Harmony.

  “I’m not running away from anything. I’m not giving up.”

  “Why? Why don’t you give up, and why shouldn’t I give up?”

  “If I tell you, you’ll think I’m stupid.”

  “I think lots of things about you, but stupid isn’t one of them. Tell me. I need to know why I should even try,” Harmony said.

  I let out a deep sigh. “You know my mother died before I was old enough to start school.”

  “I know. You were four.”

  “My grandmother walked me to and from school on my first day. I was so happy to see her waiting for me. I ran up to her, and she gave me a hug and told me how proud my mother would have been of me for going to school.”

  I took another deep breath. This wasn’t easy. It wasn’t something I’d ever told anybody or even said out loud to myself.

  “I remember how that felt, thinking that my mother was proud of me. I guess I still want to make her proud of me.”

  “How do you make a dead person proud of you?” Harmony asked.

  “Well, I just know she knows.”

  “Do you think she’s sitting on some cloud somewhere, staring down at you?”

  “I don’t know. I just know I still want to make her proud.”

  “There’s nothing I could ever do to make my mother proud,” she said. I could hear a catch in her voice.

  “Then don’t do it for your mother—unless it’s maybe to prove her wrong. Do it to make your grandmother proud. Maybe she’s sitting on the same cloud as my mother, and they’re both watching us and talking.”

  “I don’t believe in God or Heaven.”

  “I’m just asking you to believe in your grandmother and try to make her proud of you.”

  “She used to tell me she was proud of me all the time.”

  “That must have felt really good.”

  She nodded ever so slightly and started to cry. She brushed away the tears as if she was trying to hide them from me.

  “Then do good things that would make her proud and imagine telling her. That’s what I do with my mother.”

  Her whole body shuddered, and she started sobbing louder. I reached out and wrapped one arm around her, then a second.

  “I have one more thing for you.”

  “Is it the rest of the crayon?” she said and chuckled through the tears.

  “It’s a letter for you. From me.”

  “Why are you giving me a letter?”

  “I want you to be able to read what I just said. Over and over again, whenever things get tough, whenever you feel like quitting.” I pulled it out of my pocket and handed it to her.

  It was folded, and she straightened it out. On the front was her name.

  “You wrote my name in crayon.”

  “I wrote the whole letter in crayon…with the broken crayon you gave me that I just gave back to you.”

  “But why?”

  “You have to always remember this. Broken crayons still color.”

  “Do you really believe that?” she asked.

  “I wouldn’t have said it if I didn’t.”

  “Talk is cheap. Yo
u want me to do the right thing. How about if you do the right thing too?”

  “I do. Every day.”

  “No, you don’t. You’re just hanging in there. Do you really think you can keep on living the way you’re living?”

  “I’ve done it this long,” I said.

  “You’ve done it too long. And when it does break down with your father, do you think you’re going to live on your own or sleep in a tent by the railroad tracks?”

  “I’ll do what I need to do.”

  “What’s the count?” she asked.

  “Fifteen hundred and seventy-nine days.”

  “That’s a long time.”

  “Not as long as it was when you first showed up, and tomorrow it will be one day less. I’ll survive.”

  “I know you will, but don’t you ever think you deserve better than just surviving?” she asked.

  “It’s better than not surviving.”

  “You should have more than that. You’re a smart guy. You’re going to figure out something better.” She paused. “Tell you what. I’ll stick around until you do.”

  “That could take a long time.”

  “The most it could take is 1,579 days.” She paused. “Who knows? I might have to get my own notebook and do my own countdown.”

  TWENTY–THREE

  It had been a good month. No, it had been a great month. Harmony had kept her word. She was happier, doing better in school, and it seemed like the Watsons had become her backup plan. And for me, in some ways, Harmony had become my backup plan.

  My father had been doing better too. So much better that I’d started to believe it was all going to be okay and that I wouldn’t need backup plans.

  But now here it was, two in the morning, and he hadn’t come home and he hadn’t called. I hadn’t seen this one coming. I’d thought everything was going so well. How could I have been so stupid? Higher hopes had just led to a bigger fall.

  Candy started to whine, and I reached down and gave her a scratch. I wanted to tell her it was going to be all right, but I didn’t like to lie to her. I kept staring out the front window.

  Over the past hour the street had gone from quiet to completely deserted. There were no cars, nobody out walking their dogs. It was dark except for the streetlights. Only one house, halfway up the block and on the other side, still had lights on. I’d turned off our lights so that if someone were to walk by, they wouldn’t see me staring out the window.