For maybe a half hour, both of us crisscrossed the store, weaving past each other occasionally, moving up and down every rack, until finally we met at the front of the store. Me with my two dollars and a pretty rhinestone button, and Jasper with a secret smile. “Okay, let’s go,” she said.
On the curb a few storefronts down, Jasper sat, and I joined her on the hot pavement beneath the overhang of a tattered awning. “I found two dollars and a button,” I said proudly, holding out my cupped hands.
“Hmmm,” said Jasper. “Two bucks is great. But I think the button is . . . questionable. You probably shouldn’t have taken that.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Well,” she said, “my thinking has always been that a store can’t charge for money, right? Because they can’t sell it. So, like, if I bought a two-dollar skirt, and it had a hundred-dollar bill in it, it would still cost two dollars. If one of the folks who worked there found the money before I did, I’m sure they’d pocket it too. But the button is sort of a thing. Like, they sell buttons at the store. So if someone found the button, they wouldn’t keep it. They’d put it in the button box and sell it for a quarter. Know what I mean?”
I didn’t understand. “So you think you might get in more trouble for the button than the cash?”
“No,” she said thoughtfully. “It’s not that. Honestly, they’re not going to call the cops over pocket change. The folks who work there probably do it too. It’s more like . . . a code.”
“A code?” I said.
“Just, rules to live by,” she said. “It’s weird. But I feel like somehow the button is theirs, and the money is ours. I’m not sure why it matters to have rules, but it does matter. To me. Make sense?”
“I guess so,” I said. I wasn’t sure that it did make sense, actually. But I nodded anyway. This was Jasper’s adventure. I was just trailing along behind her, soaking everything up. It made sense to me that we followed her code, whatever that meant. Especially since I wasn’t sure that I even had a code. Did I have a code?
“Okay,” I said. “I’ll remember next time.”
“Cool,” she said, with a nod. “Thanks!”
“So, what’d you find?” I asked.
With a special extra-secret smile, Jasper opened her hand and unfolded it, and in the center of her palm was some change. Quarters and dimes. But shining on top was a silver dollar. “Look!” she said.
“Oh, neat,” I said. And it was neat, but not as neat as Jasper’s smile.
“I love silver dollars,” she said, running her finger over the shiny surface. “They’re my favorite. Have you had one before?” She held it out for me to inspect, like it was a talisman of some kind, a rare jewel.
I thought about all the silver dollars I’d gotten from the tooth fairy over the years, and the ones Sam had too. It was a tradition at our house. “Yeah,” I said. “I have, a few times . . . but why do you like them so much?”
Jasper shrugged. “I don’t know. Because they last forever? And because they’re prettier than they have to be. And people forget about them. They spend them like quarters, without realizing. Silver dollars just feel . . . special. Different from regular money. You know?”
Suddenly I did. As I stared at the coin shining in Jasper’s upturned palm, that silver dollar seemed like the most special thing in the world. So special I had a lump in my throat, though I wasn’t exactly sure why.
“Anyway, come on!” said Jasper, handing me a gummy worm. “It’s been a good day. Let’s get over to the bus stop.”
“Oh, before we do that,” I said, “I have to tell you something. I had a problem on the bus, before, and I guess now I need to borrow fifty cents.”
“What do you mean?” asked Jasper. “I mean, sure, you can borrow the money, but what happened on the bus?”
“Well, see . . . I didn’t have exact fare when I got on the bus to come here, and I didn’t know the driver couldn’t make change, so . . .”
Jasper stared at me. “Leah! You’re kidding me. How much did you pay to ride the bus?”
I cringed. Thinking of how hard we’d each worked for a few dollars just now, and how far we’d ridden to save money on peanut butter only made it harder to spit out the words. “Twenty dollars.”
“TWENTY DOLLARS!” Jasper looked furious.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m sorry, I know, it’s so dumb. I’m dumb. I only had a twenty. It’s a rule of my dad’s that I always have a twenty for cab fare if I need it. My dad doesn’t take the bus. . . .”
“Don’t apologize,” said Jasper. “I’m not angry at you. Why do you always feel guilty when you should be mad? You got ripped off!”
“But he said he couldn’t make change.”
“Well, maybe technically, he doesn’t have to. But anyone else on that bus would have broken the twenty if they could. And I was right there myself and would have helped if you’d asked. Any decent bus driver will help you out when that happens. Haven’t you ever ridden the bus?”
I shook my head, oddly embarrassed not to have done something I’d never even thought about doing until today.
Suddenly Jasper was walking fast and I was walking behind her, and she looked mad but also kind of on fire and excited, and I wasn’t sure what was going to happen next.
“Do we . . . ,” I called out from behind, “do we walk home now?” It was about three miles, I figured.
“No way,” said Jasper. “This route is a straight shot, up and back. That same guy should be driving the next bus or one after that, unless his shift ended. We’re going to find him.”
In my belly I felt a nervous tremble, but it was also a thrilling feeling. Jasper was in charge. Jasper could handle it. She could handle anything. I’d never known anyone like her in my life, kid or adult. How did she know all the things she knew? She couldn’t be that much older than me, but it was like she’d memorized some mysterious handbook that I’d never seen before.
When the bus did pull up, we were in luck. It was the very same driver, with his thick gray mustache and tinted glasses. He looked at us, and if he remembered me, it didn’t register on his face. Not at first, anyway.
Jasper climbed up, and I followed her, a little nervous, but eager to see what would happen next.
“Sir?” said Jasper, leaning forward to talk to the driver.
He looked back over his shoulder. “Yes, little lady?”
“My friend here says she gave you a twenty earlier for a single fare,” said Jasper as she slid some kind of card through the machine by the driver.
“I don’t recall as she did,” said the bus driver.
“Oh, really?” said Jasper.
“Nope,” said the driver.
“Okay, then,” said Jasper. “I thought it would just be easier for you to give her the money back. She has the exact change now and can pay for the ride. But we can call and talk to your manager if you want, and request it formally. If you just want to tell us your name, so we can report you . . .”
Now the bus driver sat up straight, suddenly alert. “Aw, come on, girl. . . .”
“I sure do hope there’s a twenty in the box,” continued Jasper, “so you don’t get in trouble. I mean, if you pocketed the money, and it isn’t there . . .”
We were holding up the bus now, and time seemed to stretch out unbearably. I could feel eyes all over me. They made me itch, and I wanted to turn and apologize to everyone sitting there, waiting. The woman with the sleeping baby and the man in the janitor’s uniform. But Jasper didn’t seem to mind at all. She didn’t apologize for anything. She just stood there, like no one would be able to move her. Her feet planted.
The driver glanced from Jasper to me, and then back to Jasper. Finally he sighed and said, “Just sit down. I’ll get with you in a minute.”
Jasper shot me a grin. Then we stumbled to the first empty row, where we sat down fast as the bus began to move. I was still afraid to breathe normally, but Jasper was beaming, like she’d won a major a
ward.
We rode the whole way in silence. Jasper was watching the driver like a hawk, and I was watching Jasper. But when we got to our stop, and walked past him on our way back to the door, the driver reached up and held out my twenty.
“No hard feelings?” he said.
“No hard feelings,” I replied, trying to sound normal and loose, like Jasper, as I plucked the bill from between his fingers.
Then he looked over at Jasper, and said, “Girl, you’re a tough one. I pity the man who marries you.”
For some reason, when she heard that, Jasper looked back at me and burst out laughing. And then I was laughing too, and I couldn’t stop. We both waved goodbye to the puzzled driver, stepped off the bus, and fell straight down to the ground, right there on the scruffy grass beside the cracked sidewalk along Moreland. Then we sat, rocking on our knees, laughing and laughing, grocery bags spilling all around us.
Complicated
Once we’d recovered, the two of us stood up and started walking, back in the direction of my house, bags slung over our shoulders. But when we got to my street, Jasper stopped walking and turned, reached out a hand. “Can I have my groceries?” she said. “I think this is where we part ways.”
“Oh!” I said. “No. That’s silly. I’ll carry it. I can walk you home, and that way I’ll know where you live.”
“Nah,” said Jasper. “They aren’t that heavy, and it’s kind of far. Plus, then you’ll just end up walking home alone.”
“Or I can walk you, and then you can walk me, and then I can walk you,” I said, grinning. “We can spend all afternoon walking each other home. Back and forth.”
But Jasper wasn’t grinning. “Please, Leah,” she said, with serious eyes. “Please, just let it go.”
“But why? What’s the big deal?”
She looked down at her feet. “I don’t want you to see where I live,” she said softly. “Okay?”
I shook my head. “No,” I said. “I don’t care what your house looks like. And anyway, we agreed not to worry about that stuff, didn’t we? To just be friends? Freaks together. Right?” I smiled.
Jasper wasn’t smiling. She only stood, staring at me for what felt like a long minute. I stared right back at her. I wasn’t going to give up this time.
“Leah, please?” Her voice sounded strained, or maybe tired.
I shook my head. I stood firm. “Nope.”
It didn’t feel like me at all, this stubbornness. It wasn’t a thing I’d ever done, to insist on anything this way. But I wasn’t feeling quite like myself. I was a different me suddenly. Blunt. Honest. I wanted to know Jasper, more than I could remember wanting anything. It felt like I needed to know Jasper. I didn’t like the feeling that she could drift away from me again. That she could disappear. I thought about her leaving, and how I would then just fall back into my silent house, and go back to sleep, with the shadows and the silences; and I knew I didn’t want that to happen. I needed that not to happen. So I stared at her, silent. Waiting.
She looked down at her feet in their flip-flops, so I looked at her feet too. They were a mess. Her toes were filthy, grubby from the bus and the streets. Orange nail polish chipped and grown out. They were sad toes.
“We could paint our nails,” I offered. “At your house. I could paint yours and you could paint mine? It’ll be fun.”
“You don’t understand,” said Jasper, turning away from me, walking away from me. “You really don’t. I don’t know why you’re doing this. It will change everything.”
But she was wrong. Nothing could change me wanting to be her friend. And I was tired of waiting. Something inside me needed to know more. So I followed her, even though I could tell she was upset. I shifted the strap of the grocery bag higher onto my shoulder, and winced as it cut into the skin under my T-shirt.
Then silently I followed her along Woodland for a few blocks, and I was surprised when she turned onto the rocky gravel of Mercer, back toward the farm, where we’d first met.
“Mercer? But I know everyone who lives on this street!” I said, running to catch up to her. “And I thought you said you lived farther away.”
Jasper didn’t answer me. She just kept walking. So I followed along silently, kicking gravel. I didn’t say anything when we entered the farm. I didn’t say anything when Jasper headed down toward the creek and straight into the kudzu jungle, through the scratchy green tendrils that raked at my arms and legs. I was silent as I watched her stomp along the creek. Then she came to a wall of vines and stopped.
She lifted aside a sort of curtain, a veil of vines, to reveal a gap in the green. Through that gap Jasper crawled, and I followed as she scrambled up an embankment overhanging the creek. I had no idea where we were going, but I pushed my own way through and clawed at the red clay and tree roots, trying to keep up, the heavy bag dragging at my shoulder.
A moment later, I burst through all that green, through the kudzu and ivy and honeysuckle, and found Jasper standing in front of a tiny house I’d never seen before. A house I’d never noticed. It was tucked way back in the trees at the edge of the farm, buried in all the vines, pines, and shrubs. I could barely make out the weathered tan color of the clapboards, so overgrown it was in green. Situated like that, the house was blocked from view on all sides, hidden and buried in overgrowth. It was a cottage, really, a tiny miniature house, obviously abandoned and neglected. But it had gingerbread trim and broken stained glass set into the windows. I could tell it had been beautiful once, like something from a fairy tale. But vacated long ago by the elves or hobbits or fauns who had once lived there.
A bright blue dragonfly zipped past my head, and I ducked, startled, almost lost my balance. “Wh—where are we?” I stammered.
“This is where I sleep,” said Jasper, turning to face me.
And for just a moment as I stood, facing Jasper—staring at her red hair blazing in the sun with the strange cottage behind her, all covered in vines—she seemed to shimmer, like she would disappear if I didn’t keep looking at her. That was silly, of course, but I couldn’t help thinking it. For a moment it seemed possible. As if all the childish fantasies I’d ever made up in my life, all the hunger I’d felt for something I couldn’t explain, came welling up inside me.
“This is your house?” I said.
My mind was reeling, struggling to catch up with the moment, just as my body had struggled to catch up with Jasper’s long strides.
“No,” said Jasper. “This isn’t my house. I . . . don’t have a house, at the moment. This is just where I sleep. Temporarily. Do you see now?”
“But . . .”
“I told you it was complicated,” she said, shaking her head. “It’s super complicated.”
“But your mom? She lets you just . . .”
Jasper laughed a sad laugh. “Ha, yeah. My mom is complicated too.”
I didn’t say anything after that. I looked at the little house, and then at Jasper, and then down at the bag of groceries over my shoulder. Trying to take it all in, to understand.
“See? You didn’t want to know,” she said.
But she was wrong about that. She was absolutely wrong about that. And so I shook my head. “Of course I wanted to know,” I said. “I’m your friend.”
“Really?” Jasper glanced up, met my eyes with hers. She looked shy, maybe for the first time since I’d met her. “It’s not . . . too much?”
“It’s not,” I said. “It’s a lot. But not too much. It’s just confusing. Maybe if you could tell me why you—”
But Jasper shook her head then, hard and quick. “Please, no. I can’t. I really can’t.”
“Well, okay,” I said. “That’s fine. You can tell me or not tell me. Whatever you need to do. But either way, maybe I can help, somehow. . . .”
“You know I don’t like help,” Jasper said. But she was smiling, just the faintest smile.
“I know it,” I said. “But I guess that’s just too bad for you. Because it turns out I like helping.
So there.”
“Well,” she said with a shrug, “in that case, I guess you might as well come in.” She headed for the tall grass on the right side of the house, lifting her knees high, stomping her way to the back door of the house. I followed, stomping behind her.
As I tiptoed into the dim room through the peeling doorframe and stepped into the kitchen of the little worn-out house, as I breathed in the dust and stared up at the ancient cobwebs near the ceiling, as I stood there in the summer heat, I had the strangest feeling the place was somehow familiar. Like a room I’d visited long ago, or maybe dreamed about. Like a room from a book I’d read and forgotten.
There were old fixtures on a white enamel sink, a rusted blue refrigerator, and dingy wooden cabinets. On the floor, a narrow mattress in the corner was draped with a sheet. It was a sad room. But it wasn’t only that. Because it was also Jasper’s room. I looked at her, standing beside a cracked and filthy pane of glass. Her red hair gleamed in the light from the window, despite the dirt.
When I reached up and flipped the switch beside me on the wall, no lights came on, and Jasper shrugged. “Sorry, no power.”
“It’s okay,” I said.
That was a lie. It was not okay. It was everything but okay that Jasper was living here, like this, alone, with no way to turn on a light.
Jasper didn’t want help, but maybe she needed it. She needed someone.
I thought maybe I could be someone.
Without another word, I set down my bag and ran home.
A Softer Sort of Hum
When I ducked back into the house an hour later, Jasper was sitting on the one sad kitchen chair, eating peanut butter from a plastic spoon. Her back was to me, and the filthy broken windowpane still scattered bits of sunlight in her hair. She was just sitting there, licking her spoon, not doing anything else. She turned when she heard the door creak.
My Jasper June Page 7
