The Voice on the Radio

by Caroline B. Cooney

  My baby is home, thought her mother. I am through waiting. I have her back. Only for this weekend, not for this life, but at last, she came to me.

  The daughter she hardly knew lifted a tear-stained face. “Oh, Mom, I know I shouldn’t feel this way, but part of me still loves Reeve.”

  How beautiful was this child’s face. How precious. “Of course you do. He did love you, we all saw that, and you loved back. He gave you strength when you needed it.”

  “And sold it,” Jodie reminded them. “Not because he needed to. Just to show off.”

  I bet Jodie had tantrums once, thought Janie. I bet she kicked doors shut and ripped her Barbies’ heads off.

  “Still,” said their mother, “you weigh that in. He was cruel to you, Janie, and to us, and it’s easy to hate him for that.”

  Janie could see neither hate nor anger in her mother’s eyes, only an expression similar to her father’s hug, a let-my-breath-out-at-last look.

  “But he was wonderful once,” Mrs. Spring said, “and I honor him for that.”

  Janie touched her mother’s bare arm. While Janie liked a shirt and sweater in November, her mother still wore just a T-shirt. Her skin was warm and tan. Barbies are warm and tan and always the same, thought Janie, but real people are not always the same. They are always, relentlessly, somebody you didn’t know they would be.

  It was not Reeve she was thinking of. It was herself.

  I am Jennie Spring, she thought. I am this woman’s child.

  “In math,” said Jodie darkly, “a plus and a minus equal a zero, so he’s a zero, so abandon the creep, Janie.”

  “But in people,” said Janie, “plus and minus are always there. Nobody adds up.” In October, she and Sarah-Charlotte had had their usual wedding conversation, and it had passed through her mind that if she asked both her fathers to escort her, they’d do it for her—but at what cost?

  At what cost, thought Janie, did this mother agree to call me by a different name? At what cost does she refer to the Johnsons as my parents?

  Janie’s eyes filled again with tears, and Brian, seeing this, thought, She wants a way out. He watched his mother, knowing she would give Janie a way out.

  “Or,” said Mom softly, “you could forgive him.”

  “What?” shrieked Jodie. “Mom! The guy’s scum. We’re not forgiving Reeve.”

  “Go, Jo!” said Brian, cheerleading.

  “You want me to shrug off what he’s done,” said Janie in disbelief.

  “You never shrug,” said Janie’s mother. “Shrugging means it doesn’t matter, and it matters. It matters so much. But forgive, Janie, and you move on.”

  “Move on where?” cried Janie. “I don’t see the next place.”

  Their mother sighed deeply, and suddenly Brian did not want to be here, did not want to be within miles of this place, wanted to be in good old Colorado with Stephen.

  “I had a daughter once,” said Mrs. Spring, “who preferred another mother. I did not see how I could forgive a thing like that. Nobody hurt me more. Not even Hannah. But I loved that daughter. So I for-gave her.”

  Jodie cringed.

  Brian felt ill.

  And Janie whispered, “I’m sorry.”

  “I know you are. And maybe Reeve is.”

  “How could I go on loving Reeve?”

  “We went on loving you,” said her mother.

  Brian felt he would really much rather watch television. Jodie went to change clothes before she and Janie set off for Connecticut.

  Mrs. Spring and Janie were alone with the fading sun.

  An afghan lay on the back of the sofa. Somebody with a poor color eye had crocheted it; the pinks were too purple and the blues were too turquoise. As Janie reached for it, her hand passed over her mother’s bare arms. It isn’t chilly in here, she thought, I’m not after warmth. Sarah-Charlotte knew the rule: Don’t hide, don’t run. But I can’t learn. Here I am, one more time, trying to wrap myself in a blanket and hide.

  “Mom,” said Janie. It was a strange feeling, telling the truth. “A mother and a boyfriend are not the same. You can’t compare forgiving me with me forgiving Reeve.”

  “No?”

  “No. A mother is going to love her daughter no matter what year, or season, or failure, or trouble. Even if it takes a while.”

  Her mother found the afghan, put it around both of them. When somebody else wraps a blanket around you, it isn’t hiding, it’s closeness.

  Janie tiptoed near her own failure. “And a daughter,” she said shakily, “is going to love her mother no matter what, too. Even if it takes a long, long while. But a boyfriend…”

  “Boyfriends come and go,” agreed her mother. “They aren’t blood, they aren’t family, they aren’t forever.”

  What if she lived here, in this family, with this mother? Where parents stayed strong and problems had solutions?

  “I wasn’t sure you were family,” said Janie. “Right up till this afternoon. When we came in from saying good-bye, all of a sudden, this room—it was my room; and you—you were my mother.” With great difficulty she added, “And I knew what I had done to you.”

  “You came home,” said her mother. “That’s what you have done for me.”

  And Janie knew then what she had in common with the Springs. It was not red hair. It was strength.

  I’m sure of something, thought Janie. I know who I am.

  Then her mother grinned and jabbed Janie with an elbow. In this family, the parents often behaved like kids themselves. This was a kid grin. “As for Reeve, if you see him again, and you hate his guts, and you want to light the match that will light the fuse that will blow him up in his car—then forgiveness probably isn’t for you.”

  Janie almost laughed. Not quite, because the hurt was still present. “He’s too cute to blow up.”

  “That’s undoubtedly part of the problem. He’s paid his way by being so cute. Now he knows he’s got a cute voice and a cute radio personality as well. It’s going to be hard for Reeve. It’s more fun to be cute than to have a conscience.”

  “How come you’re not more mad at him?” said Janie. “I want to drive a spike through his heart.”

  “I guess, having raised a son that age, I’m more able to forgive stupid, difficult teenage boys. Besides, Reeve may have a spike in his heart, even as we speak.”

  “Good,” said Janie. “I hope it hurts.” Then she heard the middle of her mother’s thought. “What did you have to forgive Stephen for?”

  Mom shook her head.

  “Aren’t you going to tell me?”

  “No.”

  Janie wondered if Stephen could tell her; or if he didn’t even know, the way Reeve hadn’t known the extent of what he was doing. Maybe you had to get caught in order to know how rotten you were. Maybe sometimes your parents didn’t catch you on purpose. They didn’t want to know how rotten you were, either.

  “Do you think that’s all that’s wrong with Reeve?” Janie asked. “He’s stupid and difficult and a teenager? Or do you think he’s worthless and disgusting and we should blow him up in his car?”

  “I think we should save the car,” said Jodie, walking in.

  They laughed, and Janie loved them, and she said, “I’m sorry I was such a brat last year.”

  Her mother held her tight, kissing cheek and throat and hair, the way parents did when you weren’t run over by a train after all. She did not pretend that Janie had not been a brat. “Be strong for your parents,” she said softly. “Make me proud.”

  It was dark and very late when they got to Janie’s.

  The shared driveway was full of Reeve’s family hugging good-bye. Suitcases were being loaded, instructions given, promises to be back for Christmas Eve. Maybe in the chaos, Janie could sneak inside without—

  “Yo, Janie!” shouted Todd. “Come over and meet my fiancée, Heather!”

  “I’m out of here,” said Jodie.

  “No, you can’t, my parents will be very upset, Jodie
, please, don’t drive away, come on in and—”

  “Bye,” said Jodie. “You’re on your own. See you at Christmas.” Her sister blew a kiss, backed right out and took right off. Some ally, thought Janie.

  Todd hauled her around the bushes and presented Heather. “Hi, Heather,” said Janie. “Welcome to Connecticut.” She tried not to see the rest of the family; she tried not to find out where Reeve stood, and what his expression was, and what clothes he had on.

  “Janie! Kisses!” said Lizzie, who preferred to discuss these rather than bestow them.

  “We’re just taking off,” said Megan. “See you at Christmas, Janie!”

  And they were gone, and Mrs. Shields went indoors and Janie was standing on the driveway with Reeve. The light from the houses did not reach them. The dark swirled around them like wind.

  Shadows took Reeve’s face and kept it. He could have been a stranger. Janie stared, trying to see the boy she had known. Reeve flinched and looked away. Twice he took a breath, preparing to speak, and twice wet his lips instead.

  He needs a mike for courage, she thought. Oh, Reeve!

  Her heart went out to him. She, Janie, had found her strength. Reeve—poor Reeve—had found his weakness.

  Long ago, when Janie had decided on one family over the other, a cop had said to grieving, raging Stephen and Jodie: “You got a family that loves you and Jennie’s got a family that loves her. What else is there?”

  What else is there? thought Janie, as Reeve struggled with speech. Well, there’s hurt, and deceit, and selfishness. And then, I guess, if there’s any hope of any love anywhere, there has to be the chance to try again.

  I don’t need a blanket or a hiding place. I can make it with or without an ally. I am a Spring.

  “Let’s talk, Reeve,” she said. She held out her hand, and he took it.

  CAROLINE B. COONEY is the author of many books for young people, including Diamonds in the Shadow; A Friend at Midnight; Hit the Road; Code Orange; The Girl Who Invented Romance; Family Reunion; Goddess of Yesterday (an ALA-ALSC Notable Children’s Book); The Ransom of Mercy Carter; Tune In Anytime; Burning Up; The Face on the Milk Carton (an IRA-CBC Children’s Choice Book) and its companions, Whatever Happened to Janie? and The Voice on the Radio (each of them an ALA-YALSA Best Book for Young Adults), as well as What Janie Found; What Child Is This? (an ALA-YALSA Best Book for Young Adults); Driver’s Ed (an ALA-YALSA Best Book for Young Adults and a Booklist Editors’ Choice); Among Friends; Twenty Pageants Later; and the Time Travel Quartet: Both Sides of Time, Out of Time, Prisoner of Time, and For All Time, which are also available as The Time Travelers Volumes I and II.

  Caroline B. Cooney lives in Madison, Connecticut, and New York City.

  Scroll down to read Chapter One from

  Caroline B. Cooney’s

  eagerly anticipated conclusion

  to the Janie novels

  Excerpt from What Janie Found by Caroline B. Cooney

  Copyright © 2000 by Caroline B. Cooney

  Published by Delacorte Press

  an imprint of

  Random House Children’s Books

  a division of Random House, Inc.

  1540 Broadway

  New York, New York 10036

  CHAPTER

  ONE

  Last seen flying west.

  Over and over, Janie read those last four words on the report.

  I could do that, she thought. I could be “last seen flying west.” I too could vanish.

  By not being here, I could be a hundred times more powerful and more present. No one could ever set me down. I would control all their lives forever, just by being gone.

  She actually considered it.

  She didn’t worry about the logistics—plane ticket, money, shelter, food, clothing. Janie had never lacked for shampoo or supper or shoes and she couldn’t imagine not having them.

  She considered this: She could become a bad person.

  In the time it took for a jet to cross America, she, Janie Johnson—good daughter, good friend, good student, good sister—with no effort, she could ruin a dozen lives.

  She was stunned by the file folder in her fingers, but she was more stunned by how attracted she was to this idea—Janie Johnson, Bad Guy.

  In all that had happened—the kidnapping, the new family, the old family, even Reeve’s betrayal—nothing had brought such fury to her heart as the contents of this folder.

  She couldn’t even say, I can’t believe it. Because she could believe it easily. It fit in so well. And it made her so terribly angry.

  She knew now why her older brother, Stephen, had dreamed for years of college. It was escape, the getaway from his massive store of anger.

  She herself had just finished her junior year in high school. If college was the way out, she could not escape until a year from September—unless she escaped the way Hannah had, all those years ago.

  Janie Johnson hated her father at that moment with a hatred that was wallpaper on every wall of every room she had ever lived in: stripes and circles and colors of hate pasted over every other emotion.

  But gently she slid the police report back into the file folder and put the folder in among the others, pressing with her palm to even up all the folders so that the one that mattered vanished.

  It took control to be gentle. Her fingers wanted to crush the contents of the folder, wad everything up and heave it out a window, and then fling the folder to the floor and drag her shoes over it.

  The drawer was marked Paid Bills. Her father was very organized, and now that he could do nothing himself, her mother wanted Janie to be organized in his place. For a few minutes, it had seemed like fun; Janie Johnson, accountant and secretary.

  The drawer contained a long row of folders, each with a center label, each label neatly printed in her father’s square typewriter-looking print, each in the same blue ink. Folders for water bills and oil bills, insurance policies and tax reports.

  And one folder labeled with two initials.

  H.J.

  It was invisible in the drawer, hidden in the forest of its plain vanilla sisters. But to Janie it flamed and beckoned.

  You don’t have to stay here, being good and dutiful and kind and thoughtful, said the folder. You can be Hannah.

  Reeve Shields was sitting on the floor, his back against the wall, his cutoff jeans and long tan legs sticking out toward Janie. Mrs. Johnson had been sure the project of Mr. Johnson’s papers would include plenty of work for Reeve, but so far she had not thought of an assignment for him. That was okay. He was too busy studying Janie to sort papers.

  Janie had a very expressive face. Her features were never still but swung from thought to thought. If he could read cheeks and forehead and chin tilt, he could read Janie.

  But although he had lived next door to her ever since he could remember, and although they had once been boyfriend and girlfriend and had been through two hells together, right now he could not read her face.

  He did, however, know that he wanted to read the contents of that file. The label was very tempting. The way she had returned it to the drawer, the silence she was keeping—also very tempting.

  Don’t even think about it, he told himself. How many times are you going to jerk her around? She tells you how to behave, you say, Sure, Janie, and then do exactly what you want. You going to do it now, too? She’s speaking to you again, letting you here in the house again, and once again, you can’t wait to trespass on her. You promised yourself you’d grow up. So maybe tonight would be a good time. Maybe tonight you should not look in that folder, which obviously contains the most interesting papers Janie has ever seen in her life.

  But not for you, sport. Give it up. Offer a distraction, mention dinner, get out of the house, get away from this office, do not interfere.

  So Reeve said, “Let’s all go get a hamburger. Brian? Janie? Mrs. Johnson? You up for McDonald’s? Or you want to go to Beach Burger?”

  “Beach Burger,” said Brian Spri
ng quickly. He loved that place. It had its own oceanfront, a tiny little twenty-foot stretch of rock, and you could get your hamburger and fries and milk shake, and leave your socks and shoes in the car, and crawl over the wet slimy rocks and the slippery green seaweed and sit with your toes in the tide. Of course, you had to get back in the car with wet pants and sticky salty skin, but he loved the smell of it: the sea scent you carried home and then, sadly, had to shower off.

  Brian felt so included here. It was weird to be part of a large friendly family like his own family in New Jersey and yet never feel included. Up here, visiting Janie (his sister, but not part of his family), he felt strangely more welcome.

  That wasn’t quite fair.

  What he felt was less useless.

  He missed his older brother, Stephen, badly. But Stephen was not going to return in any real way. A night here, a week there—but Stephen was gone.

  Brian’s twin was no company at all, still a shock to Brian, who had thought they would be best friends all their lives. Brendan had not noticed Brian for a whole year. And with the close of school, and the end of baseball (Brendan, of course, was captain and his pitching won the local and regional championships and they even got to the semifinals) and now summer training camps—basketball and soccer—well, the best Brian could do was stand around and help fold his brother’s jeans when he packed.

  (Brendan even said that. “At least you know how to fold T-shirts,” said Bren. “Although I don’t screw around with that myself, I just shove ’em in.”)

  And the other good reason for going to Beach Burger was that Brian wanted food in his hands, so that he wouldn’t leap forward and yank that file folder out of Janie’s hands. Because he knew in his gut that she had found something important. And everything important to Janie was important to Brian’s family. Her other family.

  But Brian at this moment did not feel a lot of affection for his own family. No matter what he did there, he was last in line. He was sick of it. Up here in Connecticut with Janie, he wasn’t first, but he was part of them, and he wasn’t going to wreck that.