My Jasper June Read online

  I wondered if my toothbrush was still there, its frayed plastic bristles collecting dust. Or if they’d tossed it by now.

  And here I hadn’t talked to her in a week. So I couldn’t help it. When a text came in, and I heard that little ping!, I’d sort of wake up a little more than usual. Just for a second. It was funny how that worked, with phones. Wherever I was, whatever I was doing, when I got a text, it made me sit up straight, made my heart race just a little. Someone is thinking of me, I’d think.

  Even if my very next thought was But it doesn’t really matter.

  Anyway, sitting around the house watching TV and waiting for texts I didn’t care about very much wore out, and finally I couldn’t take it anymore.

  So on Thursday, I put on actual pants that weren’t leggings and walked through my front door. Into the blazing, burning Georgia sun I hadn’t seen in a week. So bright it made me squint.

  The problem was that even in my actual pants, I really had no place to go and nobody to go there with. Everyone else was somewhere. It was June seventh. The people who went to interesting and exotic places were off being interesting and exotic. The people who went to camp were already at camp. I’d always been a camp person, and so I had no clue—what did people do in the summer, all summer, at home? With no camp counselors and schedules? Arts and crafts? Ropes courses? Free swim? Summer was a long time when no one was planning it for you.

  I walked to the end of my street and then turned right onto Woodland, and that felt pretty okay, walking, after a week in the house. Stretching. Seeing stuff. There were flowers to stare at in people’s yards. In front of the yellow house on the corner, James the brat was screaming his face off, and his mom, Kate, was looking like she wanted to scream her face off, and that was sort of interesting for a minute. Anyway, it was loud.

  I waved at them, and Kate waved back, so then I thought about stopping over to say hi, but James was still fussing, and I didn’t really know them very well anyway. They’d only been in the neighborhood for a few years. I kept going.

  The feral cats that lived in the church parking lot were sleeping in a patch of sun by the dumpster, and I stopped to say hi to them. They wouldn’t let you touch them, but they didn’t mind visitors, and I liked to watch them roll in the dust and lick themselves. At the corner, someone had scrawled new graffiti on the back of the stop sign. “GO TO HELL,” it said, “OR GO TO MARIETTA.” Funny.

  After a few minutes, I realized I was walking faster, and I wasn’t sure why. I felt like I wanted something, like I was walking toward something, but I wasn’t sure what that might be. For a few blocks, I tried to see who had the best political yard sign. “Injustice Anywhere Is a Threat to Justice Everywhere” was in first place, but then on one street, every single house had a “Black Lives Matter” sign, so that block won.

  Finally, I got sweaty enough to turn home, but when I strolled back down Woodland, Miss Sandy glanced up from her flower bed and gave me a suspicious look, kind of following me with her eyes. I couldn’t figure out what that meant at first, and then it occurred to me that maybe she didn’t recognize me. Was I tall enough now to be mistaken for an up-to-no-good teenager? Was that possible? I waved at Miss Sandy, but she didn’t wave back, just turned her white head down to stare at her irises as she weeded.

  My mom often complained about the up-to-no-good teenagers in the neighborhood, who always seemed to be skating or wandering around at dusk. And I thought that was funny, because as normal as my mom was now, if you looked at pictures of her from college, you could see that she and her friends had been totally up-to-no-good teenagers themselves. All the boys in those pictures had long hair and tattoos, and all the girls had piercings and colorful streaks in their hair. But whenever I’d accused her of being a troublemaker herself, Mom claimed that’s how she knew what sort of trouble teenagers got into.

  What I needed was a dog. Nobody looked at you funny if you walked around aimlessly with a dog on a leash. Maybe I’d start a dog-walking business. Dad would love that. And then I’d have something to write about in August, if any of my teachers demanded to know What I Did over Summer Vacation. That would be handy, since I wore a lot of pajamas and occasionally wandered aimlessly in actual pants probably wasn’t going to cut it.

  Maybe it was because of Miss Sandy’s suspicious look that I decided to take the long way home that day. Maybe I did it because I was thinking wandering thoughts, and so my feet were feeling wandery. Maybe because some crazy sort of magic led me there. But whatever the reason, I turned left off Woodland onto Mercer and headed for Red’s Farm.

  Mercer was a funny street, more of an alley than a road. Or maybe a country lane. Unpaved and surrounded by trees and brush. It didn’t look like it belonged in the city any more than the farm did. This was a secret place, an odd overgrown pocket, a quiet spot buried in the busy middle of Atlanta. I always slowed down on Mercer. I couldn’t help kicking at the gravel, stopping for honeysuckle or the wild raspberries that sometimes crept up on the chain-link fence. Where the road dead-ended at a wooden gate, I stopped, lifted the latch, and stepped inside.

  I hadn’t been to Red’s Farm in forever. It was private property, but Farmer Red, the guy who’d owned the place for as long as I could remember, didn’t mind if you hung out, just so long as you didn’t mess with the chickens or leave any trash behind. It was funny to be there now, alone. Everything was silent and green. Usually someone was wandering around in the distance, along the back field or down by the community garden, but today the place was dead silent. I stood at the top of the hill and looked around. At the rope swing hanging limp; at the rusty old pump, dripping; at a single yellow butterfly coasting on the still, hot afternoon air.

  But then, suddenly, there was a burst of cool wind, so unexpected it made me jump. It was like the air at the mouth of a cave. It only lasted a second, just one big gasp, like the whole farm was breathing around me. It came and went, clear and bright. I closed my eyes, and when I opened them, I felt . . . refreshed. I started walking down the hill.

  It wasn’t possible to be there without remembering. Summer-evening walks with my family down the gravel road, and picnics on a heavy blanket laid in the tall grass. We’d take turns on the rope swing, and then run back to the blanket for cold Publix fried chicken and strawberries, warm from the sun. Mom and Dad would sip their beers and we’d wait for the fireflies to come out. That wasn’t something we’d done in a long time. Years. Maybe picnics stopped when kids quit catching fireflies? Or maybe my parents had just gotten busy and forgotten about picnics?

  I pushed the thought from my head as I headed down the hill toward the creek. I was only going to walk along the creek bed home, trudge through sand and kudzu. That was why I was here. It was just a way home. That was all I ever meant to do—go home that day.

  It’s funny to think now about how everything might have turned out, or not turned out, if I hadn’t cut through Red’s Farm. It would have been a different June, that’s for sure. It would have been a different summer, and a different everything. But I did walk into Red’s Farm, and I did stop at the creek, and when I stopped, I saw her for the first time.

  Jasper.

  She was sprawled out on a big, flat rock in the middle of the creek. The same rock where we used to play pirates when we were little, in our red bandannas and eye patches. She was still and her eyes were closed and her hair was like a cloud of red fuzz all around her face—so frizzy and curly that when she was lying back like that, her profile kind of disappeared into her pouf of hair. That was the first thing I remember thinking, that her hair was totally huge. But in a wonderful way. Like she was some beautiful clown.

  She looked like she was sleeping, but I couldn’t tell, so I stood there; and after a few minutes—probably too long for me to be watching a stranger sleeping on a rock—she swatted at something near her face, likely a mosquito, and sat up.

  “Oh hey, stranger!” she said when she saw me.

  Just that.

  H
ey, stranger.

  Is it weird if I say that I knew then, at that very moment? I knew that something was happening, something important, and different . . . like in a fairy tale? That nothing would be the same ever again? It is weird. It seems impossible. But that was how it felt. Like something from one of my books. Or that’s how I remember it feeling, anyway. Like the temperature suddenly shifted, and I couldn’t say whether it was a few degrees cooler or warmer, only that my skin could sense the change.

  I think I waved. I think I called back, “Hey!” I think I was probably a little too loud. It’s hard to remember exactly. But then I walked over. Right up to her rock. Which had always been our rock, for years and years, as long as I could remember.

  “I thought I was all alone,” she said, laughing. “I must look crazy, lying here on a rock in the middle of the creek, like I’m a mermaid or something. It was just so nice out. And feel this . . .” She patted the stone beside her. “It’s warm from the sun.”

  I smiled back and shook my head. “Not crazy at all! I know. Me and my . . . I do that here too. All the time.”

  That wasn’t actually true. But it had been true. Once . . .

  After that I wasn’t sure what to say. Finally I came up with“Are you . . . new? In Ormewood Park?”

  She nodded. “Yeah, pretty new.”

  “So, where did you live before this?” I asked after another few seconds of silence. “Before you moved?”

  “Not far away,” she said. “North. Near Kennesaw.”

  “Oh,” I said. “Cool.” Even though it wasn’t especially.

  “Yeah.”

  She kept looking at me silently. And even though it didn’t seem like she was expecting anything, I tried again. “I’ve lived here since I was a baby. On Loring Street, near the end of Woodland. Over that way.” I pointed vaguely in the direction of home.

  “Nice,” she said, glancing back over her shoulder and peering into the trees. As though she had mutant superpowers and could see my house, a half mile away. “It’s pretty, this neighborhood. The houses are so cute, and I like all the big front porches. It feels almost like the country here, even though we’re still in Atlanta.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “The houses are . . . old.”

  For a magical life-changing moment, there was nothing magical or life-changing about this conversation.

  It was her turn to say something, but she didn’t. I thought she probably wanted me to go away and was giving me a polite signal. But at the same time, she was smiling in that odd, calm, encouraging way.

  When I couldn’t stand the silence any longer, I glanced all around me—up at the canopy of thick trees, then back up the hill behind me, and finally down the creek, past the new girl on the rock, into the jungle of kudzu I’d need to push through to get home. I felt strangely locked in that moment, as if under some sort of spell, a power stronger than my own two feet.

  At last I said, “Well, I guess I’ll go now.”

  “Okay,” she said pleasantly enough.

  “Okay,” I repeated.

  “Have a nice day,” she said, waving. Which people said all the time, and probably didn’t really mean, but I swear, in that moment, she sounded like she really meant it. Like she genuinely hoped I’d have an especially nice day.

  “You too!” I replied as I began to move at last, skirting around the rock and trudging a few feet down the creek bed, away. Feeling . . .

  What? Disappointed. But more than that. And for some reason, I just couldn’t walk away without even knowing her name. I turned back, to find her staring after me, no longer smiling. She had a different look on her face now. Watchful—her eyes were big and solemn. But she also seemed a little . . . lost. Like she wanted to ask me something too.

  “Hey,” I said. “I’m . . . Leah. Leah Davidson. In case we ever see each other again. Here, maybe. Or around, since you’re in the neighborhood now, or . . . whatever. Just so you know. I’m Leah.”

  She nodded slowly, as if she understood something I wasn’t sure I’d said. She looked strangely serious when she replied, “Okay, Leah. And I’m Jasper.”

  That was all.

  I turned and kept walking down the creek bed, forcing myself to keep moving forward, toward the wild green tangle. Staring at my sandals as they sank into the damp pebbly mix of dirt and sand. Trying to avoid stepping on the broken bits of bottle and old rusty cans from the storm drains that fed the creek. Brushing the scratchy kudzu out of the way as I went. Just moving forward, home. My feet got wet.

  “Jasper,” I whispered into the kudzu and the mosquitos. “Jasper.”

  And that was when I realized—I was very, very lonely.

  Totally in Control

  I went back to the farm every day after that. Partly because I had nothing else to do . . . but mostly hoping to see Jasper again.

  She was never there.

  Each time I went, I took a book along and a snack. So that it would look like I just happened to be having a lazy, old-fashioned summer day, roaming the neighborhood, reading, a happy loner. Each time, I sat somewhere different. One day I sat at the splintery picnic table under the big oak tree. Another day I climbed up into the rusty old tractor my mom had never let me sit on when I was littler, as if she was afraid it might suddenly start up and carry me away.

  But it didn’t make a bit of difference where I sat. I’d open my book and sit with it in front of me, scanning the pages, pretending to read, but I couldn’t seem to fall into the story, ever. It was like my eyes were reading the words, but my mind was listening for footsteps. So I’d end up scrolling around in my phone instead, but not paying much attention to that either.

  Each day I made sure to stop by Jasper’s rock and wait a few minutes. It almost felt like I’d imagined her there, conjured her up. It seemed likelier that she had gone on vacation with her family to Tybee Island, or maybe down to Florida. That was what people did in June.

  Then one Sunday night, I got a text from Liv, a few streets over. We hadn’t hung out outside of school in forever. Not since our moms carpooled together when we were in third grade. But now she was telling me that she was going to join the middle school cross-country team, and she had to train over the summer, and she didn’t want to do it by herself, and did I want meet up with her tomorrow morning at the coffee shop and then go for a run before it got too hot?

  I was not someone who ever really wanted to run, anywhere. I was so bad at sports my kindergarten teacher had once called home to talk to my parents about how I needed to work on my jumping. Dad used to love telling that story when my parents had their friends over. “Leah, how’s the jumping coming?” He’d chuckle with his friends. “We’re going to get her a jumping tutor.”

  But I was bored and desperate enough that it almost seemed like it might be fun to get a muffin and hang out at Joe’s, even if it meant jogging afterward. So I found myself sleepy but awake at six thirty, tying my laces and pulling my hair into a tangled ponytail.

  My parents were surprised to see me up.

  “Oh. Are you going out somewhere?” Mom asked vaguely.

  Dad looked me up and down, took note of my running shoes, and gave a quick nod of approval. “Need any cash?” he wanted to know. “You should never be anywhere without cab fare, remember. House rule.”

  “I know, Dad.” I said. “But I have a bunch of birthday money left. I’m fine.” He didn’t seem to register that, and he pulled a twenty out of his wallet, sort of shoved it in my direction. So I took the cash and bent over to slide it down inside my sock.

  “Sit down,” said Mom. “Let me make you breakfast. Pancakes?”

  “Pancakes?” I said, looking up at her. “Really?”

  “What’s wrong with pancakes?” Dad looked annoyed, but I wasn’t sure what I’d done, exactly.

  “Nothing . . . I just . . .”

  I couldn’t remember the last time my mom had made pancakes, even though they used to be a Sunday-morning ritual. With blueberries or chocolate chips. T
he house smelling a little smoky from the griddle, but in a nice way. I looked at my mom’s face and wondered what would happen if I said yes. If I just nodded. Would we really all sit down and eat pancakes together? Would the house smell warm and happy, like browned butter and crumbs? Would Dad pour way too much syrup on his, and laugh when Mom rolled her eyes?

  Mom was still waiting.

  I shook my head. “No, I’m good,” I said as I sort of edged past my dad, dug a water bottle out of the cabinet, and filled it at the sink. Then I waved goodbye and headed outside. The kitchen screen door slammed behind me.

  The truth was that I was early to meet Liv, but pancakes or no pancakes, I really didn’t want to sit at the table and watch them chew and sip right now. Mom periodically trying to start a conversation. Dad staring at his phone. Dinner each night was plenty of that.

  I think I walked along the creek that morning out of habit. Because I’d been doing it on my afternoon scouting missions, hunting for Jasper. I don’t really think I had her on my mind at that moment. I was thinking about pancakes, and trying not to think about pancakes. I was chugging my water and stretching my legs.

  But then I came around the bend, near the pile of old tires, and stepped out of the kudzu jungle, to find Jasper’s back to me, bent over something. When I saw her, I gasped, then choked a mouthful of water and spit it out, coughing.

  She whirled around. “Crap!” she shouted. But then, in a quieter voice, she added, “Oh, hey, Leah. You scared me.”

  I stood there, water dripping all down my shirt, still sputtering. I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. “Sorry,” I said.