Saving June (15 page)

Dottie clears our plates when we’ve scraped them clean and brings out three slices of peach crumb pie in Styrofoam containers. “On the house. You can save a piece for George,” she says airily, and dismisses our modest objections with a wave of her hand. Jake lays some crumpled bills on the table, including what looks to be at least a sixty-percent tip, give or take.

Jake Tolan: Secret Overboard Tipper, at least when it comes to overworked, yet resilient, bubbly waitresses with bad dye jobs. Who would’ve thought?

The afternoon is blazing by the time we hit St. Louis, and once we find it, Laney drags me along for the ride to the top of the arch thingamabob—or, as the plaque underneath it proclaims, the Gateway Arch. There are white
pod-type cars for the trip up, and in a few minutes we’re at the top viewing area, where the small windows treat us to a breathtaking view of the city sprawled out below, tall buildings jutting into the picture-perfect blue sky. It makes me wish I’d brought my better camera instead of my Polaroid.

When we come down, Jake is waiting for us, juggling two chili dogs, three Cokes and some fries. He hands one chili dog and a Coke to me, and the fries and a Coke to Laney.

“How was the ride?” he asks.

I shrug. “Okay.”

“It was awesome!” Laney plops down on the grass and shoves a handful of fries into her mouth. “You have, like, no sense of adventure.”

“I do too!”

“Oh, come off it. You’d never do anything fun if I didn’t drag you into it, kicking and screaming.”

“Maybe I’m just not in the mood for having fun right now,” I retort sharply.

A wave of instant regret hits me at the hurt look on Laney’s face.

“It was a joke, Harper,” she says. Her voice is calm but firm. “Look, I know that this is a…bad time for you. The worst, even. I get it. I get it, and I’m trying to be patient, because I know you don’t mean it when you turn me into
your punching bag. But cut me some damn slack already, would you? I’m on your side here.”

She’s right. Of course she’s right. I know if I don’t stop being so awful and pushing her away like this, one day she’ll reach her breaking point, and she won’t be there at all. And what would I do then? She’s my best friend. My only real friend. I need her.

“I’m sorry,” I say quietly. I sit cross-legged on the grass beside her, and after a minute, I bump my shoulder against hers. “Anyway, your idea of fun is driving to Canada to get your tongue pierced.”

I steal one of her fries and smile a little, and Laney smiles back, which makes me feel better.

“What’s your point? It’d be wicked. I’d do it just to see my mother’s face.” She pauses to mop her mouth off with a napkin. “Hey, Jake, thanks for the fries.”

“Yeah, well, I figured you might be hungry,” he says. “By the way, I found a pay phone and got hold of Seth. He got back to White Haven with Danny and Anna. Devon’s the only one in the group who got arrested. He’s still in jail.”

“He can’t afford bail?” I ask.

“Oh, he can afford it. His parents are loaded. But Seth tells me he’s really stoked about starting a hunger strike.”

God, what an idiot. Laney rolls her eyes and says, “He says that now. Just you watch, boy’s gonna get shanked.”
She stands up and pulls out her cell phone. “I’m gonna go call Seth.”

Jake and I watch her walk away, and then he looks at me with his eyebrows raised. “So, what do you want to do next?” he asks. “Museums? Garden tour? The zoo?”

“No zoos. They make Laney depressed. During a third-grade field trip, she tried to convince me to help her liberate the penguins and set them free in the North Pole.”

“There aren’t any penguins in the North Pole. They’re native to the Southern Hemisphere.”

“I know, but she thought they were Santa’s pets.”

He laughs and shakes his head. “She’s funny.”

An unsettling feeling creeps into my stomach. I’m used to boys who chase after Laney and her long blond hair and even longer legs, but for some reason, the idea of Jake doing the chasing annoys me. I don’t know if it’s because part of me is stupidly attracted to him, or if it’s because I’m trying to be protective of Laney. If I’m honest with myself, it’s probably a little of both.

“You’re not trying to get into her pants, are you?” I ask, eyes narrowed.

Jake’s mouth falls open with surprise. Then he closes it again and says, a little tightly, “I said she was funny, not that I wanted to bang her. But good job on jumping to conclusions.”

“I know how guys look at her, okay? Especially guys like you.”

Apparently that was the wrong thing to say. Jake scrunches the hot dog wrapper up in one fist, the paper crinkling sharply. The way he’s staring at me makes me want to break eye contact, or take back what I said, but I don’t do either.

“‘Guys like me’?”
he throws back at me cuttingly. “You don’t know anything about me, Scott. Even if I did like Laney that way—which I don’t—I wouldn’t do anything. Not when Seth’s made it clear he’s interested.”

I scoff. “Because guys never abandon all codes of friendship in pursuit of a piece of ass.”

“No, some of us don’t,” he snaps. He rises to his feet abruptly and throws his trash in a nearby garbage bin, then pulls out a pack of cigarettes from his back pocket.

I actually almost believe him, is the thing. Or maybe I just
want
to believe him. It’d be nice to think there are some guys out there who are better than that, but I know I’m right. I know how boys are. How men are. My father, Tyler, that asshole Kyle—they’re all the same. They all have a bottom line. Jake, too, has an agenda; I just don’t know yet what it is.

“Hey,” I say, standing up. He turns, and I gesture to his cigarette. “I want one.”

“Why should I share when you’re being such a bitch?” he sneers.

So, I guess we’re back to that. One step forward, two steps back.

I walk over to him and say, “Don’t be an asshole.”

“I’m
an asshole?” he echoes incredulously. “Are you freaking kidding me right now?”

“Just give me one.”

He does, and he lights it for me, leaning in close as he does. God, those eyes. They really pull you in. And I can’t help it; I kind of enjoy pushing his buttons. Maybe because he’s so willing to push mine right back. In some twisted way, it makes him even sexier. Fucking teenage hormones. I wonder if this is what it’s like for Laney, with all those boys she messes around with. It would explain a lot.

“You know that’ll kill you,” Jake deadpans, nodding toward my cigarette.

“Maybe that’s the plan,” I shoot back, which is stupid, because it’s not like—I don’t want to
die,
really.

I just—I want—I don’t even know. I want to scream. I want to want to cry. I want to feel like a person again. I want June here, so she could lecture me on what an idiot I am for picking up such a nasty habit. I want to be back in Grand Lake, sitting on my roof with her next to me, smoking one of my mom’s stolen cigarettes, knowing that my sister is there without even having to look. The same way it felt in my dream.

I close my eyes and breathe in the mingled smoke of our cigarettes because it’s the closest I’m going to get. Because I want so many things, and I’m not going to have any of
them, ever again. Because there’s no way to fill in the empty spaces June left behind.

When I open my eyes again, Jake is staring at me. He shakes his head. “You’re a real piece of work, you know that?” he says.

I exhale a stream of smoke and sigh, staring up at the blue sky overhead. “Trust me. I know.”

The pizza in St. Louis tastes different. Not bad different, just…different.

“It’s called Provel cheese,” Laney says. Laney watches way too many cooking shows.

We’ve just finished up an early dinner at some pizza place after spending the day doing, well, pretty much nothing. Jake napped on a bench in the park for a while, his hat pulled over his eyes, leaving Laney and I to entertain ourselves with playing cards and newspaper crosswords. Finally we got bored enough to wake him by tipping the bench until he rolled off and onto the grass. We were highly amused by the startled girlish yelp he made when he hit the ground. Jake, not so much.

Now we’re in some place called the Blue Lounge, because
Jake claims it would be nothing short of tragic to pass through St. Louis without soaking in some jazz.

I don’t know if I’d go so far as to use the word
tragic,
but I am enjoying the band. And I’m not the only one—there are a few older couples on the wooden floor, holding each other close and swaying to the music. Everyone looks like they belong in one of those old Rat Pack movies; it makes me glad Laney insisted we change before coming here. She looks stunning in her short red dress, not that that’s a surprise—she looks stunning in anything. And I don’t look too out of place wearing one of Laney’s skirts with a belt and a strappy tank top. Jake, of course, fits in seamlessly with his black fedora.

I know Laney sensed something had transpired between me and Jake to mess with my mood when she came back from her phone call with Seth. On the way to the jazz club, she kept looking at me weird, asking if I was okay, asking if I’d had enough to eat, asking if she could do anything.

After the tenth time she asked if I was sure I was okay, I said, exasperated, “Laney. I’m fine. Relax.”

“Of course she’s not
fine,”
Jake said to Laney. “Her sister is fucking dead. But that doesn’t make her an invalid. Get off her back.”

That shut Laney up. She fell silent, and I punched Jake in the shoulder and told him to shove it, even though I was grateful he’d put an end to the line of questioning.

I know Laney is worried, so I’m trying to pull it together
for her sake. It’s hard not to think of everything in the context of what it would be like if June was here, to not want to curl up in a ball and remain in the fetal position until we reach California, but I’m trying.

This is what I tell Jake, after we’ve staked out a table in the club and Laney’s disappeared into the bathroom. I don’t mean to bring June up; it just sort of spills out of me. Somehow it’s easier to talk to Jake about her than it is Laney. Maybe because I know there’s nothing I could say that would hurt him. And he’s clearly not afraid of hurting me.

“Think of it this way,” he says. “You’re experiencing everything she’ll never get to. It’s, like…a tribute, or something. Not living your life won’t help anyone.”

It is comforting, I guess, to think of it that way. I take my camera and snap a shot of the dance floor, then turn and take one of Jake’s profile, his face thoughtful as he listens to the band play. He gives me a look when the flash goes off but doesn’t comment.

When Laney returns to our table, Jake pushes back his chair and says, “Now, which one of you ladies is going to take the first dance?”

“Not me.” Laney wrinkles her nose. “I’m still feeling a little gross. Too much grease on those fries earlier, I guess.”

“I suppose that leaves you then,” he says to me.

“No way.” I shake my head, tugging at my skirt. I
haven’t worn one of these things willingly since…well, pretty much never. “Not happening.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t dance.”

“She really doesn’t,” Laney says around the lime from her water glass. “Trust me, I’ve tried to get her to, many, many times. Like I said earlier—she’s got no sense of adventure.”

“That’s not true,” I say defensively, but my cheeks heat up, and I realize that, okay, maybe she has me on this one.

“Prove it.”

Jake holds out his hand and waggles his eyebrows. I know both he and Laney expect me to wrap my ankles around my chair legs and refuse to budge. That is, in fact, my first instinct, but then I think: Jake is right. I need to experience things. Push beyond my comfort zone. Even if I make a fool out of myself in the process.

With a defiant look shot Laney’s way, I accept Jake’s hand and let him draw me onto the wooden dance floor. He wants to play it that way? Fine. Then it’s on.

At first I move to wind my arms awkwardly around his neck, the way I did ages ago at the sixth-grade dance when nerdy Arnold Beaman asked me, and I said yes, partly because I felt sorry for him, and partly because Laney was too distracted flirting with her harem of prepubescent boy toys to bail me out in time. But Jake stops me, guides one
of my hands to his shoulder and takes the other in his, entwining our fingers. His other hand rests lightly on my hip. The contact makes me feel flushed all over.

“This isn’t freshman year homecoming,” he reminds me. “Don’t worry. I’m not going to cop a feel.”

“You better not.” I pause, feeling awkward and cumbersome as he starts to shuffle across the floor with me stumbling along ungracefully. “Wait, wait—I don’t—I don’t know even how to dance like this!”

“It’s easy. Just follow me.”

I stare down at our feet, trying to move in time with him, but it’s like no matter what I’m a half step behind. I’m about to inform Jake of my reneging on this dancing thing, when all of a sudden his Converse comes down on my toes. I jump and cry out in surprise. And now everyone, including the band, is staring at me. Oh, and what is that I spy out of the corner of my eye? Laney, stifling a giggle into her hand. Some best friend she is.

“You’re overthinking this,” Jake says.

I glare. “Maybe if you’d stop stepping all over my feet like a—”

“Does it always have to be the push and pull with you?”

“Yes. When it comes to you, yes, it does.”

“Look. Stop. Breathe.” His hand on my waist slides to the small of my back, pushing me in closer to him. It’s all I
can do not to shiver. “Don’t look at the floor. Don’t think about it. Just move with me.”

Jake steps back, and I hesitate for just a moment before sliding with him. His grip on our interlaced fingers tightens as he begins to lead me around. On the fourth step, he twirls me in a fluid movement, pulls me back to him expertly. My breath catches a little in my chest at the look in his hooded eyes.

“You seem surprised,” he says, amused.

“You’re not half-bad at this.” My hand relaxes on his shoulder. “I’m almost impressed.”

He takes a sudden swinging step to the right, guiding us closer to the band. I glance over at the sax player in time to see him cock his head and wink, smiling around his mouthpiece. When I look back to Jake, his mouth curves in a playful grin.

“Careful, Harper. Someone might think you’re actually enjoying yourself.”

I can’t suppress a smile. “Huh.”

“‘Huh’?” He quirks an eyebrow. “What was the ‘huh’ for?”

“This just doesn’t seem like your type of music.”

“That’s because you’ve caught me in the middle of a nostalgic British Invasion phase. The first—not the second. You know, the Stones, Cream, Pink Floyd. But I don’t restrict myself to certain genres. Labels are substantially irrelevant.”

“Wow,” I say. “You are truly obsessed.”

“Yeah, I kinda am,” he agrees, grinning. “Without music, life would be a mistake.”

“Did you coin that one yourself?”

“Nietzsche did, actually. But it’s a common mix-up.”

“And you believe that?”

“Isn’t it obvious?”

He spins me once more, draws me in close and dips me dramatically. When he rights me on my feet again, I’m grinning back, matching him step for step.

“I’m starting to realize that nothing about you is as obvious as I thought,” I say. “The penchant for ABBA. The no-drinking policy. The generous tipping habits.”

“What can I tell you?” He shrugs. “I’m a complicated guy.”

I know he’s joking, but the truth is, he
is
a complicated guy, more complicated than I ever would have guessed. I wonder if June realized the same thing during all of their study sessions. Maybe she saw what I’m just starting to see—that there is a lot more to Jake than meets the eye. She must’ve seen
something,
since they were friends and all. Or at the very least, friendly.

The quartet’s jam comes to an end, the last sax note sounding out in a long, high trill. It’s met with scattered applause from the peanut gallery, including Laney’s. She puts two fingers in her mouth and blows an earsplitting
whistle. Jake tips his hat at me, then leans forward, his mouth brushing my ear.

“Has she been drinking?” he asks jokingly.

“Nah,” I say. “I think she was just born like that.”

I’m feeling…kind of good, actually. This is the most I’ve smiled since June died. I don’t know whether I should feel guilty about that or not, so I decide not to. As we walk back to the table, I bump my shoulder into Jake’s.

“So, you still think I have no sense of adventure?” I ask him.

He smiles. “You know, Scott, you’re starting to change my mind.”

Oklahoma is almost as boring as Indiana. The good news is that after wasting the entire day in St. Louis, Jake seems anxious to hit the road and put some serious mileage behind him, so I don’t have to endure too much of it. He drives all through the night, and when he thinks I’m asleep, he slips in some ABBA.

Laney stays asleep—I guess her stomach is still bugging her—and I drift in and out until around four in the morning, when I open my eyes to Jake singing “Take a Chance on Me” under his breath, his fingers drumming on the steering wheel. I watch him for a while, amused, then look out the window. We’re on some side road, off the highway. It’s still pretty dark outside.

When he notices I’m awake, Jake stops singing and turns down the stereo. “I need to gas up,” he says.

“Okay.” My voice comes out all thick and scratchy from sleep. I clear my throat, sitting up straighter. “Are we still in Oklahoma?”

“Yeah. Got a pretty long time before we hit Texas.”

Texas. Holy shit. I rub my forehead and calculate how many states we have left to pass through. Half of Oklahoma, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and then we’re there. California. It feels so close and so far away at the same time.

Jake swings into a gas station, climbs out and fills up Joplin’s tank. A minute later he yanks the pump nozzle out and heads inside to pay. I glance over my shoulder at Laney sleeping behind me. She looks younger when she’s asleep, snuggled deep into her sweatshirt, legs drawn toward her chest, her whole body curled in like she’s making herself as small as possible. It’s like nothing has touched her and nothing ever will.

I unbuckle my seat belt and climb over the seats, all the way into the open back, careful to avoid Laney’s sleeping form. The lights from the gas station’s parking lot illuminate everything with a dim yellow glow, and I squint under them until I see it. The trunk with June’s ashes. Its battered top feels smooth under my hands, old leather and brass. I unsnap the latches as quietly as I can manage and lift the heavy lid.

The urn is swaddled in Jake’s blanket. I pull it out and into my lap, brushing my fingers across the cool marble. All this time I’ve been avoiding the urn, afraid of—I don’t know. Afraid, I guess, that looking at it will make this real. Will drive home the fact that June is gone. She’s gone and that’s permanent. I can’t pretend otherwise when I’m looking at her remains.

“Hey.” I turn when I hear Laney’s sleep-heavy voice. She climbs over the backseat and slides down next to me. “Everything okay?” she asks.

I nod without taking my eyes off the urn. “Yeah. I just…”

Miss her.

“Me too,” Laney says softly, resting her cheek against my shoulder.

“I called her a bitch.”

She looks up at me. “What?”

“The night before…I yelled at her.” My throat is like sandpaper when I swallow. “She barged into my room, and I was—I was
mad.
And I said all these things—”

“Everyone says stupid shit,” Laney cuts in. “It doesn’t mean anything. It doesn’t. June knew you didn’t mean it. I know you two didn’t always get along, but she loved you. And she knew you loved her. I know she did.”

Before I can respond to that, the back doors pop open and Jake sticks his head inside.

“Sorry to interrupt the powwow,” he says. He raises his eyebrows curiously at the urn.

I quickly place it back in the trunk and close the top. “What do you want?”

He tosses something into my lap. I look down; it’s a pack of cigarettes. Camel Lights.

“Now you can stop stealing mine,” he tells me.

Laney gives me a look, but she knows better than to say anything. The same way I never say anything about her drinking. We let each other have these things, even though we shouldn’t. We have our reasons.

The sky gradually lightens as we drive on, deep midnight-blue giving way to flaring orange and dusky pink. Outside the landscape is flat, and everything looks dead: the barren trees, the brown grass. It’d be easy to be lulled back into sleep by the monotony—Laney doesn’t seem to have any trouble drifting off again—but I’m too keyed up at the moment for that. My head buzzes with thoughts that twist around each other like vines.

Maybe Laney’s right. Maybe June did love me. But I’m far less certain that she knew I loved her. Did she realize how much I needed her around? It’s not like I ever told her. I was too wrapped up in my world to notice what was going on in hers. Even if she did know, it wasn’t enough to count. It wasn’t enough to make her stay. So really, what did it matter, in the end?

The bottom line is, it’s my fault. I didn’t love her enough.
I didn’t do enough.
I
wasn’t enough. There’s no excuse. There is nothing that will ever make that okay.

I press the heels of my hands into my eyes while Jake replaces ABBA with something else—it doesn’t even sound like music. It’s weird and warped and grating. Chaotic noise. I make it about three and a half tracks in before I can’t stand it any longer. I take my hands off my eyes and press the eject button, yanking the disc out with my fingers.