Among Friends (23 page)

So here I am.

A bus station far away.

Twinkies for dinner and dirty hair.

So far I have blamed

Jennie Dunstan Quint, I think it’s time to xxxx out those and put in the real one. You. (Like at basketball games, when somebody fouls, and everybody in the bleachers stands up and points and shouts “YOU YOU YOU YOU YOU!”)

You could have gone to the English teacher and told her not to post your papers. You could have gone to the home-ec department and asked if the classes there could help with the costumes. You could have asked Emily to be your partner in the laser experiment so she wouldn’t have to do boring library research and you’d have a friend for a term paper. You could have told your mother to stop boasting to the neighbors and you …

Or maybe not.

Maybe no matter what you did, you would be isolated.

Maybe that’s what success has to be.

Isolation.

I’ve started laughing.

Because sitting on that last bus, driving into the snow, realizing that I’ve made almost a complete circle and this bus is going to stop only two hundred miles from home—another song came to me. “Ye Season, It Was Winter.” I can see the ice storm, and the burials, and the fear: I can hear percussion making the sounds of branches rubbing eerily and ice snapping under boots; I can hear an English horn weeping for a child … I am ready to compose the rest of my next musical.

I am ready to tell my mother I’m sorry.

I am ready to tell my father I’m sorry.

I am ready to face the whole school, and admit I’m a jerk, and shrug, and ask if anybody wants to help on next fall’s musical.

I’m ready to be me.

She called me.

She called me!

Out of all the people in this world who were scared for her, and wanted her home, and yearned to help—she called me.

“I’m coming,” I said.

I didn’t know how. I don’t have a car or a license. And then Jennie said, “I’ve sat here so long, Em, it doesn’t matter how long it takes you to get here. I’ll just wait.”

I set the phone down. And you know what? I began talking to God instead of Jennie, crying, “Thank you, God!”

I guess for another chance—I guess because Jennie forgave me for all my meanness—I guess because after all this terrible year—
I am the one who is a success
. For Paul and now for Jennie, I am the one who saved them.

So success isn’t writing musicals, or getting A plus, or being interviewed in the newspaper.

Success is being proud of yourself.

That’s why I hated Jennie. I wasn’t proud of myself. But now I can help her, now I am stronger, now I can let go of that terrible jealousy and just be her friend.

Of course, I don’t have a car to get her in, and I promised not to tell my parents or hers, and she thinks—and she’s right—that Hillary is still as jealous as ever—so that leaves … who?

I never had a stranger ride.

Emily came over at eleven o’clock at night.

Jared and Ansley had just gotten in from a date and we were watching a movie before Jared took Ansley on home, and Emily walks right in, takes a handful of popcorn, and says with her mouth full, “Jennie just telephoned me. We have to go get her. She’s in Albany. It’s a four-hour drive.”

“Why did you have popcorn before you told us?” demanded Ansley.

“Because I’m nervous. I always eat when I’m nervous.”

Jared leaped up, whooping and hollering. He did an Indian war dance around the room and yelled, “I love it! My life is perfect! I’ve always wanted to drive off in the middle of the night, a knight in shining armor, and rescue somebody. A four-hour drive! I love it. Maybe it’ll snow! Maybe we’ll have a hard time getting there! Maybe we’ll get hijacked!”

“Nobody hijacks cars, Jared.”

“A person can always dream.” Jared laughed and told us how we would all squash into his Porsche and be a party of White Knights in Shining Armor, racing up to the bus station!

“Good thing it’s a Friday and everybody’s parents are out,” said Jared happily. “Otherwise they’d ruin this by going themselves, or telephoning the police in Albany to
get her. Oh, this is wonderful! Ansley, get everything in the refrigerator so we’ll have plenty to eat. Emily, choose some good tapes for the drive! Paul, add up everybody’s cash. We need money.”

I collected wallets and purses and threw it all in a pile.

And I began laughing with Jared.

It was pretty wonderful.

Jennie was okay—and I am too.

I made it. Everybody I know helped me, whether I wanted it or not. And Jennie, she’ll make it too. And my mother: I think Mom is going to make it.

Some of the anger and jealousy and worry seeped out of me.

My laughter was real.

Life could begin again.

Unclassified.

Emily said dubiously, “I’m not sure we should make a party out of this. Do you think Jennie wants us to arrive celebrating, with Cokes and cassettes?”

Ansley said, “Darling, Jennie wants friends. Four is better than one.”

She was all right. I knew she would be.

She was dirty and hungry, but she wasn’t suicidal or anything.

We all hugged.

It was slow, and it was circular, first me hugging her, and then Jared (and we’re the two who matter least of all), and then Paul Classified, and then, at last, Emily. And the hug with Emily—oh, the hug of a friend who forgives you and you forgive her—oh, that was a hug to see.

Paul asked me out.

Paul asked me out.

Paul asked me out.

Paul asked me out!

Paul !!! asked !!! me!!! out!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

(He did. It’s true.)

I never thought I would do a normal thing like go out on a date with a girl. I thought I would spend the rest of my life trying to keep my mother afloat. Mr. Lowe said bit by bit being normal will come back to me and it won’t really be that hard.

Emily was so pleased that I asked her. I didn’t know
she would be that pleased. I thought she would say yes, or I wouldn’t have asked her—but I didn’t know she would get all happy and giggly and give me a hug.

I haven’t had a hug in a long time. Friday night I hugged everyone I know.

It was pretty great.

I could get into that kind of thing.

The journals were due today.

Miss MacBeth was late to class, and we all sat there, hugging our diaries. Afraid to let go of them.

Hillary tore half hers out. She doesn’t think Miss MacBeth will notice but I know Miss MacBeth will. I bet she doesn’t grade Hill down, though. She’ll figure if the entries meant so much they had to be destroyed, then Hill’s diary was the best of all.

Ansley asked who was going to keep on with a journal now that we don’t have to. If anybody is, nobody admitted it.

Well, I’m going to keep a diary forever, and I’ll never tell a soul. Not The Awesome Threesome, not my mother, not Miss MacBeth, not even Paul. This diary will be for me. I have a new stenography notebook clipped inside my American history three-ring notebook. I’m writing in it now, and nobody in this room has noticed. They’re watching—who else?—Jennie.

Jennie doesn’t have a diary to pass in. She lost it in
the bus station. “You’re going to get a zero,” Jared said to her.

Jennie shrugged. Imagine Jennie Quint shrugging. She said, “It’s only a diary I lost. I found the things that count.”

Emily’s Diary Number Two.

May it contain the things that count.