Whatever Happened to Janie? (10 page)

Janie had been their light.

Reeve did not understand why Janie had to be gone forever, why there could be no swapping or weekending, but the family in New Jersey had been firm. This is
our
daughter, they said. You didn’t know you were stealing her, but you did. Your time is up. We’re bringing her home. Do not interfere.

Even Reeve got his marching orders: do not interfere.

Settle in, that was the big phrase. Janie had to “settle in.” Then Reeve might be allowed to get in touch with her. Might. Nothing was certain.

Janie had written him twice from school. Letters scribbled surreptitiously during class. Ripped from spiral notebooks, stamped and mailed by a girl named Chrissy who sat next to Janie in choir.

The whole thing was wrong. They were piling more secrets on a girl who could hold no more, and now she was adding secrets of her own. Reeve
thought she might collapse under the weight of secrets.

He still saw Mr. and Mrs. Johnson going to work or out for dinner or bringing in groceries. They still called hello to him, and asked how school was going. But they never mentioned Janie.

He’d asked his mother why not.

“They don’t want to break down,” said his mother. “They can’t start crying. They’d never stop.”

“Does Mrs. Johnson talk to you about it?” Reeve wanted to know.

Girls talked so much more than boys. He had listened to Janie enough hours to know they needed talk more. It wasn’t just the accumulating facts of her kidnapping that had overwhelmed Reeve, it was the number of times Janie needed to analyze them. Why wasn’t once enough? Why did girls need to talk so much?

Reeve preferred action. Physical action. Every time he and Janie had been ready to move beyond kissing, it turned out that only he was ready; Janie was just ready for more talk.

There were times when he felt this was her master plan, to distract him.

Nothing had ever distracted Reeve from Janie’s body.

But he was eighteen now, and had been accepted at college. He was in a different car-insurance category, and he could vote, and enter the army … and on a Saturday in March, he could drive to New Jersey with or without parental permission.

He wanted to flourish the letter in front of
Janie. See Janie’s eyes light up. Hear Janie’s cry of delight. He wanted Janie to wrap her arms around him, and tell him how brilliant he was, and what a magnificent future lay ahead of him.

Then he wanted to get in the Jeep and drive her to some secluded spot.

When it came to fantasies, he had had them all.

On the telephone, Caitlin said, “Maybe you could think of Jennie as an exchange student. You know. From Nigeria or Mongolia. And naturally she has different customs and different habits. And doesn’t even speak your language. And so naturally she’s homesick.”

Cait was always sure of her psychology. She referred to herself as Jodie’s best friend. And that might be true, but it was not what Jodie wanted. Jodie wanted her sister to be her best friend. “I guess I’m not mad at Jennie so much as I’m mad at myself,” said Jodie. Think of her as an exchange student, she thought. It wasn’t such a bad idea. No matter what Jennie’s like, she promised herself, I’ll be a diplomat. I will be the ambassador to Jennie’s foreign country. “I shouldn’t have yelled,” said Jodie. “I should have hung on to my temper.”

“Yes,” agreed Cait. “You were a total jerk and lost everything you’d gained.”

Best friends, thought Jodie, or sisters, don’t call you a total jerk. They stick by you.

She wondered if she had either a best friend or a sister.

She got off the phone. She was too depressed to talk. That was depressed. She avoided her own
room; Jennie was in there. She headed down to the playroom instead. When the phone rang in the kitchen, she didn’t even race to the bottom of the stairs to see if it was for her.

“Mommy!” said Janie. She was so happy. Her mother had not once telephoned her; Janie had done all the calling home.

But it was not a happy call. “Sweetie, Frank and I have spent a long time on the phone with Mr. and Mrs. Spring.”

Not “your father and I” but “Frank and I.” Janie’s heart clutched.

“Janie, this is the most terrible thing I have ever had to say. Please forgive me for saying it. I love you, and that’s why I’m saying this. You are with your mother and father now. They seem like wonderful people, sweetheart. We knew they’d be. They’re
your
parents after all. And they’ve told us everything. You’re not trying, darling. You’re not trying at all. I want you to try, honey.”

Honey. Sweetheart. Darling. But not, and never again, Daughter.

“It’s hard,” said Janie, her throat filling up and her eyes overflowing.

“It’s hard here, too.” No mother is made of material tough enough to give away her baby without weeping.

“Does Daddy want me to try?”

Her mother sobbed once, and then her father came on the line. “Yes, honey, I want you to try,” he said. “We brought you up. We brought you up to be good and decent and loving. Your mother believes in
helping others; she believes that the purpose of our being on earth. We tried to teach you that. And now the people you have to help are your own mother, your own father, your three brothers, and your sister.”

“What if I love you better? What if I want to come home?”

“Ah, baby,” said her father. “In this field of wrongs, there has to be a right somewhere. And it’s right for you to be back with your real family.”

Write your resolutions down, they said next. You always loved to keep special notebooks and diaries. Resolve that you’re going to be a Spring.

Talk about blackmail, thought Janie resentfully. She was actually glad to say good-bye to Mommy and Daddy. Whose side were they on, anyway?

Alone—for once—in Jodie’s bedroom, Janie got out the blue cloth three-ring binder. What they had been through together, she and this notebook! Lying inside was the flattened milk carton that had gotten her here. If only she had never stolen Sarah-Charlotte’s milk. None of this would have happened.

Wouldn’t they all be much happier? Even Mrs. Spring—wouldn’t she be happier without this hostile enemy daughter in her home?

But that’s what my parents mean, thought Janie Johnson. Stop being a hostile enemy daughter.

She opened the binder to a fresh page. The familiar white paper with the thin blue lines and red margin marker stared back. Connecticut, New Jersey, or California—they all used the same paper
in school. One by one, she wrote, not New Year’s Resolutions, but New Family Resolutions.

• I will call Mr. and Mrs. Spring Mom and Dad.
  

• When the Springs say, “Jennie?” I will answer instead of looking around as if I don’t know who they’re talking about.
  

• I will stop daydreaming that I am still Janie Johnson.
  

• I will fit in.
  

• I will not cry myself to sleep and I will not hide in the girls’ room at school and cry there either.
  

Well, that seemed like enough. She should be able to break those resolutions in twenty-four hours or so.

Doing it was different.

This was the house around which Reeve and Janie had skulked when they were trying to figure out the milk-carton secret. Back when Janie was sure it was a fantasy created by her subconscious. But they had seen those red-haired twins get off the school bus and known: the milk carton told the truth.

Reeve parked the Jeep in the road.

His eighteenth year had turned him into a man. His arms and legs had thickened. Weight lifting and track, which he loved because the sports taxed him and because they were almost, but not quite, solitary, had come through for him. He could feel the impact of himself. He felt safer inside himself because of the size of his body and the power of his
muscles. How awful Janie must feel, he suddenly thought, so light and fragile, a person whose position can be shifted by anybody stronger.

For a moment he didn’t feel very strong either. Then he walked up and rang the bell. Harder than track. The front door opened. This had to be the oldest brother: Stephen. Also a senior, but a year younger than Reeve. Still skinny. Still a growing boy.

How Reeve used to hate that phrase. He got it a lot at Christmas when relatives materialized. My, you’re a growing boy! Grown now, he thought gladly. “Hi,” he said, extending his hand. “You must be Stephen. I’m Reeve Shields. Janie’s boyfriend.”

Stephen, slightly stunned, let him in. Reeve was in luck—or out of it, depending on what happened next: the parents were right there. Reeve introduced himself to Mr. and Mrs. Spring.

“You’re the young man who drove her down here last fall,” said Mr. Spring. “Have a seat. Hungry?”

Reeve, who was always hungry, liked him immediately and was surprised. He had cast Mr. and Mrs. Spring as The Enemy. Mr. Spring was an inch shorter than Reeve, which was nice. However, he was several inches broader in the shoulders and many pounds heavier. He had a beard that looked like nothing so much as Janie’s hair pasted on his chin. Reeve could not imagine wanting that around your mouth and all over your throat.

But then, Reeve was new enough to shaving that he still thought standing in front of that mirror and using that razor was the best thing that had
ever happened to him. Sex would be better, but sex was harder to get than razors. “Is Janie home?”

“Jennie,” Mr. Spring corrected him. “Yes, she is.”

“Yes, I am!” said Janie, coming into the room.

Reeve turned, and even though he knew how glad he would be to see her, still, he was amazed at how
very
glad he was to see her.

The sight of Janie Johnson made him laugh and want to throw things. All his life Reeve had reacted to good news and bad by wanting to throw things. It was a habit his parents had tried to end for years. Now he wanted to gather Janie in his arms and throw her in the air and catch her.

So he did.

T
he boy actually asked Dad’s permission to take Jennie out for the rest of Saturday.

Jodie knew Dad didn’t want to say yes, and also knew Dad didn’t have grounds for refusing either. Dad had to confine himself to saying, “You have a five-hour drive to get home, don’t you, Reeve?”

“Yes, sir.” Jodie knew Dad would love that “sir.” The boy even looked military, with that buzz cut and those broad shoulders.

“When do you need to leave in order to get home at a reasonable hour?”

The boy grinned. This is one good-looking guy, thought Jodie. No wonder Jennie isn’t interested in anybody else! I should be so lucky!

The boy said, “Mom and Dad get pretty worked up if I’m not home by one A.M. on a Saturday.”

“Then I guess you and my daughter had better be here by eight.”

“Thanks,” said the boy, heaving a huge sigh of relief.

Jodie was astonished. If Dad had said, “You can’t take her anywhere,” Reeve would have obeyed.

Jennie was dancing in circles around Reeve, using him like a ballerina’s bar. Her fingertips traveled everywhere on his chest and back and arms. Jodie would not have recognized her.

This is the sister we want, thought Jodie. This thrilled, laughing, happy, giddy girl is Jennie. We haven’t had this Jennie. She hasn’t given us this.

Would Reeve’s visit break the ice? Would Jennie come home able to laugh and dance and parade? Or would Jennie miss him so much when he left that she would get even more somber and quiet?

Was Jennie like this with her parents?

Parents.

Jodie caught the word in her mind. No letting herself think of Mr. and Mrs. Johnson as Jennie’s parents.

Jodie watched through a slit in the front curtains as Reeve and Jennie went out to his Jeep. Reeve was big and solid. Jennie was small next to him, but a whirlwind—more energy in her this moment than in all the weeks she had lived with the Springs.

She’s in love, thought Jodie, who had had crushes, but never what she would have considered true love. Jodie was waiting for love, thinking of it continually, hoping each new school day, dreaming before each new event, grieving every night, for true love had not yet arrived.

“She’s in love,” said Mom, looking out the same curtain opening.

Dad put his arms around Mom and hugged her hard. “So am I,” he said, kissing her on the lips. They had tears in their eyes.

The Jeep drove away.

“She’s so beautiful,” whispered Mom.

Dad nodded. “At least we know what we’re aiming for. That laugh. That eagerness. That energy.”

“We won’t get it,” said Stephen. “She’ll keep it for them.”

Janie had not forgotten she was in love with Reeve, but so many worries had interfered. So much new business. So many strangers.

The sight of him—so poised and at ease in the crowded living room, his dark complexion such a contrast to the fair, freckled faces of her new family—slugged her. Her boyfriend filled her whole horizon and her whole mind. “Reeve!” she shouted, although it came out a whisper.

Reeve was here.
He had driven five hours, through New York City traffic, paying tolls, buying gas, and ignoring the orders of three sets of parents: his, hers, and her second pair.