Friendship

The new girl stood over by the jungle gym, not climbing or talking to the other girls, but just standing there, peering into a brown lunch bag. She pulled something out of it, but I couldn’t see what it was from the distance. Matt, a skinny boy with round glasses, was talking about a scary show he had watched on television. “I wasn’t scared,” Matt boasted. “I thought it was stupid.” We all looked in awe at Matt, and told him of our own bravery stories. Still, out of the corner of my eye, I saw the new girl. She was now examining the object taken from the bag earlier. The new girl had come to our class at the beginning of the week, and Miss Emily, our kindergarten teacher, had introduced her, but I couldn’t remember her name. My curiosity got the better of me, and I walked over to the girl. I was too shy to say anything, however, so we just stood there, looking at each other. Finally, the new girl held out her hand, holding out the thing she had taken from her lunch bag, offering it to me. It was a pear. A red one. “Thanks,” I said, softly. I took the pear from her, and the girl giggled. “I’m Jenny.” “I’m Jason,” I said, and a little pear juice dribbled down my chin. I took the pear from her, and the girl giggled. I’m Jenny” “That’s funny,” said Jenny, giggling again. “Our names both start with ‘juh’.” Then, both of us broke into unexplainable fits of laughter, and whenever one of us began to calm down, the other one would continue to giggle. This would result in even more laughter, making it harder for either of us to stop. “Class!” Miss Emily called from outside the school door. “Time to come back inside!” Jenny and I swallowed our laughter, and separated into our groups, me with the boys, and Jenny with the girls. However, even in our different groups, we smiled at each other before naptime. *          *          * “I’m going to Jenny’s! I’m going to Jenny’s!” Thank goodness my seatbelt was tightly fastened; I was practically bouncing off the walls of my family’s minivan. My mother, up in the front seat, was begging me to keep calm. “We’re almost there,” she told me. But I didn’t listen, because I was going over to Jenny’s house. “I have lots of fun stuff to do,” Jenny had told me earlier that week. “Legos, roller skates, and . . .” Jenny’s eyes grew wide “. . . Barbies.” I had frowned. “Barbies? I don’t like Barbies. They’re for girls.” Jenny shrugged, not seeming hurt in the least. “That’s OK. There’s my dog, Max, and . . .” Our van pulled up in front of a nice, brick house with a colorful flower garden in the front. It was a small house, but it fit so well with my imagination’s former version of the house. On the porch, in the front of the house, there was a porch swing and on the swing sat a young girl. “Jenny!” I ran out to greet my friend. “Hi, Jason!” Jenny smiled, then waved at my mom, who was walking up the walk. A friendly-looking woman came out of the front door of the house, and smiled at me. “Hello, Jason. I’m Mrs. Weber, Jenny’s mom.” “Hi,” I said, growing shy. Our mothers began talking to each other about very motherly things, so Jenny took my hand and led me inside. “You can meet Max now.” We played all afternoon. We played with Legos, built castles in her sandbox, and played hide-and-seek. Once we got exhausted from playing, we went back to the kitchen, where our mothers were now talking at the counter. Jenny’s mom smiled at us when we walked in. “My cookies are almost out of the oven.” Jenny squealed with delight. “Mom makes the best cookies!” The timer rang, and Jenny and I greedily ate the chewy chocolate-chip cookies. “Mmmm!” I exclaimed. There were several more visits at Jenny’s, and I enjoyed every second I spent there. Then the inevitable teasing began. “Hey, Jason, is Jenny your girlfriend?” the boys would say. “Stay away from Jason, he’s got cooties, too!” That’s when I stopped playing with Jenny. Without me, Jenny was friendless. She had given me her friendship, and had trusted me, but, even in kindergarten, I had my reputation to look after. I often saw Jenny sitting on a swing, alone, swaying a little, but not attempting to go over the top of the swing set, like she used to. Sometimes our eyes would meet, and when that happened, I would quickly look away. *          *          * I was skateboarding to school that day. It was my first day of the eighth grade, and I had spiked my hair just for the occasion. One girl I passed obviously didn’t care how she looked on the first day of school. She was wearing an ugly brown sweater, and her long, brown hair was wet. I snickered as she tripped over her untied shoelaces. At lunch, after I was reunited with my old friends, our conversations got off the subject of how we spent our summer vacations, but on the other people in the school. “Who’s that?” I asked, motioning toward the girl I had seen on my way to school. Alex turned around to look at her. She was eating a sandwich at an empty table. “That’s Jennifer Weber,” he said. “Her dad gets transferred a lot. She was here, back in the old days.” Alex chuckled. “She’s really weird and depressed and stuff,” Matt said. They kept talking about Jennifer’s abnormality, but my mind was elsewhere. Jennifer Weber. Jennifer Weber. Jenny Weber. Jenny. A picture of a red pear and chocolate-chip cookie came into my mind. Then an image of a little girl, sitting alone on a swing. This image stayed a long time in

Amy sat on the cold concrete steps resting her chin on her fist, while the other hand clutched an ink-blotted letter. She stared at the sign three doors down that had a big red line crossing out the words “For Sale.” Under it in small letters it said “Sold!” Slowly a tear rolled down her cheek and plopped down onto the letter, smudging the words “Dear Amy.” She scrunched it up into a wad and threw it carelessly toward a trash can, missing it by a foot or two. She heaved a sigh and stooped down to pick it back up, knowing that if she didn’t, her mother might read it. Amy stuffed the letter into her jeans pocket, making a big lump. She shuffled across the street to Emily’s house, as if there was one last hope of her being there. Amy looked down at the latch on the gate. Did she dare? No, of course not! It wasn’t her house . . . but then again the new family wasn’t moving in until September, and it was only July. She opened the metal latch, letting it slowly creak open as she remembered the words on the letter she had almost thrown away. “Amy, look under the big rock in my backyard. Love, Emily.” She pulled the wad of paper from her pocket, carefully folded it into a neat square, and put it back in her jeans. She walked around the house to the backyard, looking for “the big rock.” She spotted a large lumpy one in the corner of the yard under a hedge, only to find a few squashed worms and a bunch of red ants underneath it. “Ugh!” she cried and jumped back, letting the rock thump down to the ground. Nearby she saw a reddish-brown rock that she and Emily had often covered with a blanket for their dolls to have tea on. She pulled it back and there it was, a miniature copper teapot in the folds of a red-and-white checkered doll blanket. She used her thumb to brush a few grains of dirt from the teapot, and carried it and the blanket home like they were pieces of fragile glass. She spread out the little blanket with the teapot and sat Sarah down across from the new doll She shoved open the door of her house and was greeted by the fragrance of home-baked chocolate-chip cookies. “Amy, what have you been doing all this time?” asked her mother curiously. “Oh, nothing,” Amy said, not wanting to admit to her that she had trespassed at Emily’s old house. She grabbed a hunk of cookie dough and was just ready to stuff it into her mouth when she heard, “Not until after dinner,” and felt the dough snatched from her hand. “By the way, a letter came for you today, I meant to tell you earlier, but you were out so long, worrying me to death by the way.” “Thanks,” said Amy, grabbing the letter and shrugging off her mother’s concern, as she ran up the stairs to her room. She jumped into bed and let her hair hang over the side while she read the letter on her back. Dear Amy, New York is really great. I’ve made lots of friends at school, but there’s one special friend that I’ve been meaning to tell you about. Her name is Madeline. Last night we went to the movies together. The ticket lady was really nice. She let Madeline in for free! Amy felt a surge of anger run up her spine and into her mouth, making her want to shout. She was hot and confused, and almost missed her mother’s voice shouting, “Amy, set the table. Now!” She dragged herself downstairs, covering her tears with her hair. When she sat down at the table with her parents her mother asked what was wrong. Her father, a tall, lanky man who was usually away at his office, told Amy if she wasn’t going to tell them what the matter was then please would she stop crying and eat her dinner. She sat there sulking, and for the rest of the meal ate in silence. During dinner she thought about how Emily and Madeline had become best friends. While she was shoveling peas into her mouth she wondered if Emily had room in her for two best friends. Probably not, she thought pessimistically. Just before dessert, Amy quietly asked to be excused, not in the mood for eating canned peaches and macaroons. In the late summer evening the sun was just beginning to set. She opened the back screen door, letting it slam behind her, and wandered across the damp, limp grass to her swing. Instead of sitting in the swing herself, she pushed the empty seat back and forth, then quickly remembered that this was what she and Emily had done with their dolls. She abruptly plopped down onto the plastic seat, and holding onto the ropes, she pushed off, pumping hard until her toes touched the branches of a magnolia tree. Then falling back toward the ground, she tilted her head back, letting the tips of her hair touch the blades of grass. Her head felt lighter, and she was able to begin writing a letter back to Emily in her head. It would say something like, “Dear Emily,” but Amy immediately frowned and crossed out “Dear” in her head. “Yesterday at nature camp a new girl came. Her name was Clorissa,” a name from Amy’s well-worn fairy tale book. She would tell Emily that she and Clorissa had won an award for picking the best herbs on the nature trail to make tea. She would say they spent all of their time together. She jumped off the swing and ran through the darkness back to her house. That night, sitting with a flashlight in bed, she carefully copied her thoughts onto paper. Then she fell asleep, and dreamed of the look on Emily’s