She Died Too Young

by Lurlene McDaniel

  “Loose ends?” Jillian repeated. “Like unfinished business? You know, like your crush on DJ?”

  Chelsea had hoped that Jillian had forgotten her earlier observation. “Your brother’s a cute guy. I don’t get to be around all that many. Plus, he’s so sure of himself. And friendly.”

  Jillian blew air through pursed lips. “Well, if I had my way, he’d notice you instead of Shelby.”

  “I don’t know this Shelby, but what have you got against her? You always seem down on her, and I know that you’re really a caring person.”

  Jillian flashed Chelsea a look that said, Sure-that’s-me, Miss Nice-nice, and both girls giggled. “Shelby’s a real pain,” Jillian said once they’d recovered from their giggle fit. “She treats me like I’m an untouchable.”

  “Explain.”

  “I guess there are people in the world who because they are physically perfect can’t abide people who aren’t. Shelby’s one of them. She’s a knockout in the looks department.”

  The information sent a sinking sensation through Chelsea’s stomach. She recalled how pretty Lacey was, but even Lacey hadn’t acted stuck-up about her beauty. Maybe because she had an incurable illness. Chelsea didn’t know. “So, Shelby’s drop-dead pretty. How does she treat you?”

  “Like I’m some kind of freak. Oh, she’s nice enough to my face when DJ’s around, but the minute his back is turned, she’s downright hateful. You’d think what I’ve got—bad heart and lungs—might be catching or something.”

  Chelsea saw that Jillian was trying to act as if Shelby’s attitude only made her angry. But she could tell that although Jillian hid her feelings behind a mask of humor, she was hurt by Shelby’s rejection. “She’s ignorant, that’s all.”

  “Don’t you think I’ve tried to educate her? I really have tried to like this girl, Chelsea. She and DJ have been a twosome ever since we were in eighth grade together.”

  A quick calculation told Chelsea that DJ’s romance with Shelby had been going on for three years. No simple little schooltime crush by that measure, she told herself.

  Jillian continued. “I figured that if she meant that much to DJ, I should try to like her. But she’s impossible to like.”

  “How so?”

  Jillian dropped her head downward so that her thick head of red hair half hid her face. “I heard her making fun of me to some other girls. I was waiting by the gym after a football game. DJ plays on the high school team,” she explained. “Anyway, I was standing sort of to one side in the shadows, and I heard Shelby imitating me for her friends … you know … the way I sound when I can’t catch my breath, when I’m wheezing and trying not to black out because the pain is so bad.”

  Chelsea knew. Shelby’s insensitivity made her furious for Jillian’s sake. “That’s not right,” she said.

  “They laughed at her imitation. All those girls stood there and laughed, like it was one big joke. And Shelby went on and on making fun of me and making them laugh at me.”

  Jillian’s hurt seemed real enough to touch. “Why didn’t you tell DJ? I’ll bet he would have broken up with her over it.”

  “He probably would have,” Jillian agreed, raising her head. “But I won’t stoop to her level. And besides, if I did, then their breakup would always be my fault instead of hers. And I want DJ to see her for what she really is and break off with her because of that, not because I tattled on her.”

  Chelsea wasn’t sure she would have chosen such a course had it been her instead of Jillian, but she felt a growing respect toward Jillian because of her philosophy. “Hurting people just to get even isn’t your style, is that what you’re saying?”

  Jillian grinned shyly. “I guess that’s it. See, I knew you understood me.”

  “But what if DJ doesn’t catch on?” Chelsea asked.

  “Given enough time, he will.” Jillian sounded ruefully confident and gave Chelsea a lopsided smile. “My daddy didn’t raise a bunch of dummies.”

  Chelsea poked Jillian’s arm playfully. “You’re right. He didn’t.”

  Jillian’s eyes locked with Chelsea’s. In that instant, Chelsea felt totally connected with her. The two of them might be sick, but at that moment, Chelsea felt she’d never known anybody like Jillian Longado, and she realized that never would she know anybody like her again.

  Jillian broke the connection by clearing her throat and asking, “You tell me all the time about this Jenny House and what fun you had there. I think maybe I should check the place out. What do you think?”

  “I told Katie the same thing,” Chelsea exclaimed. “You’d really like Jenny House. There’s no place else like it.” Chelsea’s face clouded momentarily. “The only problem I see is getting there. Katie thinks our doctors at the transplant program would give us a few days to go away, so long as we’re attached to our beepers.”

  “Wouldn’t that be a trauma,” Jillian said. “Just our luck to be off on vacation and have our beepers go off.”

  “So, I guess that may be a problem. Jenny House is in North Carolina—that’s a long drive by car.” Chelsea was remembering when Josh had driven down from Michigan to surprise Katie. He’d driven almost around the clock.

  “By car?” Jillian wrinkled her nose. “Who goes by car? We’ll fly down.”

  Chelsea wasn’t so sure her parents could afford such a weekend excursion for her. Nor was she certain Katie would be able to spend money on such a trip either. Still, it would be so much fun to show Jenny House to Jillian. The virtual reality games, the room where she’d spent the summer, the portrait of Jenny, maybe even the mountain plateau that held the makeshift memorial to Amanda. “Flying’s expensive,” Chelsea hedged.

  “So, who cares?”

  “You can’t pay for all of us,” Chelsea said. “I mean, that’s too much to ask.”

  “So, who’s going to pay commercial rates? We’ll use Daddy’s plane.”

  Dumbstruck, Chelsea stared, open-mouthed. “Your father has his own plane?”

  “Of course. How do you think he and DJ get here from Texas most every weekend? They don’t depend on commercial flights.”

  A laugh started down in Chelsea’s throat and bubbled to the surface. “Your own plane. Why am I not surprised?” She used one of Jillian’s favorite phrases.

  “You’re starting to sound like me—get help,” Jillian said with a giggle.

  “I’ve never known anyone with her own plane. And her own gold-plated Monopoly game.”

  “I told you that we do things in a big way in Texas.”

  “I think Katie should be the one to call Mr. Holloway—he’s the director at Jenny House—and find out if we can come.”

  “If?” Jillian asked, arching an eyebrow. “We’d better get to go. If he gives us any trouble, I might have to do something drastic.”

  “Like what?”

  “I just might have to have Daddy buy the place for me.”

  Chelsea collapsed in a fit of laughter. “You’d do that, wouldn’t you?”

  “I would.” Jillian’s blue eyes twinkled. “And who knows? For a really good friend, I just might be willing to throw in my brother as a booby prize.”

  Nine

  IT WAS DECIDED that the girls would visit Jenny House over Thanksgiving weekend. Chelsea’s father came for turkey and all the trimmings at Katie’s house on Thanksgiving Day, and early on Friday morning, when most of the country headed for the malls to officially begin Christmas shopping, Katie, Chelsea, and Jillian went to the airport, where Mr. Longado had his private jet fueled and waiting for the trip to North Carolina.

  Chelsea could tell that all three sets of parents were nervous about the trip, but Jillian’s dad had arranged to send a private nurse with them, and that made the anxious goodbyes less traumatic. The head of the transplant program had given his blessings for the trip, reminding them that because of the private jet, Jillian and Chelsea could easily be brought home should a potential donor be found.

  When the girls were at last settled into
their seats and the jet was taxiing down the runway for takeoff, Chelsea breathed a sigh of relief and gave a thumbs-up signal to her friends. Jillian smiled and leaned back against the seat. Chelsea thought Jillian looked tired and recognized the bluish cast on her lips as a sign that she was working for each breath. Every so often throughout the flight, the nurse took blood pressures, and offered Jillian oxygen, which made her breathing easier.

  The plane was met at the Asheville airport by Richard Holloway himself. He hugged Katie and Chelsea, shook Jillian’s hand, and gave her a hearty welcome. As they walked the hundred yards to his car, parked with special permission to the side of the runway, Jillian whispered, “He’s good-looking. For an older guy, that is.”

  At the car, a blond girl threw open the door and bounced out. “Lacey!” Chelsea cried, throwing her arms around her. “No one told me you’d be here.”

  Chelsea looked at Katie, who shrugged innocently. “Surprise,” Katie said.

  Lacey’s smile lit up her face. “I asked Katie to keep it a secret. Besides, until yesterday, I wasn’t sure I’d actually get to come.”

  Nervously, Chelsea introduced Jillian. She wanted Lacey and Jillian to like each other. “So, you’re from Texas,” Lacey said, studying Jillian and then the plane off in the distance. “Is that one of your Texas-size dragonflies?”

  Jillian grinned. “How’d you guess?”

  “I’ve heard everything comes bigger in Texas. I’m glad to meet you. Chelsea’s written something about you in every letter to me.”

  “Good stuff, I hope.”

  “The best.”

  It pleased Chelsea that Lacey was actually trying to be friendly. Chelsea had never been able to second-guess Lacey—one minute she was sweet and nice; the next, as prickly as a cactus. Katie had told her that some of Lacey’s mood swings were related to her diabetes.

  Chelsea listened while Lacey and Katie swapped stories about school. She felt the old, familiar twinge of envy because she’d never been able to attend a regular school. Lacey told of her fascination with Todd, and Chelsea thought of her hopeless crush on DJ.

  “Just wait until Chelsea and I get our new hearts,” Jillian said. “We’ll have guys falling at our feet and a hundred stories to tell.”

  “How will we do that?” Chelsea asked. “Trip them?”

  The others giggled, but Jillian waved Chelsea’s comment away. “I was thinking we could use Lacey and Katie as bait, and when the guys gather like flies, we’ll rope them in.”

  “That’s what I’ve always dreamed of—a guy hog-tied at my feet,” Chelsea remarked with a straight face.

  “We’ll charm them over. Who knows? New hearts may make us real daring.”

  The car wound its way up the drive of Jenny House. Only months before, the trees had been thick and green with leaves. Now, the last vestiges of autumn color clung to the few leaves that still hung on the branches. “Fall’s pretty,” Lacey commented, staring out the window. “Where I come from, it’s always summertime.”

  “Same way in Texas,” Jillian declared. “Course, if I asked Daddy, he’d paint the leaves like autumn for me.” She paused, then added with a grin, “If we had trees in Texas.”

  They all laughed, including Mr. Holloway. The car rounded a bend, and Jenny House came into view. The great stone, glass, and wood building, surrounded by jutting wooden decks, looked as sturdy as the mountains behind it. The sight brought a lump to Chelsea’s throat. What a wonderful time she’d had here last summer, in spite of losing Amanda. Jenny House had been her first real escape from her world of sickness and hospitals.

  “Welcome to our little cabin in the woods,” Mr. Holloway said, pulling the car as close to the front wooden deck as possible.

  “Some cabin,” Jillian declared. “I like it.”

  “Good thing,” he replied. “It’d be tough to rebuild in a weekend if you didn’t like it.”

  The staff greeted the girls, who followed Mr. Holloway up to the dorm room that had been theirs during the summer.

  “I wasn’t sure if you’d want your old room or not,” he said. “I thought I’d let you decide.”

  Except for Jillian, all their gazes focused on the bed that had been Amanda’s.

  “This will be fine,” Katie said after making eye contact with Lacey and Chelsea for their approval. “This one’s yours, Jillian.” Katie walked briskly to Amanda’s former bed and tossed Jillian’s small duffel bag beside it.

  Jillian stretched out and patted the bedspread. “Baby Bear thinks this bed is just right. And she’ll take real good care of it.”

  Katie jogged down the trail, kicking up dry leaves as she ran. She hoped Lacey was already waiting at the small rest area midway between Jenny House and the walking trail. Katie would have been on time for their meeting if she hadn’t waited while the nurse had settled Jillian and Chelsea for afternoon naps. But she had waited, feeling a responsibility toward her two friends she was unable to explain.

  Katie leapt over a tree branch that had fallen across the trail without breaking stride. In March, track season would begin, and with it, her final shot at a track scholarship. She needed to stay in shape. She jogged off the trail, through a stand of trees, and saw the wooden table and benches in the distance. Lacey was sitting atop the table, her hands shoved deep in the pockets of a wool jacket.

  “Sorry I’m late,” Katie said as she came to the table. She sat on the bench, facing toward Lacey.

  “Aren’t you even winded?” Lacey asked.

  “It’s only half a mile,” Katie insisted. “The mile run is my best event, you know.”

  “Whoopee,” Lacey grumbled through chattering teeth. “It’s cold out here. When I left Miami, it was seventy-five degrees. Why couldn’t we have met down in one of the rec rooms?”

  “I didn’t think about it,” Katie admitted. “I like being outside.”

  “Well, back-to-nature isn’t my best event.” Lacey hugged her jacket tighter to herself. “Before I forget and before you think I’m an ingrate, thanks for the airplane ticket up here. I couldn’t have come if you hadn’t sent me the money. And I really wanted to come.”

  “It’s no big deal,” Katie said. “I dipped into my Wish money, but that’s what it’s there for—to do a few things I want to do when I want to do them. Besides, I got a real cheap fare.”

  “Anyway, it was nice of you. I was green with envy thinking about the three of you coming here without me. Jillian is quite a character, isn’t she?”

  “I like her. She’s been great for Chelsea. I’m in school, and she’s got nothing else to do but lie around the house all day and wait for her beeper to go off. I can tell you from personal experience, it’s no picnic.”

  “She has a tutor, doesn’t she?”

  “Yes, but that gets boring too.”

  “Tell me about it. If it weren’t for attending classes and studying, school would be the perfect place for me.”

  Katie laughed. “I like school, so I can’t identify.

  So far this year, I’m doing great. I’ve got A’s and B’s going in every class, especially—”

  Lacey held up her hand, stopping Katie’s flood of words. “Let’s just cut to the bottom line, Katie, before I freeze to death out here.”

  “What do you mean? What bottom line?”

  Lacey leaned downward until her nose was inches from Katie’s. “I want to know the reason you told me to meet you. The real reason you bought me the ticket and wanted me to come all the way to Jenny House for three days. Tell me, Katie. I’m waiting.”

  Ten

  FLUSTERED, KATIE GIANCED around the woods as if checking to see if anyone else might be listening. “I don’t know what you mean. I wanted you to be with us. Just like this summer.”

  “I appreciate that. What I don’t appreciate is freezing my butt off out here because you want to talk privately and can’t figure a better place to meet.”

  Katie suppressed a smile. “Don’t be cross. You’re right…. I do want t
o talk to you privately.”

  “I knew it!” Lacey straightened triumphantly. “I knew something else was going on. So, tell me. What’s up?”

  Katie looked sheepish, but refused to be hurried. “First, I want you to tell me how things are for you at home. Your letters sound full of doom and gloom.”

  Lacey’s pretty mouth formed a thin line. “Same old, same old,” she said. “My parents aren’t making it. I’m betting that once the Christmas holidays are over, Dad will move out.”

  Katie felt a sinking sensation. “That’s too bad.” She remembered when her own parents were having troubles, but things had cleared up once the pressure of her transplant was off. Once it was evident she was going to live. “Are you sure?”

  “I’m sure. Dad’s sleeping in the guest room every night. So—are you going to tell me what’s going on with you or not?”

  Suddenly, Katie’s personal problems seemed petty and small. She shouldn’t be dumping on Lacey, who obviously had real problems. “It’s kind of dumb really,” Katie began.

  “Don’t let that stop you.”

  Katie took a deep breath. “I’ve been having second thoughts about Josh and me.”

  Lacey looked stunned. “You and Josh? But, Katie, you two are like an institution. A fixture. I remember how crazy you were about each other this summer. What’s gone wrong?”

  “Nothing … really. I’m just not sure I should be so serious about him. I mean, I want to go away to college and all, and if I go far away, how can we keep together? It’s not fair for us to expect each other to not date anyone else. Is it?”

  Lacey’s eyes narrowed. “Is there another guy in your life, Katie?”

  Katie felt color creep up her neck and a hot wave of embarrassment roll over her. Was she so transparent that Lacey had seen through her so quickly? “Um—not exactly.” The image of Garrison intruded into her thoughts. “There is a guy in my English class. We’ve been working on a paper together—a very important paper. It’ll count for half of our semester grade. Anyway, I spend a lot of time with him because of the paper, and Josh isn’t very happy about it.”