Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life

by Wendy Mass

  The chill now extends down my legs and out my arms. Lizzy grabs onto my arm. Tight. So tight that she’s cutting off my circulation. I choose my words carefully. “So what you’re saying is that your grandmother was a fraud? Not everyone she told that to actually died when they were forty, or, say, thirty-nine?”

  “Of course they didn’t!” she says. “Grandmama wasn’t a fraud, exactly. She just liked to mix things up a little. It gets boring saying the same old things. ‘You’ll meet the man of your dreams on a train!’ ‘You will have two children, a boy and a girl.’ ‘You’ll travel a lot.’ Read the small print.” She pulls two business cards out of the pocket of her long skirt and hands one to each of us. The card says FOR ENTERTAINMENT PURPOSES ONLY.

  “Hey!” Lizzy yells, looking up from the card. “What happened to your accent?”

  The woman shrugs. “You want a reading or not? I gotta nail appointment in a few minutes.”

  “You know, I think we’ll skip it this time,” Lizzy says. “Come on, Jeremy. Let’s get out of here.”

  I honestly don’t think my feet will move. I’m tempted to scream. My eyes begin to sting from holding back the tears I refuse to shed in front of the woman. I look her right in the eye and say, “Since he was thirteen, my father thought he was going to die when he was forty. He lived his whole life that way. He died a few months before his fortieth birthday.” Lizzy puts her hand back on my arm, but I shake it off. “Your grandmother cursed him!”

  The woman flinches. Then she says, “I am very sorry for your terrible loss. But Grandmama did not curse him. If anything, she blessed him.”

  “How do you figure that?” Lizzy growls.

  “We all live as if we are going to live forever. When you know you won’t, life looks different.”

  “Yeah, shorter!” Lizzy says. “Jeremy, can we go now?”

  “Just one more thing,” I say. “Where are the keys to the box my father left me?”

  “Jeremy!” Lizzy says. “How can you believe anything she says now?”

  I don’t reply. The woman closes her eyes. In that second, Lizzy grabs a stick of incense from the pile and shoves it in her pocket. It doesn’t even bother me.

  Madame Zaleski’s eyes pop open. In a trancelike voice she says, “You have already been very near to zhe keys vich you seek. You vil find zhem, but it vil take much vork.” She shakes her head like she’s clearing it. Holding out her hand, she says, “Five dollars, please.”

  “You have got to be kidding!” Lizzy says. “You’re lucky we don’t sue you! Come on, Jeremy.”

  I let Lizzy lead me out the door. The woman doesn’t try to stop us. We walk across the boardwalk, down a few wooden stairs, and onto the beach. All the while Lizzy is muttering “Some nerve!” and “That stupid accent was back at the end!” and “We should still sue her!”

  About halfway to the water, I plop down on the sand. It feels warm under my hands. Lizzy sits down next to me. “Are you all right? You haven’t said anything.”

  The sand starts to swim in front of my eyes and I quickly wipe away the tears. “It was just an accident,” I say softly.

  “What was?”

  “My dad’s death. It wasn’t his destiny to die young. It was just an accident.”

  Lizzy doesn’t reply. I watch as she scoops up a handful of sand and lets it run through her fingers. “Does that make it easier, or harder?”

  “I don’t know. Different, I guess. It makes me want to know what’s in the box even more. I hope whatever it is, at least part of it is a letter. I want to know what he was thinking when he made it for me.”

  “You already know. Even if we never find the keys. You already know what he was thinking.”

  “I do?”

  She nods.

  “You know what I don’t know?” I ask.

  She shakes her head.

  “I don’t know why you went up to be healed.”

  “Neither do I,” she replies.

  “Really?”

  She nods. “Do you always know why you do something?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, I don’t.”

  “So what was it like?”

  “It was… different. I felt… quiet. Like for a minute, my brain was quiet.”

  We don’t say anything for a minute. I watch two kids building a sand castle down by the water. A few seconds later the tide washes half of it away. But they don’t seem to mind. They just start right back up again.

  “What do you think about what the fortune-teller said?” I ask. “That we’ve already been very near the keys? What does that mean? Our apartments? The flea market? The store? If they really were in Harold’s office, we for sure can’t go back there.”

  “We can’t believe anything that comes out of her mouth. She just wanted her five dollars. Now come on,” Lizzy says, standing up and brushing the sand off her legs. “Let’s see if we can sneak into a casino and win a few bucks!”

  “Didn’t you tell my mother that you left your troublemaking days behind you?”

  “Hey, in Europe you can gamble when you’re younger. I saw it on TV.”

  “We’re in New Jersey, remember?”

  She shrugs. “So we’ll talk with a foreign accent.”

  “Anything other than Russian!”

  “I don’t think that even was Russian,” Lizzy says. “Come on. I’ll race you.”

  Before I can respond, she takes off toward the boardwalk. I can’t believe she managed to make me feel better. I watch her run, her ponytail bobbing behind her. I know with my freakishly long legs I could easily overtake her, even with her head start. But I don’t. Because that’s what best friends do for each other.

  Chapter 16: Flotsam and Jetsam

  Needless to say, we didn’t get into any of the casinos. Lizzy tried basically the only thing she remembered from French class last year. “Bonjour. Je ne comprend pas anglais,” she told the security guard at Bally’s, but he just laughed at her. After slices of pizza for lunch, Mom took us into Aunt Judi’s exhibit by sneaking us through the loading dock. If I thought my aunt’s artwork was weird, her sculptures were practically normal compared to some of the others on display.

  The ride home was much more comfortable, since Aunt Judi had sold four sculptures to some high roller who won five thousand dollars at roulette. “Always bet on your birthday,” the man had advised me, puffing on a cigar. “It’s your luckiest number.” I told him I’d remember that.

  Now I’m back in my bedroom trying to record my observations from the museum. This is the third H.O.J. that I’ve worked on it. Dr. Grady told us so much, I want to make sure I do it justice in my notebook. After filling my trash can with crumpled pages, I finally wind up with this:

  At the museum I learned that the universe is a lot more enormous than I thought. Every day, suns are born and die. Ours will die, too, one day. In the scheme of time, we are a new arrival to this place and are lucky to be here. In all of history, there will only be one Jeremy Fink (unless I do that time machine thing, and then there will be two of me, but I don’t really see that happening anymore), and only one of everyone else, too. I feel closer to Dog and Cat and Hamster and Ferret now, even though they are fish and I’m human. We are all connected at a deep, chemical level. We are inside the universe, and the universe is inside us. Even if we’re here for no other reason than because we’re here, I don’t think it relieves us of deciding what our own purpose here is. I still have to figure that out, but I don’t feel like I need to know right this instant anymore. I think I can wait to find out how many apples are inside me. (That last part came from Mr. Rudolph the other day.)

  The next morning, I’m in the middle of getting dressed when the phone rings. Mom answers it. A minute later she finds me in the bathroom brushing my teeth. “That was James,” she says. “Mr. Oswald isn’t feeling well. James said he’ll call us in a few days to see if Mr. Oswald is ready to have you come back to work.”

  I put down the toothbrush, my mouth stil
l filled with foam. “Is he okay?”

  “He said it wasn’t anything serious. I’m sure you don’t need to worry. This will give you time to practice for the fair. We leave in a week.”

  My eyes open wide. “It’s only a week away?”

  She nods. “The fair is earlier this year, so your grandmother and I planned the trip accordingly. I’m sorry, I thought you knew the dates.”

  I shake my head. “But that means I’ll be there during my birthday.”

  “Is that a problem?” she asks, handing me a towel to wipe my mouth.

  “It means I have even less time to find the keys to Dad’s box.”

  “Are you still caught up with that?” she asks worriedly. “I hope it’s not ruining your summer. Your dad wouldn’t have wanted that.”

  I quickly shake my head. “No, it’s not ruining my summer. It’s just making it… different. That’s all.”

  “I have to leave for work now,” she says. “Remember, things have a way of working themselves out. Not everything is in our control.”

  “I know, Mom. Believe me, I know.”

  “Good, because this morning you’re having oatmeal for breakfast. I didn’t forget our agreement that you’ll eat one new thing each week. It’s warming on the stove. Whole grain with peaches. You’ll love it!”

  My stomach grumbles in protest.

  “And I’ll know if you put it in the garbage disposal.”

  I roll my eyes. “Because mothers know everything.”

  “That’s right,” she says, looking in the mirror to attach today’s pin, READING ISN’T ONLY FUNDAMENTAL, IT’S FUN. “And don’t even think about feeding it to the fish.”

  After she leaves, I force myself to sit down and have a few spoonfuls of the glop in the pot. I bite into a piece of peach and almost gag. I have to pull it out of my mouth. Peach is one of my favorite flavors of Mentos. Why can’t I eat a real peach? Determined not to let it get the best of me, I pick out another piece of peach, use my napkin to wipe off the pieces of oatmeal stuck to it, and pop it in my mouth.

  Ten seconds later my stomach rebels, and I am kneeling over the toilet bowl saying goodbye to my first bowl of oatmeal. It looks exactly the same in the toilet as it did before I ate it. That’s just not right.

  I return to my room to find a note from Lizzy.

  Meet you outside to practice at noon? Dad won’t let me hula in the living room ever since I broke his great aunt’s vase.

  I scribble Okay and stick it back through the hole. I plop down on my bed with a comic, but before I open it, the words from the palm reader start running through my head. What if the keys are right here, under my nose? After all, I didn’t really search the apartment. Mom said they weren’t here, and I believed her, but what if she was wrong? Only one way to find out. I toss the comic book aside.

  Starting in the kitchen, I open every drawer as far as they’ll go. Underneath all the take-out menus I find a lot of buttons and paper clips and Post-it pads. Beads galore. Marbles, stamps (not old ones), an old postcard Grandma sent from a trip to the world’s largest ball of yarn, and assorted Tic Tacs. I find three keys, but I recognize them as being the front door keys of Dad’s store.

  There aren’t any drawers in the living room, but I look behind the drapes and under the coffee table and behind the bookshelves. I reach under Mongo, and my hand lands on something squishy. I grab hold of it, and pull out an orange bunny Peep from a long ago Easter. Even I wouldn’t eat it now. The scary thing is, it still looks perfectly fine. Dusty, but fine. I think Dr. Grady was wrong. At the end of the world will be bacteria, cockroaches, and Peeps.

  I feel weird looking through Mom’s room. I step inside, but then I hurry back out. I can’t do it. I’ll take her word that they just aren’t here.

  I slip a note through the wall and ask Lizzy to check in her apartment. After all, Mom had said that’s where the box was kept for a while. She writes back that she’ll check. Twenty minutes later I pull out a note and find two keys wrapped up in it.

  These were both in a little tray on my dad’s dresser. What do you think?

  I turn the keys over in my hand. They’re a bit smaller than the ones I think we need, but it’s worth a try. I bring them over to my desk and sit down in the chair. I slide the box toward me, but I can see without even trying that they’re definitely too small. I try them anyway, then wrap them back up and send them through. No note is necessary.

  At noon I meet Lizzy on the sidewalk. The hula hoop is zooming around her waist, and she’s wearing her old fake-grass skirt. It’s much shorter now than when she was eight. She’s gotten very good in the last week. Her props are on a towel next to her. I pick up the football and toss it to her. She catches it neatly this time.

  “The crowd roars,” she says, holding it above her head as she twists her hips.

  Walking toward us with a grocery bag swinging from each hand is Rick. I haven’t seen him since the whole invisible thing. Lizzy doesn’t notice him, since she’s facing the wrong way, and I don’t want her to get distracted. Lizzy tosses the ball back to me, and I catch it. Maybe he’ll walk by quietly, and she won’t even notice. No such luck.

  “What on earth are you doing?” Rick asks, stifling a laugh.

  “What does it look like?” Lizzy says.

  “It looks like you’re playing with a hula hoop. And you’re wearing some kind of grass skirt.”

  “So what if I am?” Lizzy says, sticking out her chin. “Hula is a national sport in Hawaii.”

  “Last I checked, this is America,” Rick says.

  “Hawaii is in America!” I point out.

  “You know what I mean,” he says, but turns away from Lizzy and heads up the stairs. Before he disappears inside, he calls out, “Good luck at the tractor pull!”

  “For the last time,” Lizzy yells, “we are NOT doing the tractor pull!” Her hula hoop falls to the ground and wobbles for a few seconds before coming to a rest.

  “When we win first place,” she says, hands on her hips, “he won’t be laughing anymore.”

  “And we won’t let him have any of our Snickers,” I reply, lifting up her hoop and handing it to her. “Now let’s see you peel that banana again.”

  We practice the routine pretty much nonstop for the next two days, until Lizzy claims she now has a permanent red mark around her waist. By the time James calls on Thursday morning to say he’s coming for us, we have the routine down cold.

  “James!” Lizzy says as we slide into the cool backseat. “We missed you!”

  “The limo hasn’t been the same without you two,” he replies, pulling away from the curb.

  “Is Mr. Oswald okay?” I ask.

  “He likes to say he has ‘old bones.’ Sometimes it’s hard for him to get around much. But he’s better. He’s looking forward to seeing you both.”

  Hearing that makes me feel good. Lizzy smiles, too. Neither of us has said it, but I, at least, have started thinking of Mr. Oswald sort of like a grandfather.

  “So what are we returning today?” Lizzy asks.

  James shrugs. “I get my assignment when you do.” And with that, he puts up the window divider.

  I lean back and enjoy the scenery. Usually all the people on busy streets like Fifth Avenue freak me out a little, but today it doesn’t bother me. After all that stuff about everyone being connected, I feel warmer toward my fellow man. I munch contentedly on a sandwich.

  “Jeremy?” Lizzy says, startling me. “I did something I never told you about.”

  I let the sandwich fall to my lap. My mind races with all the things Lizzy might have done. Opened the box somehow? Stole something really big? Kissed a boy? Rick! I bet she kissed Rick! When, after the séance? Or the tractor pull comment?

  “It had to do with Mabel Billingsly,” she says. “The woman with the Winnie-the-Pooh book?”

  I breathe a sigh of relief. “What about her?”

  “You know how Mr. Oswald said I should pay more attention to what people s
ay and how it makes me feel?”

  I nod, unable to imagine where this story is going, but grateful that it won’t end with her kissing Rick. Not that I’d care if she kissed someone, just not him.

  “So that night I looked up Mrs. Billingsly’s phone number, and I called her.”

  “You did?”

  She nods. “And I asked her what she thought the meaning of life was.”

  “No way.”

  “Way.”

  “What did she say?”

  “That’s the weird part,” Lizzy says, taking a sip of soda and placing the can back in the cup holder. “She said the meaning of life is friendship. But the thing is, she lost her best friend sixty years ago by selling that book, but all this time, that’s what was most important to her.”

  “Wow.”

  “Yeah. So I got to thinking, what if we tried to track down her old friend—the one with the funny name—and maybe we can get them back together?”

  “Bitsy,” I say. “Her name was Bitsy Solomon.”

  “Right! Bitsy! So what do you think?”

  “She died a few years ago,” I say quietly.

  “Oh,” Lizzy says, frowning. Then, “How do you know that?”

  I told her what I learned on the Internet, and about Bitsy naming her foundation after the necklaces they both wore.

  “Wow,” Lizzy says. “Do you think Mrs. Billingsly knows?”

  “Probably.”

  Neither of us says anything for a minute, and then Lizzy says, “You know what all this means, right?”

  I shake my head.

  “It means if you piss me off, and we don’t stay friends, that sixty years from now you’ll regret pissing me off.”

  I pop open a can of 7-Up. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

  “You’d better,” she says, and turns to the window. She stares out for the rest of the ride.

  Mr. Oswald opens the door for us. For the first time he’s in regular pants, a button-down shirt, and a white brimmed hat. Even though he looks a little frailer than the last time we saw him, he looks much better in these clothes than in his usual suit. More natural or something. Lizzy surprises all of us by running up and giving him a hug.