We drive for another half hour, and the scenery gets prettier and prettier. We don’t talk, but I play my favorite CD on repeat. It was made for me by Bernie when I first got my license, and on the front he scrawled Don’t crash the goddamn car in his messy chicken scratch. It’s a road trip CD, full of songs to drive to, from a time when “music wasn’t so shitty,” as Bernie puts it. As we near our destination, one of my favorite tracks comes on, a song from the sixties by Jim Croce. Like the pine trees lining the winding road, I got a name. Out of the corner of my eye I can see Josie mouthing the words. We both grew up on Ned and Bernie’s music.
Two minutes away. I glance at Josie, and she sits up a little straighter. A glimmer of recognition crosses her face, but she doesn’t say anything. We turn onto a tree-lined gravel road, and the tires rumble and creak on the uneven terrain. And then we take a left and then a right, and there it is.
There’s no one in the lot, but I park far away anyway. I get out and slam the door, and Josie does the same. She still doesn’t say anything. Together, we walk across the parking lot.
A huge battered sign reads Jimbo’s Drive-Thru in peeling black letters, perched precariously atop an old school bus. The bus has been taken off its wheels and painted a bright turquoise, with a big window in the front surrounded by an even bigger menu. A field off to the side sports a handful of picnic tables, all covered in red-and-white checkered tablecloths.
Josie is still quiet. And I am getting more and more nervous.
We reach the window, but there’s no one behind the counter. Josie squints at the menu. I cautiously stick my head in.
“Hello?” I call.
Almost immediately a head pops up, making Josie jump. A cheerful older woman with bright purple hair grins at me. “Mitchell Morrison!”
“Hi, Angie.”
She reaches right through the window and envelops me in a hug. Josie watches, bemused.
Angie pulls back and studies Josie. “Is this your girlfriend?”
Josie’s face almost immediately turns pink.
I quickly shake my head. “No. Nope. This is my Josie.”
Angie’s eyebrows shoot up, and Josie’s face turns even redder.
“Not my Josie!” Now my face is red, too. “Just Josie.”
“Well hi, Just Josie,” says Angie warmly. “You’re lucky to be hanging around this guy. Even if you are just friends.”
Josie smiles faintly. “He’s all right.”
“He’s a good kid,” says Angie. “Our most loyal customer.”
“Really?” asks Josie. “But we live over an hour away.”
Angie leans forward and whispers, “We have really, really good fries.”
I laugh, and Angie joins in. Josie looks back and forth between us.
“So.” Angie picks up a spatula and gestures to the menu. “What’ll it be today?”
I sneak a quick glance at Josie. “We’ll have two chocolate milkshakes.”
“I knew it!” Josie’s eyes light up, and she grins and shoves my arm.
Internally, I let out a huge sigh of relief. She does remember.
Angie raises her eyebrows and turns toward the back. “Coming right up.”
Josie shakes her head. “I can’t believe it. This is really the same place?”
“It really is,” I say. “I thought you would recognize it sooner. How many restaurants operate out of a rusty blue school bus?”
“Well, yeah,” she says. “But it was a long time ago. And I didn’t expect . . .”
I know what she means. The last time we were here together, we were eleven. In fifth grade. That was the last year we were homeschooled by Myra at Paintbrush, our last year before public school and other kids and the real world. When we passed our state-issued end of year exams, our moms always took us out. That year, we drove a whole hour to go to this special dinosaur-themed novelty restaurant, one of those quirky small town tourist traps my mom had read about in a travel magazine. But when we got there, it was closed. A frazzled-looking employee told us that the animatronic T-Rex was malfunctioning; we could hear it roaring from outside, fierce and loud, in a constant, unending loop. So we drove ten minutes to the next town over, and found . . . this. Jimbo’s.
It looked exactly the same back then. We ordered chicken fingers and french fries and chocolate milkshakes. It was the best chocolate milkshake I’d ever had. And then later, while Josie’s little sisters finished their food and our moms chatted away, we found a tree to climb. And way high up, in the tallest, thickest branches, we kissed.
It was a dare. Josie dared me eat a pine needle. I dared her to lick a piece of bark. She dared me to swing upside down on a branch . . . and I was too scared to do it. I was going to lose our game. So I dared her to do something I knew she would never do: kiss me.
“On the lips,” I declared dramatically.
“Ew!” she answered, horrified. And I grinned smugly.
But before I knew it, she was scrunching up her face, closing her eyes, and leaning in. And she pecked me right on the lips.
“Gross!” we said at the same time. And then we said “Jinx!” at the same time. And then we laughed and climbed down.
It was a first kiss for both of us. Her lips were cool and soft and tasted like chocolate milkshake. We never talked about it again.
The next year, we both went off to middle school. We made different friends. We stopped hanging out as much. We really only saw each other during our morning and afternoon carpool, and at Paintbrush. We were still friends. We’ve always been friends. But it was different after that summer.
Josie is examining the giant menu when Angie returns with our milkshakes.
“Here you go,” Angie says. “Extra whipped cream, three cherries. As usual.”
“Thanks, Angie,” I say.
“How do you make all this stuff?” Josie asks, picking her milkshake up from the counter. “Teriyaki chicken fingers? Cajun fries? Fish tacos?” She squints toward the top. “Does that say Haggis? Isn’t that—?”
“Sheep’s innards?” Angie asks cheerfully. “Yep. It is. A traditional Scottish delicacy.” She lowers her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “We don’t really make it, though. We just like to see if anyone’s brave enough to order it. If they are, we give them their food for free.”
Josie laughs. “In that case, I’ll have the haggis.”
Angie shakes her head. “There’s no point. It’s already on us.”
I try to slide her a ten, but it’s no use. She shakes her head and shoos us away toward the grove of picnic tables.
I smile gratefully. “Thanks, Angie. See you next week. And tell Gretchen I say hi.”
Josie and I wander over and take a seat at the nearest table. I slurp my milkshake and close my eyes. These milkshakes are the closest thing to heaven on earth I’ve ever encountered.
“Gretchen?” asks Josie. She takes a sip, and her eyes widen. “Oh my god. Even better than I remembered.”
“Right?” I grin. “And Gretchen is Angie’s wife. And business partner. They’ve run this place ever since Angie’s dad died and left it to them.”
Josie toys with her straw, considering this. “And you know them . . . how?”
I gesture to the bus behind us. “From here. Just from coming here so much.”
She looks at me for a long moment.
“What?” I ask.
“Nothing.” Her eyes twinkle, the corners of her mouth turned up. “You’re just a little bit mysterious. That’s all.”
We sit in a companionable silence for a while, sipping our milkshakes and soaking up the late afternoon sun. I’m a little worried she’s going to ask why I brought her here. Because I really don’t have a good answer.
And I’m also wondering if she’s remembering our tree kiss right now. Like I am. If she even remembers it at all.
I’m slurping up the last chocolaty dregs before Josie is even halfway done with hers. She stares at me.
“Seriously? Already?”
>
I pop the last maraschino cherry into my mouth. “I can’t help it. It’s like crack.”
“So that’s why you brought me here?” she asks. “To help you break your habit?”
“The first step,” I say solemnly, “is admitting you have a problem.”
She rolls her eyes and sips her shake. Her gaze roams the scenery around us. “I can see why you drive all the way here. Not just the milkshakes. It’s beautiful.”
She’s right. Jimbo’s is on the outskirts of a small mountain town, sitting smack in the center of this deep valley. All around us are mountains, rising steeply everywhere we look. It’s gorgeous.
“It’s my favorite place to come and think,” I say.
“Chocolate milkshakes. The perfect thinking food.” She hesitates and then adds, “New England will be different.”
“Yeah. It will.” I look at her face, framed by long hair that glows a golden-brown in the late-afternoon sun.
“Won’t you miss this?” she asks.
“There are mountains in New England.”
“But they’re different mountains.”
I shrug. “This place is beautiful.” I look down at the table, trailing a finger across the sticky red-and-white checkers. “But a mountain’s a mountain. No matter where it is.”
“Maybe.” But she doesn’t sound convinced.
Another silence. I can’t tell if it’s comfortable or awkward. But then Josie interrupts it with a big slurp.
“Finished!” She holds up her empty cup.
“Damn it. I was hoping you’d get full so I could finish yours.”
Her jaw drops. “How dare you imply that I can’t handle a whole milkshake. I could eat two whole milkshakes and not bat an eye.”
I stand and stretch. “Well, coming from someone who has done that very thing on multiple occasions, let me tell you. It’s not a great idea.”
“Wait. You actually did that?” She stands too, climbing out of the picnic table bench. “And you actually thought it would be a good idea?”
Together, we start toward the truck. “Hey. You could be a little nicer to the guy who just helped you relive a cherished childhood memory.”
My cheeks flush as soon as the words leave my mouth. I meant the day. Not the kiss.
Josie doesn’t say anything, but I swear she glances toward the tall pine towering in the corner of the field. She remembers.
I walk a little closer to her. I can’t help it. She smells like fresh grass and a little salty, that warm summer smell of sweat. She walks with a little bounce in her step, and our shoulders brush. I chance a glance at her face, at her eyes that sparkle in the golden sunlight, at her lips curled up into a small smile.
I bet she tastes like chocolate milkshake.
“Something is going on,” Cord announces as I slide across from him at the lunch table.
I pick up my banana and start to unpeel it.
“What’s going on,” I reply, “is that it smells like Woodstock at this table.”
“Like fresh air and good times?” he asks hopefully.
“Like you smoked a bunch of weed before school today.”
He waves his hand in the air, dismissing me. “Two weeks until graduation, dude. I’d be stupid if I showed up to class and I wasn’t high. I’m getting a whole new perspective on my education.”
“We still have to take finals.” I shake my head. “You’re going to college in a few months, man. You can’t pull this kind of shit there.”
“What are you talking about? It’s college! It’s exactly where I can pull this kind of shit.” I open my mouth to respond, but he cuts me off. “Besides. You’re avoiding the question.”
I take a big bite of banana and chew as slowly as I can, just to make him mad. I take my time swallowing before I speak. “What question?”
He sighs and pulls out his phone. “Last night. I texted you the following.” He clears his throat dramatically, and I roll my eyes. “Yo. Stay over here this weekend. I bought the West Side Story restored version on Blu-Ray with commentary, plus Zombie Revolution Four: The Final Countdown. Also the five pound bag of cheese balls from Wal-Mart.”
He looks up and tilts his head at me, like he’s waiting for an excuse. I don’t say anything.
“And you texted me back saying: Sorry, dude. Plans this weekend.” He drops his phone back onto the table. “Plans this weekend? Since when do you or I have plans this weekend that don’t involve each other?”
I shrug. “You know I’m not a big West Side Story guy.”
“I know. You like Guys and Dolls much better.”
Sadly, this is true. This is what my friendship with Cord has done to me.
He continues, “But normally you’d sit with me through a viewing of West Side in order to get to the good stuff.”
“The good stuff being fake cheese snacks and zombie killing?” I ask.
“Five pounds of cheese balls, Mitchell. Five. Pounds.”
He’s right. Not a lot could drag me away from cheese balls and Zombie Revolution. Except . . .
“I think I know what this is about.” Cord smirks at me as he slices his greasy cafeteria pizza into small squares.
“Normal people eat their pizza with their hands, dude. You know that, right?”
He completely ignores me. “It’s the same reason that you’ve mysteriously disappeared every day this week after school. The same reason we’ve been sitting over here by ourselves, and not”—he tilts his head toward our usual lunch table, stuffed with laughing cheerleaders and burly athletes—“over there.” He frowns. “The same reason you’ve cruelly abandoned me on a Friday night to watch Maria cry over Tony’s dead body all by myself.”
I eat my last bite of banana and toss the peel onto my tray. The peel hits the blue plastic with a loud smack. “Just spit it out, Cord.”
He grins. “Josie Sedgwick.”
He’s right. Josie and I have hung out every day this week. On Tuesday, we drove out to Silver Lake and waded around in the water. On Wednesday, we went to the big used bookstore in Asheville and each bought a book for the other to read. On Thursday, we went to the local park and swung on the swings. Before community dinner, of course. Which I didn’t attend.
None of these were planned things. They just sort of . . . happened. I try explaining this to Cord, but he shakes his head.
“What you’re describing are dates, dude. Not hanging out.”
My heart jumps a little at that word. Date. They’re not dates, I tell myself. They’re just coincidences.
Then why do I feel like I need to keep my entire weekend totally free, on the off chance that Josie will, at some point, want to hang out with me for even a few minutes?
Cord has been talking while I’ve been lost in thought. I don’t hear a word until he says, “Like I told her to.”
I focus back on him. “Told her to what?”
“At the party?” He smirks. “When you got all mad at us? You acted like a jealous boyfriend when I was talking to her.”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Yes, you did. Anyway, all I was telling her was to keep an eye on you. Because you could use a distraction.” He smirks. “Seems like it’s working.”
“Shut up, Cord,” I reply automatically. But my brain is turning. Are we just hanging out because Josie thinks I need help? Because she’s watching out for me, after everything that happened with my mom?
Maybe this isn’t anything. Maybe she just feels sorry for me.
But maybe isn’t enough for me to stop myself from seeing her tonight.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Josie
I think Leah might explode. She is quivering, actually quivering, from excitement. And from what I suspect is an effort to not shriek at the top of her lungs across the parking lot.
“Date!” she shouts. “You have a date!”
A few people walking by turn their heads, and I grab her arm.
“You have got to stop,” I hiss. “And you’ve als
o got to go.”
I point to her car across the lot. Leah has me cornered up against Mitchell’s truck. She showed up a second ago and shouted a loud and dramatic, “Aha!” as she spied me getting into the passenger seat. Like she had caught me committing some kind of crime. Now we’re leaning against the side of the truck as I desperately try to convince her to leave.
“I always drive home with Mitchell.” I look around. He’s still nowhere to be seen. Thank god.
“But you’re not usually so secretive.” Leah is practically cackling. She adores drama and secrets, and she loves to feel like she’s right. Today, she’s hit the jackpot. “And you never hang out with him like you’ve been hanging out this week. And you get that starry-eyed look when you talk about him.”
“Starry-eyed?” I practically spit the word out. “I don’t know what starry-eyed even looks like, but I can promise you, it’s not a look I’ve ever had.”
She pokes my shoulder. “And then you avoided all my questions at lunch today, and now you’re looking all suspicious and sneaky.” She claps her hands together. “Josie Sedgwick, you have a date.”
“Leah.” I stare her straight in the eyes, as seriously as I can. “I do not have a date.”
And it’s true. I don’t have a date. I’m just hoping, in a totally desperate way, that somehow our nothing plans will evolve into something plans. The way it’s been happening the past few days.
Leah’s expression falls. She slumps her shoulders and sighs. “Fine. But I expect a text from you tonight telling me all about it.”
“All about what? There’s nothing to tell.”
She looks at me knowingly. “After the way the last few days have been? You and I both know that there’ll be something to tell.”
I shake my head at her, but I can’t deny the hope rising in my chest. It’s a desperate, nervous, pathetic hope. And every time it rises, it gets pushed down by the truth: that whatever I think is happening has probably been all in my head.
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