Always and Forever

by Lurlene McDaniel

  With satisfaction she inspected her makeup, then her hair and figure. Gingerly, she touched the ends of her wig, smoothing them under, close to her ears. Few traces of her ordeal with leukemia remained, and unless someone had known her before, no one could tell she’d ever been sick. Yet, she cautioned her reflection, remission didn’t mean the disease was over, but simply that it was held in check.

  She thought about the night ahead of her. In two hours, she’d be sitting on the stage of the Tampa Civic Center Auditorium facing every other high school panel in the Bay area for round one of Brain Bowl. Butterflies fluttered in her stomach, but they were welcomed. Her nerves tingled, but they also felt sharp and alert. Melissa knew that she was ready for the competition.

  She thought back to the week before, when the names had first been posted and read over the school PA system. All day long, kids had stopped her in the halls and congratulated her. And late in the afternoon, when she’d been waiting for Jory by her car, Brad had hailed her.

  “Wait up, Melissa,” he’d said, jogging toward her. He still had the power to make her heartbeat quicken, and she guessed some things would never change. “I’m really glad you made the team and I just wanted to say, congratulations and I told you so.”

  “Congratulations to you too, Brad. I’m glad they picked you to be captain. We’re gonna win it, you know.”

  “Of course we’re going to win it.”

  An April breeze ruffled her hair, blowing it across her cheek, and he reached out to smooth it. This time, Melissa did not withdraw from his touch. “The wind can’t do much damage,” she said, holding his gaze. “It’s only a wig.”

  “I figured. I had an aunt who went through chemo, and she lost her hair and had to wear a wig, too.”

  Suddenly, she felt a jumble of hopes and illusions and wishes. She glanced at his wrist and noticed that the ID bracelet still belonged to Sarah. Then, setting her mind at ease, she let go of her longings for Brad. She slugged him playfully on the arm. “My real hair’s growing out well, and by the end of the summer, I’ll bet it’s past my jawline.”

  “I’ll check you out before I go away to college,” he told her. They talked for a few minutes and she watched him head toward his car. Now, days later, Melissa could really shrug off the last vestiges of yearning, and refocus her energy on the evening ahead.

  There was a knock at her door and Jory breezed in, her green eyes dancing. “All set?”

  “What do you think?” Melissa twirled, showing off the jacket, white pleated skirt, and white pumps.

  “Preppy,” Jory said, then added with an impish smile, “but on you, it’s sensational.”

  “You look different,” Melissa observed, scrutinizing her friend from head to toe. Jory’s standard funky look had been replaced by polished sophistication. Her dress was simple, but elegant, the green perfect for her auburn hair. Her usual wild shade of nail polish had been exchanged for a soft shade of apricot.

  Self-consciously, Jory dropped her gaze. “I decided it was time for a new image. Even Peter Pan had to grow up.”

  “I’ll bet Michael will approve.”

  “Do you think so?”

  Jory asked the question so quickly and with such eagerness that Melissa intuitively reached out and squeezed her friend’s hands. “Let’s go dazzle him with our combined beauty. I’ll bet he and Mom are waiting for our grand entrance right now.”

  Jory hung back slightly. “In a minute. First, I want to give you a present.”

  Melissa noticed the small bag Jory was holding. Surprised, she asked, “For me? What is it?”

  “Close your eyes.” Melissa obeyed, more excited than curious. “Okay, open them.”

  Jory held a wig, a fall of hair that was rich and black and incredibly long. Melissa stared, open-mouthed. “Oh, Jory … ”

  “It’s real hair, Melissa,” Jory began to babble. “I sent for it ages ago, through a salon in New York that specializes in only the finest. I sent them pictures of you and had them make up the hairpiece just for you. It’s just like your real hair, don’t you think, Melissa? I insisted that it had to be perfect. Tell me you like it. Tell me you’ll wear it.”

  Mesmerized, Melissa reached out and touched the hair, sifting it through her fingers. Tears gathered on her lashes. “I-It must have cost a fortune … ”

  Jory dismissed her remark with an impatient wave. “It’s my money and I can spend it however I like.”

  Unable to take her eyes off the hair, Melissa whispered. “Help me put it on.”

  In moments the switch was accomplished and Melissa could only stare in the mirror at the reborn image of herself. I-I’d almost forgotten … ” She gathered a fistful of the hair and rolled it through her fingers, feeling the luxurious weight of it, the silkiness of it on her skin. It hung to her waist and she tossed her head to feel the way it brushed her shoulders and flowed down her back. She caught Jory’s eyes in the mirror and turned toward her. “Thank you.”

  Jory blinked, haphazardly running her forefinger beneath an eye. “Don’t want to smear my mascara,” she mumbled, shifting nervously from foot to foot.

  Without a word, Melissa slipped her arms around Jory and hugged her tightly, not caring that she herself was crying and probably ruining her own carefully applied makeup. “It’s the most beautiful gift I’ve ever been given. I love you, Jory Delaney.”

  “Oh, Melissa, I love you, too. You’re my best friend. My best.”

  Melissa might never have let Jory go, except for a rap on her door and Michael’s muffled, impatient voice. “Aren’t you two ready yet? We’re going to be late if you don’t light a fire under yourselves.”

  “Cool out. We’re coming,” Melissa said. Both girls quickly touched up their makeup, then Melissa opened the door with an exaggerated flair. “Good grief, Michael, I can tell time and we’re not late.”

  When he saw her he stared, shocked. “It’s a gift from Jory,” she told him.

  He looked at Jory, standing timidly behind Melissa, who stepped aside. “You did this for Melissa?” he asked.

  Jory tilted her head, her expression caught between defiance and desperation. “Why not? What are friends for?”

  Michael’s hand drifted up to touch Jory’s cheek. “Thank you,” he said. He tipped her chin upward and with incredible tenderness said again, “Thank you, Jory.” She blushed, staring into Michael’s eyes, unable to speak.

  Reluctantly Melissa broke the spell. “Are we ready?”

  Michael stepped away from Jory and took Melissa’s hand. “Mom’s waiting in the car.”

  Melissa’s heart swelled, and she was filled with joy. “Last one out buys milk shakes for everyone after the match,” she called. “Chocolate!”

  She bounded out of the room and down the stairs, her hair chasing behind her. It caught the lamp glow and sparkled like starlight in the night.

  Goodbye

  Doesn’t Mean Forever

  FROM

  Too Young to Die

  Or maybe she should explore her feelings about her family and friends. About how much she cared about them, and how precious they’d become during her illness. And what about life once she got out of the hospital? Would she be normal again? Who would ask her for a date? Who would ever kiss her or want her? Melissa sighed and thumbed through the blank pages. Sixteen is too young to die, she thought. She tossed the book aside, knowing that she had a lot to say and no earthly idea of how to say it.

  FROM

  Goodbye Doesn’t Mean Forever

  “People don’t get what they deserve—good or bad. Life isn’t always so logical.”

  “The rain falling on the just and unjust?” Jory asked.

  “Yes, but regardless, we still have one very real thing going for us. We have hope, and I think that’s what separates us from the rest of creation. We get to hold on to hope … hope for things not seen.”

  Jory was moved by Mrs. Austin’s faith and she wondered if she’d ever feel that way herself. Would she ever
come to accept gracefully what she couldn’t understand or change?

  ALSO AVAILABLE FROM DELL LAUREL-LEAF BOOKS

  DAUGHTER OF VENICE, Donna Jo Napoli

  SHABANU: DAUGHTER OF THE WIND

  Suzanne Fisher Staples

  DR. FRANKLINS ISLAND, Ann Halam

  COUNTING STARS, David Almond

  GODDESS OF YESTERDAY, Caroline B. Cooney

  ISLAND BOYZ: SHORT STORIES, Graham Salisbury

  SHATTERED: STORIES OF CHILDREN AND WAR

  Edited by Jennifer Armstrong

  THE LEGEND OF LADY ILENA, Patricia Malone

  MIDNIGHT PREDATOR, Amelia Atwater-Rhodes

  For Rochelle

  ——

  “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”

  HEBREWS 11:1 (KJV)

  Chapter One

  “Jory Delaney, you can’t be serious! What do you mean you don’t want to go to Europe with your father and me next month?”

  “Mother, please, give me a break. School starts at the end of August. You won’t be back by then and I can’t miss the start of my senior year. Besides, I don’t feel like exploring ruins and visiting a bunch of moldy castles.” Jory faced her mother across the glass-topped table on their patio next to the pool. Her breakfast lay cold and untouched, and butter melted in a crystal dish in the rapidly warming Florida morning.

  “Well, that’s the silliest thing I’ve ever heard.” Mrs. Delaney tossed her pink linen napkin onto the colored flagstones and pushed her chair backward, making it screech. “You have the opportunity of a lifetime here, and you’re throwing it away. Missing your first week of school can’t be that big a deal.”

  “Well, it is to me.”

  Mrs. Delaney dismissed Jory’s words with a flip of her hand. “Your father and I work very hard. This is the first non-working vacation we’ve planned in years and you don’t want to go. That is such an insult.”

  Jory gritted her teeth, biting back the hot words she longed to throw at her elegant blond mother. Sure, mother, she thought sarcastically. Just a cozy little family threesome. After all the years they’d shuttled off on their real estate deals, leaving Jory under the care of some anonymous housekeeper, now they wanted her to drop everything and take off with them.

  “You and Daddy go to Europe, Mother. I’ll be perfectly happy to stay here and start school on time. And I’m sure Mrs. Garcia will see to it that I don’t starve to death.” She emphasized her retort with a toss of auburn curls.

  “Well, don’t worry. We will.” Mrs. Delaney said coolly.

  “Fine. Then it’s settled.”

  Silence hung between mother and daughter. The bright blue water of the pool sparkled with the sun. On the far side of the patio a sprinkler spun, tossing water over boxwood and summer flowers. “Jory, your refusal really burns me up. You won’t be but a week late in starting school if you come with us. What’s a week compared to a monthlong tour of Europe?”

  It wasn’t over. “I told you,” Jory said with an exasperated sigh. “Europe and old castles and quaint cottages aren’t my idea of a good time.”

  “And just what is? Going to public high school with a bunch of riffraff? Honestly, Jory, we’d send you to Tampa’s best private school if you’d say the word. And Briarwood School for Young Women doesn’t start classes until after Labor Day, so that would you give you plenty of time to get home before school begins if that’s what’s stopping you from coming.”

  “The word is no, Mother. I like Lincoln High.” She stabbed a strawberry from a selection of fresh fruit arranged on a crystal platter. She didn’t want her mother to dredge up that old argument about Jory’s choice of public over private school.

  “Your father and I have worked very hard for all this.” Mrs. Delaney gestured around the patio and yard, which were carefully secluded behind an eight-foot security fence. “Money is security, Jory—not a curse. You certainly have enjoyed its benefits so far. A new convertible, the latest fashions, a home in the most exclusive area of Tampa …”

  Unable to stand her mother’s count-your-blessings-speech one more time, Jory jumped up. “I’m going for a swim.” She tugged at the French-cut leg of the green suit that hugged her body like a latex glove.

  “It’s that Austin girl, isn’t it?” Her mother’s accusatory tone caused Jory to stop short. “Ever since she came down with cancer last year, that’s all you’ve been concerned about.”

  Jory suddenly became calm and said, “Melissa Austin is my best friend and has been since the fifth grade. And yes, I’m concerned about her. Even though her leukemia is in remission, she isn’t cured. She’s the bravest person I’ve ever known.” Jory wanted to say more. She wanted to remind her mother that it was Melissa who opened her home to Jory over the years when her own parents had been too busy earning money to be available. In some ways, Jory even thought of Mrs. Austin as her second mother.

  Mrs. Delaney arched one perfectly shaped eyebrow and tapped long manicured red fingernails against the glass tabletop. “Loyalty is an admirable quality,” she said, “but there’s more at stake here than old friends and returning to high school on time, isn’t there? Face it, Jory, you aren’t exactly headed toward scholastic immortality in your schoolwork. Have you followed up on any of those college applications your father wanted you to?”

  “No.”

  “And why not? Most of your friends have already finished their applications and you haven’t even started. Once you graduate next June, just what do you plan to do with yourself?”

  Jory tipped her chin, her green eyes as cool and hard as her mother’s diamond rings. “Maybe I’ll run off with the gardener and get married.”

  “That’s not funny, Jory. You have money—lots of it in a trust fund. You’re seventeen and without purpose or direction. If you won’t choose a college and you refuse to go to Europe this summer, what are you going to do? We won’t have you sitting around when there’s so much at stake in your future.”

  Jory was so angry she was shaking, but she knew that she couldn’t speak rationally. Her mother rose in one fluid motion, her floor-length silk lounging robe billowing around her. “That was an unnecessary and tacky comment about marrying the gardener. Use some discretion. Don’t make people gossip. We have an image to maintain in Tampa, you know.”

  “I’ll keep your request in mind,” Jory said through pressed, white lips. “We don’t want people to talk about your shiftless daughter, do we?”

  “Don’t be so melodramatic. Reputations are important, and what you do now can follow you the rest of your life.” Mrs. Delaney glanced at her gold watch. “I have to dress and meet your father at the club. We’re entertaining some Arab businessman who’s interested in one of the old estates on Bay-shore Drive. It’ll mean a tidy commission if we close the deal. But don’t think this conversation is ended, Jory. I’ll let you stay home from Europe this trip, but I expect you to do something about your future. And you’d better get started. Time’s running out for you to get into a good college.”

  Jory swore she saw dollar signs flash in her mother’s eyes before she swept through the patio’s French doors, leading into the house. Still trembling, Jory plunged into the cool blue water of the pool, balling her body to stay weighted on the concrete bottom.

  Beneath the surface, it was quiet, serene. She opened her eyes, allowing the chlorine to sting and take the place of angry tears. Jory wasn’t stupid. She knew that her wealth gave her a cushion. She thought again of Melissa, of the horrible cancer that lurked within her body. She thought of the chemo that had stripped her of her hair and her beauty. Jory also knew her mother was right. Life had smiled on Jory Delaney. For years, she’d dated and partied and lived exactly as she pleased. But there was a void inside her too. In some ways, Melissa had so much more than she did, in spite of her cancer.

  Lungs bursting, Jory struggled to the surface, gasping for air. She swam to the side and heaved herself onto the glazed tile border. “Wel
l, Mother, thanks to me at least she’s pretty again,” she muttered, remembering with satisfaction the waist-length wig she’d given Melissa as a gift. She stretched backward onto the tile, allowing the sun to warm her golden skin. And as for her mother’s warning about who to date …

  For Jory, there was only Michael Austin, Melissa’s dark-haired, blue-eyed, brother. He was twenty-two but seemed older. For as long as Jory had known the Austins, Michael had been son and brother and father. When Mr. Austin walked out on his family, Michael stepped into his role while their mother worked. Now, between his jobs and classes at the university and an occasional ride in his hot-air balloon, Michael seemed to have no other life. Jory longed to change that. She could be so much to him if only he’d let her.

  “Michael … ” She whispered his name. He’d always thought of her as Melissa’s spoiled rich friend, a kid, but she’d prove him wrong. She recalled the one time when he hadn’t looked at her like she was a child, the night last spring when she’d given Melissa the wig.

  “You did this for Melissa?”

  “Why not? What are friends for?”

  His hand drifted up to stroke her cheek. She gazed at him through thick lashes, her heartbeat fluttering and erratic. “Thank you.” He tipped her chin upward and lightly brushed her bangs off her forehead before trailing his fingers over the arch of her cheekbone.

  She could have drowned in his eyes. She almost lost emotional control and whispered, “I love you, Michael …”

  Restless, tingling with the memory, Jory sat up. She would dress and drive over to Melissa’s. With school starting in five weeks, they could talk about new wardrobes and what it would be like to be seniors and speculate whether Melissa would be named a National Merit semifinalist. And maybe, if she was very lucky, she’d catch a glimpse of Michael.