My Cousin's Keeper

by Simon French

  Then I heard Julia’s voice.

  “Mrs. Gallagher, you know it wasn’t just today that those boys have picked on Bon.”

  “Julia,” came the reassuring reply, “I know, and it’s being dealt with. Why are you out of class?”

  “Because Bon is my friend.”

  I stared at the blank notepad page a bit more, and I began to write. Because Bon was a new kid, I wrote, and because he looked unusual is why a lot of the boys started picking on him. I thought a moment, and added, Even me.

  The hum of voices from the principal’s office echoed softly between the open doorways. Then came something I heard more clearly.

  “Julia, the school your mother wrote down as being your last school — on the enrollment forms —”

  “It was out of state, ma’am.”

  “I know that. I contacted them and they had no record of you being there. Can you tell me the school you last attended, Julia?”

  Julia’s reply was a place I had never heard of.

  I heard Mrs. Gallagher’s voice. “It’s just that I feel I need to rely on you for answers, rather than your mother. Something here is not quite right.” There was a long moment of silence before she spoke again. “Julia, do you and your mother move around a lot?”

  “Yes,” Julia replied after a pause.

  “Is there a reason for that?”

  “My mom doesn’t want my dad to find me.”

  I could hear the sigh in Mrs. Gallagher’s voice. “Julia, you understand that I have to take a step away from this. It needs to be put into someone else’s hands. You might need help that I’m not in a position to give.”

  “But I’m OK for now,” Julia said. “I’m totally fine. It’s Bon that you need to help. Not me.”

  Mrs. Gallagher’s voice dropped to a confidential murmur.

  Julia murmured a reply, then said, “Thank you, ma’am,” in a louder voice I thought sounded pleased. And suddenly, she was in the doorway of the room where I sat. “Hi,” she whispered.

  “Hi,” I whispered back, surprised.

  “What are you writing?”

  “About what happened at lunchtime. And the times before.”

  “You stood up first. I liked how you did that.”

  It sounded like a compliment. A little relieved, I shrugged.

  “Those boys will leave Bon alone now,” Julia said.

  We looked at each other for an awkward moment, and I could almost sense she knew I had been listening to her conversation with Mrs. Gallagher. “I heard what you said,” I told her with an effort. “About your mom. And your dad.”

  Julia nodded slowly.

  “I won’t tell anyone else,” I said.

  “I know you won’t,” Julia whispered. She was silent for a moment. “See you after school,” she said at last.

  “See you,” I replied, and heard her footsteps sounding away along the corridor.

  I haven’t had a school photo for two years. Julia had said that to her mom that afternoon at the supermarket.

  My mom doesn’t want my dad to find me. I had just heard her say that to our school principal. I stared at my writing, my head full all over again with the mystery of Julia and her life, about how she had arrived in town at the same time as Bon.

  I managed to finish writing. I am sorry about Bon being treated badly and will help it never to happen again.

  I showed Mrs. Gallagher my page and wondered why she’d kept me here when the other boys had been sent back to class.

  She read it and nodded. “Thank you, Kieran. You’d better take yourself back to class.” She paused. “It can be hard to choose friends wisely, sometimes. Maybe today has taught you something about that, because what’s been happening has affected someone in your own family.” She held up my page. “You’ve written something very honest here, Kieran. I know it will mean a lot to your cousin.”

  Bon was going to sleep over at our house that night. He would walk home from school alongside me and Gina. I wondered if Mrs. Gallagher had called Mom, because I was sent back to the classroom with just a warning, and without the playground-suspension punishment I found out had been given to Mason, Lucas, and a few of the others.

  In the afternoon, I waited for Gina at the front school gate as I usually did. Julia wheeled her purple bike and walked with a group of girls from her class, some of the kids she had attracted since the day she’d arrived — Amy, Shona, Emma, and Amber, all laughing and chatting to one another. A short distance behind them, Bon walked in silence. On the sidewalk outside, everyone said their good-byes and set off in different directions.

  I saw Julia squeeze Bon’s shoulder and say, “It’ll be OK.”

  “Yeah,” Bon replied in a flat, unconvinced voice.

  Julia strapped her helmet on and launched herself onto her bike. “See you,” she said, looking at Bon and me in turn. “Remember everything we talked about.” She waited for us to reply yes, which Bon did softly, and I did nervously. “Remember,” Julia said one more time before riding away. I wondered if she would go straight home to the trailer park, or meander around town the way I had noticed once or twice before.

  Once I had Gina beside me, as well as a silent Bon, we set off for home. Bon and I avoided looking at each other. I tried willing myself to say sorry, but the word wouldn’t form in my mouth. At last it came out, but in a mumbled voice I didn’t intend and knew he probably hadn’t heard. Gina was chatting about her day and the games she had played with her friends. It took her a while to realize Bon wasn’t replying to her.

  “Bon, you’re not talking to me. What’s the matter?”

  At first it had seemed like a dream fragment — the soft rustle of bedsheets, the quiet scratch of Velcro shoe straps — and so I didn’t wake properly or turn over in bed to put a picture to the sounds. But then I thought I heard the window opening and a click as the fly screen was popped loose. Cold night air breezed into my room as Bon fidgeted with the screen until it slipped into the garden outside.

  My eyes flew open and it was more real and strange than I could have imagined. The faint light that shone through the window was enough to show Bon dressed in more than pajamas, that even the silly wool hat with pom-poms was pulled down over his hair, its elf peak pointed up at an angle. There was the rustling of something being packed away and the sound of a zipper — a backpack zipper.

  When Bon moved again, the lump of bag shadow was added to his own. He stopped for a moment, and I sensed that he was going to look at me. Quickly, I closed my eyes and listened for him to move again. He didn’t right away; it was as though he was thinking of something. Or was he still looking at me, deciding whether or not I was awake?

  Seconds or minutes later — I wasn’t sure — I opened my eyes again, sat up in bed, and stared as best I could across at his empty bed. I heard faint footsteps on the path outside.

  “Where are you?” I asked, knowing that my voice was a nighttime whisper. There was no reply.

  I thought quickly. Bon had his backpack. He had filled it with what could have been clothing, and he had taken it with him. I fumbled for the bedside light. This was more than Bon simply being awake and sitting up in bed, gazing through the window at the night. Bon had gone. He was there, in the night, and he had his backpack with him.

  I rubbed my eyes and willed myself to wake up. Think.

  Kicking off the blanket, I searched in frantic silence for clothes. With the open window, the bedroom had turned cold, and right over my pajamas I layered myself in long pants, a fleece top, thick socks, and sneakers. Last of all, I jammed my flame ski hat over my head and ears, all the while moving as quietly as Bon had, hoping that no one else in the house would wake. I stopped then, looking once at the closed bedroom door and at the open window. I was about to do something alone, something that my head and fast breathing told me might need an adult’s help. I was about to walk out into the darkness of our town and try to find my cousin. He had packed a bag. I had to find him.

  My feet found
the ground outside the window, first the patch of garden and then the concrete of the driveway. The fastest way to search would be on my bike, and I walked softly to where it was propped in the usual place against the back wall of the carport. The other bike was not there.

  How could I find him? He could have gone in any direction.

  Getting my bike to the street quietly would mean carrying it, the same as I guessed Bon had just done. I heaved it up so that the top of the frame rested hard on one shoulder.

  It wasn’t until the end of the sidewalk that I felt safe enough to put my bike down and coast slowly toward the shopping center. Even then, the click of wheel cogs sounded too loud against the night silence of the empty road. From the distant highway came the occasional soft engine moan of a truck climbing a hill, but though I strained to listen, there was no sound of movement in any street nearby.

  There was an unwelcome taste in my mouth, the flavor of feeling afraid. I swallowed hard, knowing how aimless my riding felt, and stopped to organize my thoughts. I tried to put myself into Bon’s head and to think the way he might have.

  I looked back in the direction of the highway, then pushed and pedaled my bike into a deliberate sort of speed. The trailer park. Julia. Somewhere nearby, a dog began to bark, and I swore quietly at it to stop, to not give me away. I passed the shops, the Tealeaf Café, the Travelers’ Rest Motel, the park, and the turnoff to the soccer field, all the while pedaling fast and turning my head from left to right, back to where I’d been and then to where I thought it was best to head. Even with the glow of the streetlights, I was straining my eyes for the movement of another boy on a bike, and I was worrying that the direction I’d chosen was completely wrong.

  I saw him then.

  The glare of lights from the twenty-four-hour service station near the highway was visible now, and on the last stretch of Sheridan Street was Bon. I couldn’t see his bike, but I could see his small, distant figure standing near the last streetlight. I pedaled fast. At some point, he spotted me coming, and then he was picking up the old bike, stumbling onto the seat, and cranking the pedals. I didn’t dare call out.

  I knew I could pedal faster than him, but as I got closer, I realized how fast he was pedaling as well. Suddenly, I could see that he was no longer shaky on a bike, that he had found his sense of balance. His confidence was unnerving and unexpected.

  “Bon, stop,” I said a little breathlessly as my bike caught up to his.

  He didn’t reply or even look at me.

  “Bon, stop. You have to.”

  He kept riding. His feet pumped up, down, up, down, and he stared straight ahead. It was as though he knew exactly where he was going.

  “Bon, listen to me. Stop.”

  The tires of our bikes hissed along the road. The lights of the service station loomed closer and closer, and still Bon refused to say anything.

  “Please, stop.” My voice had panic in it.

  “Why?” he replied abruptly. “Why do I have to stop? You’re not the boss of me.”

  “Stop pedaling.”

  “No!”

  “Please. I don’t know where you’re going. You have to come back.”

  “What if I don’t want to come back?”

  “But you have to.”

  Abruptly, Bon squeezed the hand brakes and brought his bike to a stop, the brake pads hissing and squealing against the wheel rims. I let my bike go a little farther ahead before turning and coming to a halt in front of him. “You have to come back,” I repeated.

  He stared back at me, unblinking. He didn’t say anything for a moment, but took his fingers away from the handlebars to pull at the straps on his backpack. “No,” he said quietly.

  “But you have to,” I insisted.

  “Did your parents send you after me?”

  “No.” There was almost a desperate laugh in the word as I said it. “I heard you leave. It’s the middle of the night. It’s not safe. You’re by yourself and . . .” I paused for breath. “And it’s freezing cold, and I don’t know where you’re going.”

  My hands were stiff and sore from the handlebars. Bon had been thorough; I saw that he had a pair of wool gloves on — my wool gloves, I realized. His silly hat with the furry pom-poms sat low over his face and covered all of his hair, except for his braid, which trailed out from under the wool in a blond knotted rope down his back. His helmet was strapped on over the top and it looked kind of comical, though I didn’t smile about it. He turned away from me — in the direction of our town, and then at where the highway led from distant north to distant south. He looked at where the trailer park was.

  “Please, come back, Bon.”

  He didn’t reply.

  “Where are you going?” I ventured.

  Bon’s breath trembled. “Nobody wants me here,” he told me at last, without looking back. “Not really. I know you don’t.” He met my eyes. “You don’t want me. You don’t even like me. Julia is my only friend.” Then he added softly, “And Gina. But she’s only little.”

  It took me a few seconds to realize what he had said, and in that moment, Bon had his fingers back on the handlebars and had repositioned his left foot onto the pedal.

  “You have to come home,” I repeated. The last word had come out without me even thinking. Home.

  “Why?” Bon demanded.

  “Because it’s not true what you said. It’s not true that nobody wants you. Everyone does. Nan. My mom and dad. Gina.”

  “But what about you?” Bon asked. “You don’t want to be friends with me. You want to be friends with kids like Mason and Lucas. And you want them to be friends with you. Except it’s not working out like that.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “You want to be popular,” he said.

  I didn’t know what to say next. Bon fidgeted with the handlebar grips, and then he spun a pedal backward so that the bike chain rattled loudly in the silence. All I felt was cold, and I shivered a cloud of nervous breath into the space between us.

  “I had a friend,” I told him softly. “Before you came to visit that time. My dad’s party.” I looked down at the handlebars of my bike and at the dark road surface, feeling as though I were sharing my deepest secret. “Connor. But he moved away and I never saw him again.”

  “And you miss him,” Bon stated flatly.

  I nodded.

  “Would you miss me?” he asked. “Because we’re cousins and not friends?”

  He looked at me carefully. I couldn’t read the expression on his face and had no way of knowing what could happen next. “Yes,” I answered, but felt as though this reply was carried away by the night air and the next long silence. “Please, come home, Bon. I’m sorry about what happened at school. At first I thought it might be funny, and then I knew it wouldn’t be. But it was too late to make the other kids stop.”

  Sorry. Finally it came out clearly, the one word that I hoped would put everything right. “I’m sorry,” I told him one last time, worrying that whatever happened next would be final.

  Bon began to pedal away.

  He went down as far as the glow of the last streetlight reached, then turned his bike and rode slowly back past me. I felt too tired to keep wondering about where in the night Bon had intended to go. He didn’t say anything on the ride home, but it was a silence I was grateful for, because perhaps it meant that I had been forgiven.

  I couldn’t think clearly the next day. I was tired from lack of sleep and exhausted by the thought of what had happened in the night. Bon had ridden away on my bike. He had refused to say where he had been going, and I worried that he was going to do it again.

  “Late night, Kieran?” Mr. Garcia asked, because he could see I was fumbling with the schoolwork I usually completed without any problems.

  “Chicken,” Lucas hissed at me at the beginning of recess. “Running off to tell Julia Barrett. Might as well have been a teacher.”

  “So you are on your cousin’s side now,” Mason said. “Some frien
d you are, writing all that stuff about us for the principal to read.”

  I watched as the two of them walked across to the office. I had been given a lecture by Mom and Dad, but Mason, Lucas, and the others were missing recess for a week, and Mrs. Gallagher had also made them write apologies to read in person to Bon. But I knew, from the sneers they had directed at Bon on the playground already that morning, that their apologies meant just about nothing.

  Nobody wants me here. It hurt to hear Bon’s voice in my head, telling me exactly what I’d thought and said to him in the weeks since he had arrived in town.

  I had made a point of sitting right next to him at breakfast that morning, and I willed him to look at me and say something. But at first he had spooned up mouthfuls of cereal and gazed into his bowl as though it were a mirror. I had felt invisible.

  “I want to sit next to Bon!” Gina had protested when she arrived at the table.

  “We can share,” I’d told her. “Sit on the end chair, Gina.”

  “That’s not next to, that’s near,” she had grumbled, but she’d sat down anyway.

  I’d offered Bon the bottle of apple juice and he took it silently, poured a glass for himself and then one for Gina, and passed it back to me.

  “Thanks, Bon,” I had said.

  “It’s a pleasure,” he’d replied in his precise voice. And then — as though he suddenly found his reply as weird and old-fashioned as it sounded — he had smiled to himself.

  My shoulders drooped in relief.