Minn and Jake
Page 6
See you in September.
Jake leaves,
and Minn takes a very long bath,
one of those
hold-your-breath-and-soak-your-head baths
that makes ideas float out your ears
to where you can see them more clearly.
A thought floats out Minn’s left ear:
I have lost
my old true best friend, Sabina,
and now I am losing
my new true best friend, Jake.
What is wrong
with me?
And a thought floats out Minn’s right ear:
Nothing is wrong
with you, silly.
Jake is still your true best friend.
He needs to visit
his sick grandmother.
Maybe you should try
to go to Los Angeles, after all!
Another thought floats out her left ear:
You’ve ruined everything.
Hope he forgets by September.
Another thought floats out her right ear:
Call him!
∼
Not knowing the right thing to do,
Minn does the next best thing:
she goes to sleep.
She wraps her long wet hair in a towel,
and even though
it is only 4:30 in the afternoon,
she closes her door
and pulls her curtains shut
and makes her mind watery
and blank,
remembering her life
as a giant squid.
Minn sleeps so deeply
she sleeps through her mother shouting, Mi-I-inn!
She sleeps through her father shouting,
Dinnertime!
She is wandering
through the world of dreams:
Something is chasing me—
it wants to cut me in half
with scissors
but I am running,
running away—jump!
Now
I am some sort of an animal—a horse,
or a large cat.
What is that burning smell?
Here is Jake.
But small and bald and fat
like a baby.
I hand him a jar.
Here is a lizard I caught for you, Jake.
Eat her up, and you can grow big.
Jake shakes the lizard out of the jar
and holds her behind the head.
He lifts her up to his mouth
and he kisses her—
AAAAAAAARRRRGGGH!
Minn wakes up
with the soft mushy taste
of burnt marshmallow
in her mouth
and spit on the side of her face
and her pillow.
She sits still,
with her eyes shut,
trying to remember more of her dreams,
until she remembers,
Jake is leaving this morning!
Minn runs down the stairs.
Her father and mother
are reading the newspaper.
Minn knocks over her father’s coffee.
Drive me to Jake’s house—
What time is it?
Hurry! Please, please, please!
36 / The Goodbye Surprise
It is 6:15 a.m., Saturday,
and Jake and Soup and their mother
need to be at the airport in an hour.
Jake and Soup
and their mother and father
waddle out the door
with their suitcases.
Jake’s father is packing
the suitcases in the trunk
just as Minn and her father
drive up, waving.
∼
Minn knew! Soup says,
running into the house.
Minn came
because she knew!
I’m going to give it to her!
No, don’t! Soup! Jake shouts.
Dad, stop him!
Give it to me? Minn says.
Something I got for you.
Last night.
My dad is going to take it to your house
later on,
after he drops us off
at the airport.
What is it? Minn wants to know.
Nothing. You’ll get it later, OK?
Why’d you come? Jake wants to know.
I came to say goodbye, Jake.
And to ask if it really would be all right
to visit Los Angeles.
I mean, for me.
If my parents let me.
Do you really think it would be fun
if I came to visit—
A LIZARD!
Soup hands an empty honey jar
to Minn,
a honey jar full
of a lizard,
a lizard without a tail,
but with a note folded up
and placed inside:
Dear Minn,
I never thought
I would want to catch a lizard,
but you have taught me
to look at a lot of things
in a brand-new way.
I will miss you
this summer.
Your buddy,
Jake
∼
Minn wipes the sweat from her hands
onto her pajama pants.
Where did you—
Did you catch this, Jake?
I caught him! Soup shouts.
We caught him, Jake says.
Well, you caught him,
but I taught you how—
I taught you exactly what Minn
taught me—
It was the most amazing thing, Minn—
it’s almost like the lizard
was waiting
to be caught,
wanting to be caught,
just sitting here on the front steps—
∼
Minn shakes the lizard out of the jar
and grabs him behind the head.
She lifts him up to her mouth
and she kisses him—
AAAAAAAARRRRGGGH! Jake shouts.
Ooooooooooooh, let me kiss him, too!
Soup begs,
but Minn drops the lizard
back in the jar
as Jake’s father pushes the two boys
into the car.
Goodbye, Minn! Jake and Soup shout,
waving out the car window.
Call me on your cell phone!
Minn shouts back,
waving goodbye.
∼
And up in the clouds,
the Lizard Gods are waving, too.
About the Authors
Janet Wong was born in Los Angeles, California and grew up in Southern and Northern California. During her junior year in college, she lived in France, studying art history at the Universite de Bordeaux. When she returned from France, Janet founded the UCLA Immigrant Children’s Art Project, a program focused on teaching refugee children to express themselves through art. Janet graduated from UCLA, summa cum laude, with a B.A. in History and College Honors. She then obtained her J.D. from Yale Law School, where she was a director of the Yale Law and Technology Association and worked for New Haven Legal Aid. After practicing corporate and labor law for a few years for GTE and Universal Studios Hollywood, she chose to write for young people instead. Janet’s poems have been reprinted in many textbooks and anthologies, as well as in some more unusual venues. “Albert J. Bell” from A Suitcase of Seaweed was selected to appear on 5,000 subway and bus posters as part of the New York City Metropolitan Transit Authority’s “Poetry in Motion” program, and poems from Behind the Wheel have been featured on a car-talk radio show. Janet’s awards include the International Reading Association’s “Celebrate Literacy Award,” presented by the Foothill Reading Council for exemplary service in the promotion of literacy. She also has been a
ppointed to the Commission on Literature of the National Council of Teachers of English. Janet’s first two books have received several awards including the prestigious Stone Center Recognition of Merit, given by the Claremont Graduate School’s Stone Center for Children’s Books. You can sign up for email updates here.
Geneviève Côté was born in Montreal in 1964. For as long as she can remember, she has always wanted to be an illustrator. It seemed considerably easier than becoming an astronaut, which was her second choice. Over the last fifteen years, she has illustrated a wide variety of subjects—serious, funny, or frankly bizarre—for publications like The New York Times, the Boston Globe and Utne Reader. She has also worked for various advertising agencies in Toronto, Montreal, and Melbourne. Illustrating children’s books, however, is what she loves best of all. Her work has appeared in Communication Arts, Print, Critique, and American Illustration, and has earned her several awards. She lives in Montreal, Quebec. You can sign up for email updates here.
Also by Janet S. Wong
with pictures by Geneviève Côté
Minn and Jake’s Almost Terrible Summer
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Contents
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
1 / Extra Lizardy and Alone
2 / How NOT to Choose a True Best Friend
3 / Stuck
4 / Minn’s Worms
5 / Yes
6 / Soup
7 / Jake’s Fish
8 / The Long Hike Home
9 / The Hunt
10 / Mad
11 / 4:05 p.m.
12 / An Invitation (Part One)
13 / An Invitation (Part Two)
14 / An Invitation (Part Three)
15 / The Lizard Lesson
16 / The Lizard-Tail Trail
17 / Jake Makes a Deal
18 / Minn Makes a Deal
19 / Patching Up
20 / The Lizard Gods
21 / Jake’s Lizard Dream
22 / Minn’s Lizard Dream
23 / Two Heads
24 / Sharing Time
25 / My Gummy Valentine
26 / Jake Loves Minn
27 / Lizard Revenge
28 / Minn Loves Jake
29 / The Gulch
30 / Truth or Dare
31 / Rescue
32 / Happy Valentine’s Day, Jake!
33 / Crime and Punishment
34 / Storm
35 / The Long Sleep
36 / The Goodbye Surprise
About the Authors
Also by Janet S. Wong
Copyright
Text copyright © 2003 by Janet S. Wong
Pictures copyright © 2003 by Geneviève Côté
All rights reserved
First edition, 2003
Sunburst edition, 2008
Our eBooks may be purchased in bulk for promotional, educational, or business use. Please contact the Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at 1-800-221-7945, ext. 5442, or by e-mail at MacmillanSpecialMarkets@macmillan.com.
eISBN 9781466894846
First eBook edition: August 2015