by Anna Kerz
She didn’t even try to give me a kiss, he thought. He wasn’t sure if he would have objected this time.
In the distance, the starter’s pistol went off again. It was followed by the roar from cheering spectators as a new race started, but for Jeremy the joy of cross-country running was over for that day.
EIGHTEEN
It was way past noon when the bus dropped the runners off at school. Jeremy was cold and tired and hungry, but he took his time getting home. He wasn’t worried about facing his mother. He didn’t think she’d say anything else about Aaron. She hardly ever got mad at him anymore. Not since the accident. Ever since his father died, she was careful not to upset him, so careful that her silence bothered him. For a while he had tried annoying her on purpose. He had ignored her calls to dinner and burped loudly at the table. Once, when she bought him a new shirt, he snapped, “That is so not cool.” Before the accident she would have reminded him about his manners, sent him to his room or yelled at him.
For sure she would have made him apologize. Now…?
Now she only frowned and looked sad. In some ways that was worse than being yelled at.
No, it wasn’t his mother he was afraid to face, it was Milly.
She’d been really nice ever since they came to stay with her. Never got mad. Never shouted. Never bossed him around. But today…? Today she had looked disappointed, and he wondered what she would say.
“Hi, Milly,” he said, faking cheerfulness as he walked into the kitchen.
Milly was standing behind the ironing board. He looked for one of her welcoming smiles. It didn’t appear.
She did say, “Hello, Jeremy,” but she didn’t look at him, and he could tell from her tone that she wasn’t happy.
“Is Mom home yet?”
“She’ll be late. She has to make up the time she took off to see you run.”
The muscles in his stomach tightened. His hunger faded.
Milly walked to the stove and brought a cup of tomato soup and a sandwich to the table for him. It looked good. It smelled good. He wrapped his fingers around the cup, enjoying the warmth, but he didn’t pick up the spoon.
He watched Milly return to the ironing board and pull one of his shirts from the laundry basket. He saw her lips pinch and the lines over her nose pucker. The iron came down with a thwack as she pressed wrinkles out of first one sleeve, then the other, flipped the shirt and smacked the iron down again. He sighed. She was mad. He could tell.
“I should have told you that I’ve known Aaron’s grandmother for a long time,” she said.
“You mean…you’re friends?”
“Yes. No. We’re not close friends. We run into each other here and there. At the grocery store or the library. Like that. And we talk.”
The muscles in Jeremy’s stomach clenched, and his arm wrapped protectively across his middle.
“As for Aaron. Well, that boy doesn’t make life easy for her.”
No kidding, was on Jeremy’s lips, but he knew this wasn’t the time for a smart remark.
Milly finished ironing the shirt before she spoke again. “Did you know that his parents are both gone?”
Jeremy shook his head. He hadn’t given Aaron’s parents much thought.
“He was only two when his mother died,” Milly went on. “It was some kind of cancer. The doctors gave her treatments before she knew she was pregnant. They stopped as soon as they found out, but maybe not soon enough. Some of Aaron’s problems might come from that. Cancer medication and babies don’t do well together.”
“What…what happened to his father?”
“He took off after his wife died. He calls every so often but he hasn’t come back.”
“Oh…I thought he was sick or something.”
“What made you think that?”
“I thought Aaron said his dad had a scar on his chest.”
Milly frowned and Jeremy wasn’t sure if it was because she was thinking about Aaron’s father or the shirt she was folding.
Then she said, “When Aaron was little, his grandmother told him that his father left because he had a broken heart and that was something doctors couldn’t fix. I suppose Aaron imagined a scar.”
She pulled a tablecloth from the basket. “It can’t be easy for Aaron either: a boy living alone with his grandmother.”
“He’s not alone. He’s got a brother.”
“Brother? He doesn’t have a brother.”
“But we saw him. On the streetcar. His name’s Paul. He said he was Aaron’s big brother.”
“Oh, Paul. I forgot about Paul. He’s with that Big Brothers, Big Sisters organization. He’s a high-school student who spends time with Aaron every couple of weeks. Nice boy, but not his real brother.”
Jeremy stared into the soup congealing in his cup. His shoulders sagged. “How come you’re telling me now?” he asked.
“Aaron’s grandmother says you’re Aaron’s best friend. I thought you should know.”
“But…I’m not his friend,” Jeremy said stubbornly. He didn’t want to give in on this. “You know I’ve been complaining about Aaron since the first day of school. It’s not my fault that he’s weird. He drives everybody crazy. Why do I have to be his friend?”
Milly matched the ends of the tablecloth and folded it in half and then in half again. She ran her hands across the cloth before she looked up. “I can understand why he’s a nuisance to you,” she said.
“But you’re making it sound like I have to be his friend,” Jeremy said, prepared to argue.
“No…” Milly shook her head. “That’s a decision only you can make.” She leaned down to pull the iron’s plug from the wall. “But I think it’s sad, isn’t it, that someone you don’t like at all thinks you’re the best friend he has.”
She collapsed her ironing board then and carried it out of the kitchen, leaving Jeremy with a mouthful of protests and no one to hear them.
NINETEEN
On Monday Jeremy went back to school prepared to give Aaron another chance. Maybe they could be friends some of the time.
When Mr. Collins gave the class time to work on their mealworm projects, everything went well—for a while. He and Aaron drew a design for a maze, and when they showed it to Mr. Collins, the teacher said, “I think that experiment’s worth a try.”
He sent them to borrow a bin of blocks from the kindergarten and they settled on the floor at the back of the room and began building. When the maze had an outer wall and three small rooms for the mealworms to wiggle through in their search for food, Aaron began building a tower at the entrance.
Jeremy sat back on his heels. “There’s no tower in the plan,” he said, trying to keep his voice calm and reasonable. “Besides, we’re building a maze, not a castle.”
“But, but, but what if we put them in the tower first? It would give them a chance to see the maze from the air. An’ then, an’ then, they’d know where they have to go. Before, you know, before they enter the maze. An’, an’, an’ the first mealworm that gets out of the tower gets a head start.”
“It’s an experiment, not a contest,” Jeremy said, his voice not nearly as calm as before. “We’re trying to find out how mealworms find food, not how they get out of towers.”
“Yeah, but this will make it more interesting.”
“But they’ll fall. Mr. Collins said we’re not supposed to do anything to hurt them, remember?” And then all his calm left him and he said, “Why can’t you for once do what you’re supposed to do?”
“You’re not the boss of me!” Aaron crowed.
“But I’m the boss of your mealworm,” Jeremy began, and then he couldn’t stop. “I’m the one responsible for what you do to it and I’m not letting you drop a mealworm from your stupid tower. What if you kill it? You’re such a pain!”
“You’re not the boss of me!” Aaron crowed again as he added another block to his tower.
The tower, already twelve blocks high, teetered.
When it steadied Aa
ron smiled triumphantly. “Now I just need a red block for the top,” he said, rooting through the bin. “The kind that has a hole in it that looks like a bridge.”
“There aren’t any more,” Jeremy snarled. Feeling almost pleased, he added, “I used the last one.”
“Oh,” said Aaron, scanning the maze. Then he reached over and plucked out the block he wanted, destroying a section of the wall Jeremy had just finished.
“Hey! Give it!” Jeremy reached to take the block back.
“Mine!” Aaron said.
“How’s it going, guys?” Mr. Collins spoke softly as he squatted on the floor beside them. Jeremy’s lips pinched into a tight line. He was too angry to answer.
“I made a tower,” Aaron said. “So we can find out what happens when mealworms are in a high place.
Like, do they jump off or do they look over the side and say, ‘Uh-oh. Too high.’”
“That’s quite a drop for a little creature like a mealworm,” Mr. Collins pointed out. “What if your mealworm’s not smart enough to stay away from the edge?”
“Then it’s gonna fall.”
“It certainly will. And you’re its protector. So what will you do to protect it?”
“Jeremy can catch it. He’s a good catcher.”
Jeremy grimaced.
“What if he misses?”
“It’ll hit the floor and kapowee!”
“Exactly.”
“And he’ll die?”
“Maybe. Why not pass on the tower and stick with the maze,” Mr. Collins said before he walked away.
Aaron didn’t say anything as he crossed his legs and started rocking.
“Let’s see what happens when we put the mealworms in the maze,” Jeremy said, trying to sound cheerful now that he had the teacher’s support. He put a small pile of bran at the far end, took Spot from the can and placed him just inside the entrance. The mealworm didn’t move. “You wanna put Darth Vader beside him?”
No answer from Aaron.
“Come on, put him in,” Jeremy said, knowing he sounded like a grown-up trying to convince a kid he’d love broccoli if only he’d try some.
Aaron didn’t move, so Jeremy scooped Darth Vader from his tin-can home and put him down beside Spot. Darth Vader wriggled and twisted and whipped back and forth; then he stopped too. When Jeremy nudged them, Spot barely moved, but Darth Vader wriggled to the nearest wall and stretched out beside one of the blocks.
“This is no good,” Jeremy said, “What do you think?”
Aaron didn’t answer.
Jeremy peered at the mealworm. Spot was longer and much fatter than he used to be. Maybe that’s why he was so slow. He nudged the mealworm again, but as he did, his hand brushed a block and he was horrified to see a section of the wall collapse, burying Spot.
Jeremy’s hand flashed out, but in his hurry to rescue Spot, his balance shifted, and his hand came down on a block. He felt the squish underneath.
When he lifted the block, Spot was a flat wet splotch on the floor.
My fault. My fault. I killed it. My fault. His hand went to his throat. He saw Aaron staring, his eyes large and round. Saw him frown. Saw him snatch Darth Vader from the mess on the floor and drop him into Spot’s can. Saw him sweep his hand in a wide arc and shout, “Kapowee!” as he collapsed his tower and sent blocks sliding across the room.
“Mr. Collins,” somebody called out. “Look what Aaron did.”
Mr. Collins was already on his way. “It was my—,” Jeremy began, but Aaron rolled on the floor and started to howl.
“Enough already,” Mr. Collins said. For the first time he lost his cool and shouted, “Stop! Stop right now.”
Aaron howled on. By the time he was removed from the classroom, everyone knew that a mealworm had died and everybody believed that it was Aaron who had killed it. By then Jeremy thought it was too late to tell what really happened.
It’s only a mealworm, he told himself. Just a mealworm. But the guilt of the tiny mealworm’s sudden death stayed as a heavy weight on his mind. My fault. My fault. I killed it. My fault.
TWENTY
On Tuesday Aaron sat in his chair and rocked. He didn’t talk, or answer questions, or do any work. Jeremy was left to finish their maze experiment on his own. It turned out to be a bust. Darth Vader refused to move even when he was nudged, and Jeremy couldn’t think what to do. He was too embarrassed to ask Aaron for advice.
Wednesday and Thursday dragged. Lessons were hard to follow. When he wasn’t thinking about Aaron and the mealworms, Jeremy’s mind was filled with Thanksgiving and the trip home.
And then, sometime between Thursday night and Friday morning, Darth Vader disappeared. He didn’t exactly vanish. He changed. Just like that. Overnight. He was still a mealworm when Jeremy went home, but in the morning when he looked into the can, there was a little cream-colored pupa. Everybody came over to see, so Jeremy stepped back and let them look. He didn’t feel any joy in the attention. It wasn’t his mealworm. It was Aaron’s, and Aaron was the only one who didn’t come.
Mr. Collins talked about how mealworms have a life cycle just like butterflies and moths. “They go through a metamorphosis,” he said, “but what comes out of the pupa is a beetle, and the beetle goes on to lay eggs that hatch out into mealworms, and so on.” He showed them a circle of drawings to explain the different stages.
Aaron knew that, Jeremy thought. He’s a lot smarter than the kids in the class realize. If only…he wasn’t such a pain.
That night when sleep didn’t come, Jeremy lay in bed and began counting off days on his fingers. Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday. Five more sleeps, he thought, remembering what his mother used to say when he was little and waiting for Christmas or his birthday. Five more sleeps and we’re going home.
He couldn’t wait to go back to Nova Scotia. He wanted to see Nana and Grampa, to walk in the woods, to climb over the rocks, to play tag with the waves. He couldn’t wait to see everything. No, not everything. He didn’t want to see their old house. Somebody else lived there now. Probably some other kid played in the yard. Maybe some other dog lived in the run. He wouldn’t think about that.
He squirmed. He didn’t want to think about Aaron either. I should have told. I should have told. He knew why he hadn’t. It wasn’t so much about what the other kids thought. It was because Mr. Collins had expected him to be responsible. I messed up, he thought. Messed up again.
On Monday Jeremy woke to the sound of rain and wind and the shock of Thomas’s wet nose in his ear. Jeremy flipped onto his stomach and pulled the covers over his head. The cat bounded lightly onto his back and balanced his way down his body and along his left leg until Jeremy groaned and rolled out of bed. Another rainy Monday. Just two more sleeps, he comforted himself. Just two more days of Aaron and mealworms.
It was still raining at morning recess, so nobody was surprised when Mr. Collins said, “Have your snacks at your desk and then find a quiet activity.”
What did surprise Jeremy was Karima. She looked right at him and said, “I brought a deck of Uno cards.” Turning to include Horace and Tufan she asked, “Do you guys wanna play?” Jeremy saw Horace hesitate, and he heard Tufan snort. Would he say no? None of the boys ever played with the girls at recess—not outside and not in the classroom.
“Sure,” Jeremy said quickly. “I like Uno.” To his relief, Horace nodded and after a moment of hesitation, Tufan nodded too.
“Why not?” he said, snatching the cards from Karima’s hand. “I’ll deal.”
Jeremy smiled, but when Karima smiled back he looked away.
He saw Aaron at the front of the room standing on his tiptoes, reaching for the ceiling. Jeremy couldn’t see what he was after, but whatever it was, it was too high, and Aaron pulled over a chair and climbed up.
“Aaron,” Mr. Collins’ warning voice called, “get down please.”
Ignoring the teacher, Aaron reached again. Then Jeremy saw the shimmery gleam of a spider’s silk. As he w
atched, Aaron grasped the fine thread between his thumb and finger and stepped down. With the thread in his hand and the spider dangling, he walked slowly toward the back of the room.
“What’s he doing?” Karima asked.
Jeremy laughed. “He’s taking a spider for a walk.”
“What a dweeb,” Tufan said. He was dealing out cards and barely looked up. “Why doesn’t he step on it?”
“Step on a spider and you’ll have rain,” Karima said.
“We’ve already got rain, haven’t we?” Tufan said. “What kind of stupid superstition is that anyway?”
“I’ve heard that too,” Horace said. “Maybe it’s true.”
“If you wish to live and thrive, let a spider run alive,” Jeremy added, remembering something he had heard Nana say.
“You guys are all weird,” Tufan said. “Play the game.”
Jeremy picked up his cards. He was organizing his hand when Aaron’s announcement voice interrupted them.
“Mr. Collins. Mr. Collins. Mr. Collins. The snake’s gone.”
Everybody saw Mr. Collins hurry to the back of the room and glance into the snake’s vivarium.
“Tanisha, close the door. Now!” he called to the girl who sat closest. Then, in a softer voice, “All right, everybody. It’s just a garter snake and it’s probably scared. I need you to stay right where you are and look around. Tell me if you see it. It’s probably hiding beside or behind or inside something. Let’s find it before it gets out of the room.”
“You mean it’s loose in here?” Tufan said, and Jeremy was surprised to hear a tremor in Tufan’s voice. A couple of girls gave little squeaking screams as if they were practicing being afraid.
“What if it’s inside a desk?” somebody said, and more kids made tentative screaming noises.
“Settle down!” Mr. Collins called. Then more loudly, “Listen up!” But before he could say anything else, Aaron dove behind a box.
“Got it,” he said. When he stood up, the snake was in his hands. It did not look happy. Its tail whipped around Aaron’s wrist. The forked tongue flicked, tasting the air, and its head made several lunges in its search for freedom. Aaron shifted his hold with the snake’s every movement until Mr. Collins took it from him and put it back into the vivarium.