by Jenn Bishop
Delia gets up to answer the door.
“Emma?” she yells from the living room. “It’s for you.”
For… me?
But nobody here even knows me. Still, I clink my spoon in my cereal bowl and pad into the living room.
Sitting on the sofa is Tyler from the library. He’s wearing the same white pants as when I met him—the kind I for sure would stain in less than five minutes—with a plaid purple button-down shirt.
I cross my arms over my chest, suddenly self-conscious about being in my pajamas, even though there’s hardly anything to cover up. Becca might have gotten real boobs last summer, but I’ve still got the chest of an eight-year-old.
“Finally, you’re back! I came by yesterday, but you weren’t here.”
“We went camping. Wait—how do you know where I live?”
“Well, you’re staying with Sadie. And I had Mrs. Sadowski for fifth grade.”
“Oh,” I say. How small is this town, exactly?
“Well, I’ll let you two be. Holler if you need anything, Em.” Delia heads back into the kitchen.
“You got any plans today?” I catch it there again, that little bit of lilt to his voice that says he’s from Wyoming.
I shake my head.
“Want to hang out?”
“Sure,” I say. “No offense, but what is there to do around here besides the library?”
“Ouch.” Tyler rubs at a spot on his chest like I’ve just pierced his heart.
“Actually, is there a Goodwill or a Take It or Leave It in town? Or a flea market?”
Tyler’s eyes light up. “You want to go shopping?”
“Sort of,” I say.
“I’m game.”
I’m all ready to slip into some shoes and leave with Tyler when I remember I’m still in my pajamas. “Can I go get dressed?”
“Nope, it’s a requirement. We can only go shopping if you stay in your pajamas.”
I laugh. “I’ll be right back.”
I’m halfway down the stairs when Tyler shouts, “Does Mrs. Sadowski still have that cat she always talked about in class? Gandalf?”
“Dumbledore,” I shout back up the stairs. “But watch out, he can turn on you in a second.”
After changing into shorts and a tank top, I grab the two buffalo postcards I filled out for my parents and Austin. I’m pulling out the address for the rehab center when the piece of paper about the art competition falls out of my backpack. There aren’t that many rules for this one. All that’s included is the deadline, information about how to submit the art, size constraints, and this: “The principles of true art is not to portray, but to evoke.”
Beneath the quote is the name Jerzy Kosinski. I don’t know who that is. An artist? Some person who runs the contest?
“Ow! You vicious beast! You’re no Dumbledore. You’re Draco Malfoy. You’re Lord Voldemort himself. Hey, Em, this cat’s some kind of Dementor.”
“Don’t provoke him, then!” I shout back.
“I was just trying to pet him.”
Across the way, the door opens. Sadie stands in the frame, rubbing sleep out of her eyes. “Where are you headed this early in the morning?”
“To Goodwill. With Tyler.”
“Look at you, making friends already.” She nods like she’s impressed, then heads down the hall toward the bathroom.
I toss my wallet and buffalo book in my backpack, surprised by how my mouth keeps breaking into a smile. It feels good hearing that word. Could I really have a friend here already?
* * *
“Can we stop by the post office on the way?” I ask as I hop onto Sadie’s old bike outside. Tyler’s is looking a little rough—the front fender is banged up and he could use a bit more air in the tires, plus it looks too small for him.
“You got some mail to send your boyfriend?” Tyler teases.
I laugh. “No.” If some boy from back home teased me like that, I’d probably blush or feel all awkward, but I don’t with Tyler. He acts like we’ve known each other for years even though we’ve barely spent half an hour together. He’s not so closed off like people are back home. His heart feels a little more open.
Maybe it’s a Wyoming thing. Delia seems that way too.
“It’s for my brother,” I say, and then I wonder if that sounds weird. Like, wouldn’t it also be for my parents? Wouldn’t I just say my family?
But Tyler doesn’t ask that question. “Older or younger?”
“Older.”
“I always wanted an older brother,” Tyler says, almost wistfully. “What’s he like?”
“He’s…” The answer used to come so easily. Athletic. Popular. Ridiculous—well, if you spent enough time around him. But now I don’t even know where to start. I can’t tell him the truth. Tyler barely knows me. Plus, what do people think about family members of addicts, anyway? That they should’ve known? Should’ve been able to do something to stop it?
Sometimes I think that deep down, part of me was in denial. I couldn’t believe something that bad could be happening with my brother.
“I know. It’s pretty impossible to describe someone you know that well. Maybe someday I’ll get to meet him. Do you guys FaceTime?”
We would if he weren’t in rehab. But then again, if he weren’t in rehab, I wouldn’t be here in the first place. Just as I’m about to say something vague back, I notice an animal in the grassy field off to the side of the bike path. With the body of a deer and long, twisty horns, it looks like something out of a safari exhibit at the zoo. “What the heck is that?”
“The antelope? They’re basically like squirrels,” Tyler says.
“Like squirrels? Have you seen a squirrel? That thing’s huge and—”
“Not technically like a squirrel. Just as in how many there are around here. How have you not seen any antelope yet?”
I shrug, relieved that the antelope has gotten us off the topic of my brother.
At the post office, I hop off my bike, careful to keep my hand over the address on the postcard. I don’t want anyone—not Tyler, not even a stranger—to see where it’s going.
After I slide the postcard in the blue box, I can’t help but think about the other three in my bag. Becca has no idea I’m in Wyoming. Unless my mom decided to tell hers. What’s my mom even saying to people, anyway? Like when she runs into someone we know at the grocery store? When people back home ask how the kids are, can she answer like she used to, not skipping a beat, “Oh, they’re great”? Even though one of us is in Wyoming and the other in rehab?
As weird as it is for me here, it’s got to be weirder back home for Mom and Dad.
When we get to Goodwill, the cool air-conditioning hits me and it’s like diving into a pool on a hot summer day. “Ahhh,” I say, throwing my hands up in the air. I can’t help myself. I don’t know how Tyler wears pants in the summer here.
“So, what are you looking for?” Tyler asks.
“I don’t know.” It’s the truth. It’s also why most people back home hate to shop with me. I head to the back of the store, where I always start, to the shelves of odds and ends, housewares, et cetera, where you never know exactly what you’ll find. I pick up a tarnished spoon, holding it up to the light.
“Mrs. Sadowski’s silverware not good enough for you? Though, I’ll be honest, that one looks like it’s seen better days.”
“Exactly,” I say. “Sorry. I’m not doing a good job explaining myself. It’s for my art.”
“Your art.” Tyler looks impressed. And he’s doing that repeating-me thing, which I actually find kind of hilarious when it’s him, even if someone else doing it would drive me up the wall.
“I make these boxes. Shadow boxes. I find stuff that catches my eye—that could tell a story, I guess. Stuff that you don’t think would go together, but somehow it does.”
“Like this old dish and a…” Tyler scans for something super random. “Toilet plunger?”
“Ew. But yeah. Except not a toilet plun
ger. But you get the idea.”
Tyler puts down the toilet plunger, his face totally giving away his regret. “That’s cool, Em.”
I raise an eyebrow. “You don’t think it’s weird?”
“Well, it’s different, I guess. But weird? I think everything’s a little weird if you spend too much time thinking about it. It’s your thing and it makes you happy. So what if it’s weird?”
It’s something about the way he says it, or maybe it’s that he says it at all. That he’s okay with weirdness—mine, anyone’s—but I can’t stop myself from blushing a little. I turn toward the shelf, not wanting him to notice, and that’s when I see it.
An astronaut Barbie. The exact same kind Becca got for her eighth birthday. She hated Barbies—we both did—and so after her party, where she did a medium-good job of pretending she liked the gift, we did what any nerdy third grader would do.
We launched her. Not into space, just over Becca’s house. With her birthday money, Becca went out and bought the gift she actually wanted, a model rocket kit, and while she worked on that, I got Barbie ready for her maiden—okay, only—voyage. I gave her a tattoo sleeve—stars, obviously—and a good haircut. (Who’s got time to wash that much hair in space?)
Unfortunately, we didn’t get the launch angle exactly right, and Barbie didn’t so much go over Becca’s roof as get caught on one of the back gables. Her dad kept saying he’d call someone to come get her down, but he clearly wasn’t prioritizing it, because by the time someone came with a tall enough ladder, she’d vanished.
Some bird must’ve flown off with her. That was Becca’s theory, anyway.
I wasn’t so sure. I liked to think Barbie didn’t give up on that first try, when things didn’t go quite right, and that she launched herself into the outer reaches of the atmosphere one cool winter night.
There’s no price tag on the Barbie, but there’s a sign on the top of the shelf saying everything in this aisle is two dollars. I grab a basket from the end of the aisle and add her to it, and that’s when it hits me: how I can win Becca back.
Not with a postcard. Not with something I write. I mean, who am I kidding? I’ve never been much of a writer.
I need to show her that I remember what our friendship means. And what better way to do that than with a shadow box? I’ve got almost two months to make it. Two months to fill it with everything that can remind Becca of how we used to be.
And then when I go home at the end of the summer, I can give it to her myself. Maybe we need this time, Becca and me, to see what we’re missing. What we lost by drifting apart this year. And then we can go back.
Just like rehab is helping Austin go back to how he used to be, this box will help me and Becca.
Tyler and I scan the shelves of Goodwill. I don’t tell him what I’m making yet, or why. Not that everything that goes in my basket is just for Becca’s box. Sometimes things just catch my eye—I save them for later, not knowing why I’ll need them, only sure that they have some purpose. Plus I have two months here. Plenty of time to make several shadow boxes.
Eventually our stomachs are growling and I’ve collected more random stuff than will fit in my backpack. At the register, the elderly lady ringing us up marvels at the sheer range of our findings. Old magazines, the astronaut Barbie, the tarnished spoon, random old postcards, some beaded necklaces, marbles, and a couple of toy cars like the ones Austin had as a little kid. “So, who’s your new friend, Tyler?”
“Emma,” he says proudly. “She’s here from Baaahston.” He turns to me. “Better?”
“B-plus.”
Tyler seems pleased with himself.
“Boston, huh?” She shows me my total. All this stuff for fifteen dollars and some change! “Don’t see too many folks from your neck of the woods out here.”
I hand her a twenty. “My mom came out here when she was in college,” I say. “She wanted me to have an adventure this summer.” So far, Tyler hasn’t asked any more questions about this reasoning. Maybe in his head, it’s something people back in Boston do all the time. Send their kids off to remote locations for the heck of it.
“Well, I’m sure our friend Tyler can make that happen.” I help her put what doesn’t fit in my backpack into two plastic bags. “Have a good one, you two,” she calls after us. The bell by the door jingles while Tyler holds it open for me.
“You have a lot of old-lady friends?” I ask on the way out, teasing Tyler.
“Actually, yeah.” His voice suddenly sounds more serious. “She’s good friends with my grandma,” he says. “I live with my grandparents.”
“Oh,” I say as I try to figure out how to attach these bags to my bike so they won’t whack me the whole way home. “That’s…” But I don’t know how to finish the sentence. I can’t say I’m sorry, even though that’s what almost comes out. For all I know, he prefers it this way. Still, part of me wants to ask Tyler why he doesn’t live with his parents. But then the other part thinks of how kind he was earlier not to pry about my brother. “Can I meet them sometime?”
“They work during the day. Grams at the grocery store, and Gramps at the mines.”
“Chris—Mr. Sadowski—he works there too,” I say, though inside, I’m wondering if both of Tyler’s parents are dead. How awful. How unfair.
Tyler takes one look at what I’ve done to my bike and laughs. “Okay, clearly you have never had to carry anything on a bike before.”
“True.”
He unwinds the plastic bags from the handles and secures them to the sides. “Much better. So, where to next?”
“Back to Delia’s?”
“To Delia’s!” He pumps his fist. “Okay, sorry, it’s really weird calling her anything other than Mrs. Sadowski when she used to be my teacher. How about this: Back to your place?”
“Back to my place.” Now I’m the one who feels weird, thinking of Delia’s house as my place.
By the time we’re back at Delia’s, the sky has clouded over, which finally makes the temperature somewhat bearable. We bring my bags of Goodwill treasures downstairs. Sadie and Delia are nowhere to be found. There’s a note on the kitchen table: Went out for a bit. Be back around 2 p.m. Help yourselves to anything for lunch. XO, D.
I grab a jar of salsa and a container of guacamole from the fridge, along with a new bag of tortilla chips.
Tyler peeks out the window. “Storm’s coming in.”
“It’s just cloudy,” I say.
“We don’t do cloudy in the summer. It’s either a storm or it’s hot as heck. Do you want to go up on the roof and watch?”
“Up on the roof?” Now I’m doing the repeating thing.
Turns out it’s not as dangerous as I would’ve thought. For one, Delia’s house isn’t nearly as tall as mine or Becca’s. And two, you can reach the roof pretty easily by climbing the back deck.
The shingles are still hot from the midday sun, but I lay a blanket across them like Tyler suggests. Just as I’m sitting down, my phone buzzes with a text from my mom. Having fun?
Tyler sees it too, and as I start typing a response, he says, “You better tell her I’m fun!”
“Telling her I had the worst day ever. With this awful boy Tyler who won’t leave me alone.”
Tyler sticks out his tongue at me. I do it back. I think I made a new friend today. Having lots of fun. Miss you.
For a second I feel the worst kind of guilt. Because it’s true, I am having fun today. When’s the last time someone stopped by my house three days in a row just to see if I could hang out? Never. Not even Becca. I don’t deserve Tyler. I’m not sure I deserve any of this.
I crack open the salsa and dip in a chip. And then all I can think about is the spiciness hitting my tongue and that we’re up on the roof with spicy salsa and I completely forgot drinks.
Mom writes back, So happy to hear this. Miss you lots.
Suddenly it occurs to me that even though Tyler won’t be able to meet Austin via FaceTime, I do have photos of him on my
phone. “Do you want to see a picture of my brother?”
“Yeah, sure.”
I flip all the way back to last August. My parents had rented a house on the Cape for two weeks. The Grossmans came down for the weekend in the middle. I skip past the pictures of me and Becca and our epic sandcastle until I find one of Dad and Austin. Dad’s wearing his Celtics shirt. Austin’s flexing like a goof, and he’s got his Patriots hat on backward. My fingers leave a salty smear on my phone as I pass it off to Tyler. “That’s Austin.”
“He kind of looks like a young Christopher. You know, from Gilmore Girls?”
I shake my head—I’ve never seen Gilmore Girls, though I know Kennedy watched some of it with her moms.
“He’s cute in that preppy way. I mean, not that I—he’s too old for me. Ugh. Now I seem like a weirdo, creeping on your brother.” He shoves a few chips in his mouth. “Okay, but actually, he is. He’s really cute. I mean, not that you’re—ugh. I should not even be allowed to talk anymore. Shut up, Tyler. Shut up.”
“It’s fine,” I say. “You’re not the first person who’s ever said that.” I was right earlier, in the library. But it doesn’t seem like Tyler wants to make a fuss over it now, so I don’t say anything about it.
“I don’t even know why you want to hang out with me. Your family is beautiful. You get to travel all over the country like it’s no big deal. Twenty dollars is nothing to you. I haven’t even been on a plane yet! The farthest I’ve been is South Dakota. And not even Sioux Falls, just Rapid City.”
I can’t let him go even one second longer thinking that I’m on some higher tier than him, when really, I’m like a basement dweller on the good-human scale. “Tyler, stop.”
He’s halfway through a chip when I say it, so he just chews for a second while I try to figure out what to say next. So many confessions compete for the chance to come out. Actually, aside from you, I have no friends right now. Like, literally zero. I sold out my old best friend. I missed every sign of my brother’s addiction. And that adventure? My parents sent me away for the entire summer to stay with people I barely know. They have no clue who I really am or all of what went down this year. And if they knew the truth?