It was the beginning of a new school year, and Judith was starting second grade. More than anything else on earth, Judith wanted a best friend. She had spent the summer with her mother at Nana’s house over on the coast, but Nana’s house was isolated, and it had been lonely with no nearby children to play with, so when she returned to Cedar Crest all she could think about was finding a friend—a best friend. On the first day of school she had worn the plaid woolen skirt that Nana had made along with brand-new saddle shoes that squeaked with each step. She felt very grown up that day as she walked to school all by herself for the first time. (Always before, her mother had insisted she ride in the car and stay in Mother’s classroom until the first bell rang.) But this year was to be different.
Judith had known ahead of time that her teacher was to be pretty Miss Harper, who’d just started teaching the middle of last year when crabby old Mrs. Warner retired. Everyone in the school wanted Miss Harper for their teacher. She was young and brunette and had a beautiful smile just like Jackie Kennedy. Judith thought life was just about perfect then. Now if only she could find the perfect best friend. As she walked to school she considered the girls in her class from the previous year, and while they were nice enough, none of them seemed like real best-friend material. Just the same, she hoped to find someone who was very, very special.
In Miss Harper’s classroom, Judith found her name printed neatly on a manila card that was securely taped to the left-hand corner of a square, wooden desk. She carefully arranged her school supplies and sat down to wait for the bell to ring. Then Miss Harper greeted the class and began to read the roll. Judith longed to look around to see who might become her new best friend, but instead kept her eyes straight forward on her teacher as she worked through the names.
“Judith McPhearson?” she finally said.
“Here.” said Judith with her brightest smile.
“Jasmine Morrison?”
“Here, Miss Harper.” said a sweet, lilting voice from behind Judith. But the way the girl pronounced the words sounded more like, Hee-yah, Miss Harpah. And some of the children giggled at the sound.
Judith turned in her seat to see who this new Jasmine Morrison might be and was pleased to spot a brown-eyed girl with nut-brown hair cut just like a pixie sitting only two seats away. Judith smiled at the new girl and was met with an impish but not unpleasant grin.
By the end of the day they discovered they had the same initials, identical saddle shoes, and hated beets with a passion. But the best discovery of all was that they shared the exact same birth date! By the end of the week they were indisputably best friends. And by the end of fifth grade, they became blood sisters, the same way Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer had done. By then they both wore their hair in the same short style, and because they both had brown eyes, they often pretended to be twins. Sometimes strangers actually believed them because they really did look similar, although Jasmine’s face was decidedly rounder and, in Judith’s opinion, prettier. And Judith had troublesome freckles.
Judith rose from Peter’s chair and picked up the obituary clipping again- She read it more slowly this time, searching for some sort of clue, trying desperately to recreate Jasmine’s entire adult life out of a two-by-three-inch piece of low-quality newsprint. Apparently Jasmine had been married to a Hal Emery who resided in Cedar Crest, but it didn’t appear they had any children. Poor Jasmine.
She had always wanted to have at least eight children. It also said she was survived by her parents who still lived in Jackson, Mississippi, but gave no mention of Jasmine’s little sister, Constance. Jasmine had died only two weeks earlier, but no cause of death was given, and the internment was to take place, most likely had already taken place, in Jackson, Mississippi. Not a lot of information to patch together the nearly thirty years that Judith had been out of touch with her friend.
Judith stood up and began to pace back and forth across the living room of her tiny apartment. She was well aware how in the past eighteen months she had worn a path on the matted down carpet, and sometimes old Mr. Ramsey downstairs would thump impatiently on his ceiling when Judith forgot the time and paced into the wee hours of the morning.
A multitude of questions rumbled through her mind, but two seemed to dominate. First, who had anonymously sent this clipping to her? But it was the second question that really bothered her. If Jasmine had been living in the state all this time, why in the world hadn’t she been in touch with Judith? Judith still had a cousin who ran the only beauty parlor in Cedar Crest. Goodness knows how many times Judith and Jasmine had gone there for haircuts. Surely Jasmine would’ve known that Polly could’ve easily reached Judith’s mother, who could’ve put her directly in touch with Judith. It hurt to think that Jasmine, living only a hundred miles away, had never even bothered to call. For all Judith had known, Jasmine might just as well have been living in Tibet. Why hadn’t she called or written? Why? And now it was too late. Jasmine, like Peter and Jonathan, was gone. Gone for good.
Without thinking, Judith went, over, picked up the phone, and dialed information for her cousin’s number, then for “fifty cents extra” waited as the operator directly connected her. Judith hadn’t spoken to her cousin in years. Polly was really her mother’s cousin and about fifteen years older than Judith, but she was also an excellent source of information as almost every female in Cedar Crest eventually stopped by the little beauty shop for one thing or another. Polly had always loved both giving and receiving the freshest scoop on the latest morsel of gossip. “Polly’s Hair Salon. Can I do a “do’ for you?”
“Hello?” Judith felt her voice tremble. “Is this Polly?” “Sure is. What can I do for you?”
“Thiis is Judith McPhearson Blackwell—”
“Why, Judith Anne, it’s been absolutely ages! How are you, darling? Oh, honey, I heard about your misfortune. Such a shame. And from what I heard your husband was a really great guy too. I’m just so sorry. I meant to drop you a card—”
“That’s okay, Polly. Thanks for your concern. It’s been kind of rough...” Judith paused, not quite sure what it was she wanted to ask. “Say, Polly, I wondered if you knew anything about my friend Jasmine Morrison—well, not Morrison, that was her maiden name. Let’s see, I can’t remember her married name off hand.” Judith waited a moment, hoping that Polly would fill in that piece of information, but when the line remained silent, Judith stretched the phone cord over to the table and reached for the newspaper clipping then finally read. “Emery. Her married name was Emery—Jasmine Emery, Polly. And I know that she died a couple weeks ago, but that’s about all I know...”
“Yes, I know of that person.” Polly’s voice grew stiff and formal, nothing like the friendly woman who’d originally answered the phone.
“Do you know anything about what happened to her? I mean, how did she die? And who’s this husband, this Emery guy? And how long had she been living in Cedar Crest?”
“I can’t really say.”
“Do you mean that you can’t say, or that you just don’t know?”
“That’s right.”
What was wrong with Polly? Why was she acting so strangely? “I don’t understand—”
“I just can’t tell you much, is all.”
Judith sighed. “Polly, I don’t get it. Is something wrong?”
“No. I just don’t have anything to say right now.”
“Okay.” Judith gritted her teeth, determined to remain calm, but the tone of the other woman’s voice made her want to jerk the phone right out of the wall and scream.
“Anything else I can do for you, sweetie?” Now she sounded more like the same good-natured Polly, which left Judith feeling even more confused.
“No, nothing, Polly. Thanks for your time.”
“I’m really sorry, Judith.” This time Polly’s voice sounded sincere. Almost as if she were saying something more, as though perhaps she was sorry about Jasmine too. But why couldn’t she just say it plain and clear? Why couldn’t she simply answer J
udith’s questions? It was all too baffling.
Judith hung up the phone and slowly shook her head. What was this all about? Why had someone anonymously sent her this obituary in the first place? She paced again, finally stopping at the window. She pressed her forehead against the glass, this time staring blankly at the lethargic city traffic in the street below.
“Dear, dear Jasmine,” she whispered. “What has happened to you, my friend?” And then the tears began to trickle down her cheeks. It was the first time she had cried since that awful day when she had learned that Peter was dead. And even then she had only allowed herself to cry for part of the day. After that she had become very busy, bustling about, taking care of details, making lists and funeral arrangements, meeting with people. She had gone above and beyond what is expected of one who had just lost half—no more than half—of their life.
But today she cried with loud wailing sobs, not caring whether or not she disturbed old Mr. Ramsey downstairs. She cried for Jonathan. She cried for Peter. And she cried for Jasmine. And then finally, she cried for herself. For suddenly she realized that in many ways she was only a few steps behind them all. A fine line stretched between life and death, and she had been standing precariously close to its edge. But now this news about Jasmine had temporarily jolted her back into the land of the living again. How very like Jasmine Marie, the one person who had so completely loved living, that she could somehow manage to reach beyond the grave to give Judith one last firm shove towards life.
Finally her tears stopped, and Judith took a long tepid shower. For the first time in ages she actually felt the sensation of cool water running over her still throbbing head and down her thin body. She scrubbed and scrubbed, as if to erase all signs of death and decay. Because for the moment, she wanted to live. She wasn’t sure what would follow. But for the moment, her curiosity propelled her.
She stormed her bedroom, jerking an old canvas suitcase from a dark corner of her closet and quickly filling it, paying little attention to what items she tossed inside. She had no idea where she would stay, nor how long she’d be gone. But one thing was crystal clear. Her destination was . Cedar Crest. Somehow she was going to find out what had happened to Jasmine Marie.
CHAPTER THREE
FOR THE FIRST TIME since Peter’s death, Judith was actually driving beyond the invisible boundary of the city limits. Teaching at an inner-city school had made it unnecessary for her to drive much anyway, and more and more her little dark green MG had remained parked in the garage below the apartments. She had been slightly surprised when the old car had started after more than two weeks of complete neglect. It felt strange and slightly frightening to be traveling so fast down along the crowded freeway. But then, why should she be afraid? Her life, in her opinion, had been nearly over anyway. What difference would it make if she were killed on the freeway? Except that now she had a mission of sorts.
This strange new urgency almost made her feel alive again. Almost. As if some inexplicable inner force now compelled her to find out what happened to Jasmine. For some reason, however childish, she felt she owed it to her dear friend—her blood sister.
Suddenly, and with startling clarity, Jasmine’s young tear-streaked face forced itself into Judith’s consciousness. There had only been a handful of times when Judith had actually seen Jasmine cry, and although this was a muddled sort of memory and one that Judith had nearly forgotten, it seemed clearer than ever right now. Still, Judith tried to push it from her mind, for she knew it was tainted with unhappiness, and it wasn’t a memory she cared to recall. But it was useless to resist, for the persistent image forced itself upon her in a haunting and powerful sort of way.
The two girls had just celebrated their mutual twelfth birthdays and were making all sorts of exciting plans for when the school year would finally end. It had been a trying year, with other sixth-grade girls vying to squeeze into their tight-knit world and split the two friends apart in the way that only sixth-grade girls can do. But in the end their friendship remained stronger than ever. Until that sunny day in late May.
Unexpectedly, Eli Paxton had wanted to walk home with them. Which was fine with Judith because she and Eli had been good friends ever since she’d first moved to Cedar Crest. In fact if Eli hadn’t been a boy, and Jasmine Marie had never moved to town, he might’ve very well become her best friend. Eli’s family lived just down the street from Judith, and sometimes when Jasmine couldn’t play, Judith and Eli would shoot baskets in front of his rickety garage.
But as much as Judith liked Eli, Jasmine had always remained distant to the boy. She’d never wanted to get acquainted with him, and sometimes Judith suspected that Jasmine was simply jealous of him. And even on that ill-fated day in May, Jasmine seemed slightly vexed when Judith invited Eli to walk home with them. But before long, Eli’s imitation of Fats Domino had Jasmine laughing so loudly that her famous snort followed and threw Eli into complete hysterical fits. And so Judith had been hopeful that the three of them might finally become good friends. She and Eli waved goodbye to Jasmine, who then turned off toward her house on the hill. But before parting, both girls promised to meet at the city park as soon as they changed clothes and did their chores, Judith boasting that she would be first since she had developed a scientific system for getting her chores done quickly.
As Eli and Judith continued toward Pine Street where they both lived, Eli asked Judith if the Morrisons were very rich. And Judith said that she guessed so since they lived in the biggest house on the hill. Then she and Eli said goodbye, and Judith hurried home to hastily change her clothes, make her bed, and do the breakfast dishes. Then she hopped on her bike and zipped to the park. Just as she expected, she was the first one there. She waited and waited at the park, but soon it was nearly five o’clock with no sign of Jasmine. Judith decided to ride up the hill and see what was keeping her friend. It was never easy to peddle her one-speed Schwinn up the steep hill, and she ended pushing it up the final block.
When she finally reached the white two-story house with its columned porch, she noticed that Jasmine was sitting on the front steps with her head bent down to her knees. Judith became worried. Was Jasmine ill? She dropped her bike on the immaculate lawn and ran up the walk calling to Jasmine. When she looked up her face was blotchy and red, wet with fresh tears. But worse than that was the dark, angry look in Jasmine’s eyes—a look Judith had never seen. Then Jasmine actually yelled at Judith, telling her to go away, saying that they couldn’t ever be friends again—not ever! Just like that! Judith froze on the walk unable to believe her ears. What was going on? Had aliens invaded and taken over her friend’s brain? Then Mr. Morrison stepped out. He was a tall man with short-cropped blond hair and steely blue eyes. He looked down upon Judith as if she were a worthless piece of trash that some stray dog had just dragged in and deposited onto the front lawn.
“Don’t you ever come around here again, Judith McPh-earson.” he said with authority. “We don’t allow nigger-lovers in our home. Do you understand me?” At first Judith didn’t know what in the world Mr. Morrison was talking about. And then suddenly she remembered: Eli. His smooth skin, the color of polished bronze. Surely that was not what this was all about! She opened her mouth to explain, but before she could even finish her sentence, Mr. Morrison made it very clear that it indeed was Eli whom he was referring to. And then Judith climbed clumsily upon her bike, flying down the hill at breakneck speed with tears running sideways across her cheeks. When she reached the flats she continued to pedal toward home with wobbly knees and a broken heart. And when she told her mother, she noticed a flash of anger cross her usually peaceful countenance. Then her mother gathered her into her arms and kindly stroked her hair, saying, “I’m so sorry, Judith.”
“Is Mr. Morrison right?” sobbed Judith. She’d been taught to respect adults and to believe that they were usually, if not always, right.
“No, dear,” said Mother in a soft voice. “He is very sadly wrong. I’m so sorry.”
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nbsp; The next day, Jasmine avoided Judith, her face a closed door and her eyes downcast. But finally, at last recess, Judith spied Jasmine sitting all alone behind the backstop of the baseball diamond. Judith walked over and quietly said hello, but Jasmine didn’t look up or even answer. Just the same, Judith stubbornly sat down right next to her estranged friend, and after much persistent probing, she finally learned that Mr. Morrison had actually whipped Jasmine with a leather belt yesterday, and that he would do it again if she was ever caught anywhere near Eli Paxton or any of his kind. And for the time being, even consorting with Judith was strictly off limits; Jasmine was grounded until further notice and maybe all summer if need be. It seemed that Mr. Morrison had been driving home at the same time the two girls were walking and joking with Eli, and he had seen them. He had met Jasmine at the door in a livid rage, his belt already removed from his pants. Jasmine said she’d seen her daddy’s temper numerous times before, as had Judith, but never anything like this—at least not toward his own daughter.
Jasmine then tried to patiently explain to Judith how things were different in the South where she’d come from. White girls simply did not walk home with Negroes—ever! Fact was, they didn’t even go to the same schools as Negroes, at least not until something called “bussing” came along, and she still wasn’t completely clear on what that meant, but according to her daddy it was bad—very, very bad. And her father sure didn’t like it that Negroes went to the same school here, even if there was only one family of them in the entire town. Then finally, Jasmine gingerly lifted up the back of her neatly pressed white blouse to show the awful red welts that had been put there by Mr. Morrison. It was then that Judith began to sob uncontrollably. She gently hugged her best friend, careful not to touch her tender back, and she promised that if that’s how it was to be then she would just tell Eli Paxton that he couldn’t walk home with them anymore. And they both decided that until Mr. Morrison cooled down some, they would just have to be best friends in secret.
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