June Sparrow and the Million-Dollar Penny

by Rebecca Chace

  It was cold. Wretchedly cold. Plus it smelled. June couldn’t honestly decide if she liked the smell or not. It was that dense, loamy scent of farm animals that was equal parts nice and nasty. June tried to get comfortable on the floor of the tack room, where Aunt Bridget had told her she would find a pile of horse blankets. Blankets were an overstatement, in June’s opinion. These were filthy, quilted things that had clearly been worn many times by large animals in bad weather. June unfolded one to put underneath her and Indigo and pulled the other one on top. But it didn’t work. Nothing worked. Plus June’s stomach was growling because she was too proud to go back into the house for dinner after she and Indigo made a dramatic exit to the barn.

  She pulled her mother’s knit hat farther down so that it covered her eyes and pulled Indigo even closer. He was hungry too, though he wasn’t complaining—in fact, he was being uncharacteristically compliant. June wondered if it was a bit intimidating for him to be surrounded by all these animals, since he had never been in a barn before. Now that it was well and truly dark outside, June had to admit that whatever hope she had that Aunt Bridget would worry about them looked to be a complete waste of time. In the books, your long-lost aunt would come out to the barn with a warm plate of food. Apparently Aunt Bridget hadn’t read the right books.

  June had grabbed a Nancy Drew mystery from her mother’s bookshelf as she left the bedroom, and she liked Nancy Drew well enough, but when she tried reading aloud to Indigo, he yawned loudly and closed his eyes. “Okay, forget it!” June said, slamming the book shut. “Since it’s too cold to sleep, let’s see who’s here.”

  Indigo looked up at her in alarm. Sometimes June got a little reckless when she was frustrated, and Indigo knew that tone of voice. June threw off the top blanket and swept him up in her arms. They walked out of the tack room and stopped at the first stall they came to. A brown cow with a small white blaze on her chest lifted her head and blinked at them, her long lashes seeming to take forever to rise and fall. June reached out her hand, and as she touched that soft, inviting nose, she felt some of her anger start to ease.

  “I know it’s a little late to visit,” June said. “But we’re new here. I’m June and this is Indigo.” The cow blinked slowly again, and June held Indigo out so that he could exchange sniffs with her. The cow sniffed once, twice, and raised her eyebrows in surprise. “Yes, he’s a pig,” said June. “You could say he’s . . . the runt of the litter.”

  Indigo gave her a dirty look, but June pressed on. “He’s a little sensitive about his size, but in terms of miniature pigs, he is a fine example of the breed.”

  “Sorry, Indigo,” she whispered into his ear. “I don’t want to overwhelm them.”

  Indigo wriggled out of her arms and jumped to the floor of the barn, which was hard dirt. June was worried he might hurt himself jumping so far, but Indigo shook himself briefly and marched right down the center aisle. June could swear the cow was smiling. “He can be a little stubborn,” she said apologetically. “Typical New Yorker.” The cow smiled even more, then pulled a bit of hay out of the rack in front of her and chewed steadily. June’s stomach growled.

  Indigo was scratching impatiently at the next stall, and June lifted him up to stare at the wide, brown rump of a horse. Indigo rested his trotters on the top of the stall door and sniffed as loudly as he could, but the horse only shifted his weight from one back hoof to another.

  “Hello?” June tried tentatively, wishing that she had a carrot or an apple or a lump of sugar like the girls in books always did, but she didn’t have a thing. The horse continued to ignore them. There was a nameplate on the stall: “Mr. Chips.” June tried again. “Mr. Chips?” At this the horse stamped hard and flicked his ears but kept his rear end facing directly toward them. Then the tail lifted and the horse deposited some manure right there in front of them! June pulled Indigo back quickly and took a few steps away in shock.

  “How rude!” she said out loud, and thought she could almost hear laughter coming from the horse stall. “Well, you don’t have to poop and laugh in our faces!” she said indignantly. The laughter got even louder, and June realized it was not coming from the horse, which had lowered his tail and still not turned to look at them (rude thing). There was someone else in there. Tiptoeing back, June and Indigo peered over the edge of the stall, and there was a small, round-bellied goat staring up at them. He must have been hiding behind the horse, but now he stood right up on his hind legs and rested his front hooves on the stall door to survey them.

  He had a sly look, though that could have been due to the horns and silky goatee, which did not exactly inspire confidence. He was snorting and wheezing, most definitely laughing at them. June gathered as much self-possession as she could and held out her hand.

  “My name is June Sparrow,” she said. The goat allowed her to shake his hoof, though his eyes narrowed to slits so that he appeared to be even more amused. “And this is Indigo Bunting. We’ve just arrived here from New York.”

  At this the goat gave them both an appraising look. He sniffed at Indigo, who kept his trotters to himself and extended his snub nose as warily as if he was being introduced to a leopard that everyone assured you had been raised as a house cat.

  “A pleasure,” said June briskly, and with one more glance at the horse’s backside, she continued down the line of stalls with Indigo poking his head out from beneath her arm. The goat stared at them, leaning his head to the side so that he could rub his little black horns on the wall.

  “Tough customer,” June whispered to Indigo.

  The next few stalls were empty, but when they reached the last one, Indigo began to sniff with a great deal of interest. Inside was a fresh bed of hay and a low trough filled with what could only be described as compost. June opened the door warily, but the stall was empty. She plopped down on the hay and let go of Indigo, who moved quickly to the trough and clambered inside. He ducked his head down and stood there eating the stuff.

  “Indigo Bunting!” June was shocked. “You are standing in garbage and eating it!”

  Indigo gave her a deeply apologetic look but kept right on eating.

  June sighed and lay back in the hay, which actually smelled good and was quite a bit warmer than a horse blanket if you burrowed in a bit. Of course she had read Charlotte’s Web, but so far she had met no spiders in the barn, and she had a bad feeling. Clearly, this was a pigpen. Clearly, Aunt Bridget had put the hay and slops out here, figuring that Indigo would end up right here doing exactly this. June propped herself up on her elbows and watched Indigo eat. He was a very tidy eater, but he was willing to stand in a pig trough rather than miss a meal if given the chance. This was not a good sign. Then she looked on the wall at the back of the barn just past the pigpen. Her heart skipped a beat, and she had to put a hand over her mouth to keep silent.

  Hanging on a nail on the wall was a heavy butcher knife. On the floor below was a broad tree stump that had to be as old as the barn itself, maybe even as old as Aunt Bridget. June got up quietly, so as not to alert Indigo, and peered more closely. By the bare bulb that lit this end of the barn, she could see that the top of the stump was deeply scored with marks of a blade. June looked even more closely. “Holy Saskatchewan Sunday,” she breathed. In every score on the wood there were bloodstains. This wasn’t an old tree stump; this was a chopping block.

  The horror of the morning: woken by Aunt Bridget for a breakfast that had more meat and eggs than June had ever seen on one plate; the hay that stuck in her hair; the old toothbrush she had to use and the clothes from her mother’s closet that didn’t fit right. Aunt Bridget must have brought out a warm blanket at some point in the night, because June woke up with a brightly colored afghan tucked around her shoulders. That was a nice surprise, because the hardest part was the fact that it was still dark outside.

  It was dark when Aunt Bridget shook her awake in the pigpen and dark when she pushed scrambled eggs around her plate; dark when the school bus stopped at the end of
the driveway, where Aunt Bridget waited in the warm Cadillac with the motor running while June had to stand out in the cold “to make sure the driver sees you because you’re new.”

  June had never ridden on a school bus before, but what she had seen in the movies scared her. Kids were always being beaten up or forced to eat the contents of other kids’ lunch boxes while the driver behaved like a prison guard. When the long yellow bus pulled up, she saw a few faces pressed against the steamed-up windows and wondered which one of those kids would soon be shoving her off a playground swing.

  She took a deep breath and pulled her mother’s flannel-lined farm jacket closer around her. She had never been so cold, and she was separated from Indigo for the first time since they’d left New York. She had tried to sneak him out under her jacket, but Aunt Bridget had looked at her with that X-ray vision and said, “If you want the pig impounded by Animal Control, you can take him to school. Otherwise, you can leave him in the barn.”

  June climbed the three high steps onto the bus, and the driver nodded at her with a businesslike smile, then waved past her at the Cadillac. June turned and saw the headlights pull back as Aunt Bridget put the car into reverse. She can’t wait to leave, thought June. The bus was strangely quiet and June hesitated at the front. Every seat looked full and most of the kids were slumped against the windows. It was not yet seven in the morning. The driver pulled the doors shut with the big handle, and the bus hissed and groaned.

  “Find yourself a seat,” the driver said, and June realized that underneath the bulky jacket and wool cap was a woman, not a man. In the movies the driver was always a man, and the bus was filled with screaming children. June walked down the silent aisle, submitting to the judgment. She knew that most of the kids were only pretending to be asleep. There were several spots with only one kid on the wide black seats, but nobody moved over. June went all the way to the back, holding on to the tops of the seats as she went. Every step felt like she was on trial, but she kept her balance.

  This was easier than the subway, where she used to stand in the middle of the car and pretend she was a surfer: no hands. Shirley Rosenbloom always worried when June took the subway instead of a taxi, but June happily took public transportation whenever it suited her. She had yet to see a bus or a taxi in South Dakota.

  The very last seat had the faint smell of tuna fish, which June realized was coming from a boy slumped against the window like the rest. She stood for a moment, not knowing if she should walk all the way back down the line; then Tunafish Boy moved his feet over to make room, down below the seats where nobody else would see. June took this as a yes, and sat down. Tunafish Boy scooted over and didn’t open his eyes. June stared straight ahead at the road in front of the bus, way down at the end of this long, long aisle. It was finally starting to get light outside. Rows of corn, rows of brown earth, and hay bales wrapped in white plastic were placed on this platter of land like candy for a giant. Nothing in sight was recognizable as the life of June Sparrow.

  “June Sparrow?” The homeroom teacher’s voice sounded harsh above the scraping of chairs and whispering voices.

  “Present.” June had seen kids in classrooms in movies and on TV, but so far nothing at this school looked like it did in the movies.

  The teacher stopped and looked at her. “Present?” A few kids laughed, and June sat up straighter. She already knew that attending middle school was not the best way to get an education; that’s why she homeschooled herself. But she still wanted to try to blend in with kid camouflage. She was pretending that she was a scientist gathering data for a research project on the habits of sixth graders in the midwestern region of the United States of America.

  “Welcome to Red Bank Middle School,” the homeroom teacher said with strenuous cheer. There were thumbtacks sticking through corrugated yellow borders around the blackboard and cloud-shaped cutouts taped along the edge of the ceiling with affirmations written inside: “Your Best Is Always Good Enough!” “Turn That Frown Upside Down!” “Be the Person You Want to Be!” The teacher was wearing a sweaterdress and chunky necklace over purple velour leggings and she seemed very determined to be a Bright Spot in Your Day. June thought it was a little early in the morning for this sort of thing, but she was taking notes on the dress and habits of local flora and fauna.

  “Thank you,” June said politely, but she wasn’t sure if the teacher heard her, because the bell rang again. (There was a lot of bell ringing in school—she hadn’t known about that.) Everyone scrambled to get to their first class, and June made her way to the front of the room.

  “I’m Ms. Huff,” the teacher said, smiling at June as she handed her a piece of paper with a grid laid out on it—just like the South Dakota landscape. “Here’s your schedule. English is first period. Better scoot!”

  June didn’t think she had ever heard anyone use the verb “scoot” before. She opened her mouth to say something, thought better of it, and gave Ms. Huff an upside-down frown. The hallway was packed with people banging lockers and pushing past each other—everything was loud and confusing—and then suddenly it was totally empty. June eased herself away from the wall, where she had pressed herself to avoid the crush, and began to wander down the hall looking for the classroom on her schedule. June had never been inside any school before, and she wished there were signs telling her where to go, or even a map with a big red dot saying, “You Are Here.”

  A teacher came hurrying past, and when June stopped him to ask directions he gave a quick, irritated look at her schedule, then pointed her up a wide set of stairs. His frown was not upside down.

  June trudged up the main staircase, still carrying the army-style backpack she had found under her mother’s bed. She didn’t have a locker yet and worried that her bag would begin to smell as much as Tunafish Boy’s. There was a ham and egg sandwich inside that Aunt Bridget had made for her with the assumption that lunch and breakfast only had to diverge in form, not content. She didn’t seem to comprehend that June did not eat pork. June hadn’t wanted to frighten Indigo when she saw the axe in the barn, but this morning she told him to be very careful to keep his distance from Aunt Bridget. New York might be the only place where people really understood pigs as pets. She had to get them back to the real Dakota as soon as possible.

  June sighed and looked back at her schedule. There was a large window at the top of the stairs, and she saw some high school kids in the parking lot leaning against their cars. It looked just like Grease without the fun musical numbers. She wandered down the hall until she finally found the classroom with the number that matched her schedule. A second bell had rung about five minutes ago, but everything looked the same in these hallways with their horizontal stripes of green paint over beige walls. June took a deep breath and opened the door as quietly as she could. The teacher wasn’t sitting at his desk in front of the room—that seat was empty and a blond boy with skin almost as pale as his hair was standing at the front of the room. June wrinkled her nose—it was Tunafish Boy! He had been reading from a piece of paper but stopped and stared as June tried to edge inside. The teacher raised his thick eyebrows but didn’t move his corduroy-jacket-clad self from the windowsill, where he was leaning back and listening to the report.

  “Yes?” the teacher said.

  “I’m sorry I’m late.”

  “Are you in the right room?”

  “I think so,” June said, checking her schedule again. “Mr. Fitzroy? English?”

  The teacher nodded without saying anything.

  “I’m June Sparrow,” she said, slipping into an empty desk in the front row. “I’m new.”

  Mr. Fitzroy looked at her for a long moment. He had gray hair and his tie was thrown over his shoulder as if he had flipped it out of the way when he ate breakfast that morning. His wide-framed glasses made his eyes look far away, and it was impossible to tell what he was thinking.

  “It’s nearly the end of September,” he said flatly.

  “Yes, it is,” June said, a
nd was surprised when she heard some giggles and saw the teacher frown. She hadn’t meant to be rude. She was failing badly at kid camouflage and thought of something she had heard somewhere, probably one of those nature shows she and Indigo liked to watch on TV. When it comes right down to it, there are only three laws of the universe for all living organisms: adapt, migrate, or die. Death was certainly the least complicated of the three options, and it looked like she was headed for sudden death this morning.

  June pulled out a notebook and pen from her mother’s backpack. The teacher turned back to Tunafish Boy and nodded for him to continue.

  “Go ahead, Joe.”

  “The Red Badge of Courage is the book I liked most on my summer reading list,” said Joe in a stronger voice than she would have expected from someone who hunched his shoulders as if he wanted to appear shorter than he really was. He read his book report straight through, and June thought it was pretty good. She wondered how many books they were required to read over the summer and why they were still going over the summer reading list at the end of September. At least they were talking about something she liked.

  “June Sparrow,” the teacher called out after Joe went back to his seat. June looked up, surprised. “Did you do any reading this summer that you would like to share with the class?”

  June nodded. “I read lots of books this summer, but I haven’t prepared—written anything about them. . . .” She let her sentence trail off. Why had she drawn attention to the fact that she was behind and ill prepared?