“Now.” Jasper’s mouth is full of food, and his words come out muffled. “You have to tell me why she’s named Georgia.”
“Oh, that’s simple too.”
“I bet I can guess.”
I laugh. “She wasn’t conceived in this state if that’s what you’re going to guess.”
Jasper lowers his head, defeated. “All right, so I can’t guess.”
“It pretty bizarre,” I admit. “Her parents have only been to Georgia once. They’re both from South Carolina, though.”
“Really.”
I nod, then I realize all my fries are gone. Jasper still has some, so I steal one of his. He swats my hand away as I say, “Her parents dated in high school but broke up when they went to different colleges. Then her mom was going to get married to some guy she met in college after only six months of dating. She invited her ex to the wedding—which was here, in Georgia.”
A slow grin grows on Jasper’s face. “I can figure out where this is going to go.”
“Yup, so her dad arrived at the wedding. This is only a year after they broke up, and they were only twenty years old. Her dad confesses his undying love to her mom, and then right then and there, instead of marrying her intended groom, she marries Georgia’s dad. It was a huge scandal.”
“And they’ve never been back to Georgia?”
I shake my head. “No, but Georgia was born two years later, a couple of months after they graduated college. They named her after the state because it was the start of their ‘true’ romance, and not the dumb, immature one they had in high school.”
“That is bizarre.”
“Georgia’s pretty proud of it. She says it’s the love story of a generation.” I try to snatch another fry, but Jasper’s more vigilant this time.
He scowls, though it’s not serious. “First, you’re stealing crayons, and now you’re stealing french fries?” he accuses. “Get a life, Judith Pierce.”
“Actually, I seem to remember a certain person paying for these fries.” I manage to snatch one. “So, I think I’ll be taking some.”
“My uncle is sending me more money tomorrow!”
“Uh, I think we’ll be in Jacksonville by then.”
He mumbles something, but I can’t untangle the jumbled words into something comprehensible. I move on. “You know, Georgia tried out for the swimming team once. Her freshman year, I think.”
Jasper pauses, and while he’s probably trying to remember this, I’m able to dump a large load of his fries onto my plate. Jasper glares at me and edges his plate closer to him and out of reach from me. He says, “I remember that. I thought she made the team, but she never swam.”
“No,” I agree. “She complained that it was too much work, so she quit.”
Jasper laughs, but because he’s eating another fry, he chokes on it. Then he’s waving his hand to tell me that he’s fine before I’m able to try the Heimlich maneuver. His eyes are watering, and his throat is scratchy when he replies. “I love swimming.”
He pauses and rubs his hand over his Adam’s apple.
“I can tell.” When he raises a questioning eyebrow, I explain, “Your hair is still bleached.”
He runs a hand over his short, bleached blond hair and grins sheepishly. “I’ve known how to swim since I was two. Carlisle was the captain of the swim team at our school, you know, back when I was still in middle school. He broke records.”
“April hates swimming.”
This time, both his eyebrows shoot up. “Carlisle used to tell me he’d never date a girl who couldn’t swim.”
“Oh, April can swim,” I say. “She just hates to.”
“Carlisle will probably change that,” he warns me. “He can change anyone’s opinion on swimming.”
I steal another fry.
“Would you stop doing that!”
I laugh. “They’re pretty much gone anyway—”
“Thanks to you!”
“—so let’s get out of here. Know any other interesting places in Atlanta?”
Jasper glowers, but then he says, “Well, when you were busy learning all there is to know about Coca-Cola, I looked up someplace in Atlanta.”
I lean forward. “Well?”
“The Center for Puppetry Arts,” he declares. “The largest organization in America dedicated to the art of puppetry.”
I stare. “What?”
He points. “You subjected me to the Coca-Cola museum because of Georgia’s whim. Now you have to suffer this with me.”
I stare at him, and then I stare some more. Then I realize I’m staring and, just like that, I grow uncomfortable. I realize that Jasper and I have spent the entire day without arguing—not seriously, anyway. We’ve talked, and we’ve shared. There’s a comfortableness that wasn’t there yesterday when we spent most of the day in awkward silence.
I realize I enjoy Jasper’s company, even without the presence of his crazy friends, to make it easier to be around him. I want to hang out with him. I want to know more about him. I am leaning and angled toward him instead of trying to put as much space between us as possible. He has a draw that is impossible to ignore, and I can’t take my eyes away from his chocolate-brown ones.
“You can’t say no,” Jasper says, grin lopsided and eyes mischievous. He has ketchup on his black shirt.
I realize that, in different circumstances, Jasper and I could’ve been good friends. Great friends. Not only do I warm to that feeling, but I like it intensely. I’m not sure what that means.
“Pierce.” Jasper is looking at me now, hard. “June?”
“Yeah,” I say, and I try to sound defeated, even as I’m anything but. “Let’s go.”
Twenty
“That’s no longer an excuse.”
I convince Jasper to check into a hotel before he drags us to the puppet museum. There’s no way I want to keep driving us around the city; I’d rather take public transportation than risk another car accident because of my horrible driving. Thankfully, the two museums aren’t far from each other, and I find a hotel easily.
“I’m going to call my uncle,” Jasper says after we’ve checked in. He holds up his phone. “I need to tell either him or Carlisle I’m still alive.”
Perfect, because that gives me some time to call Georgia and tell her all about the Coca-Cola museum. She’s already texted half a dozen times, asking for updates and then freaking out because I haven’t answered any of them.
Even though Jasper and I slept in the same small cabin space on bunk beds last night, we’ve gone back to separate rooms now. I pull my suitcase into the room, settle down in the chair by the tiny, old table and press the dial on my phone.
“June! Finally!”
I have to laugh because Georgia sounds exasperated and energetic. Like always. “So, I went to this museum today…”
“I know! Tell me all about it, girl!”
I barely get two sentences in before Georgia interrupts me to ask a clarifying question—“two billion a day?”—or before she reminds me half a dozen times already that I have to send her the photos I took—“do it now, June.” I lean against the chair, legs out and ankles crossed on the chair opposite me. Talking to Georgia is always easy.
“And then on the way out, Jasper yelled that he preferred Pepsi.” I laugh.
There’s sudden, dead silence on the other line.
I sit up. “Georgia?”
“I don’t know if I’ve ever heard you so happy when talking about Jasper.” Georgia’s voice is a mixture of slow, careful, and amused.
Something in my stomach tightens, lifts its head. “Oh.”
“Girl, it’s not bad.” She says this fast. “So, did you ask him about Melanie?”
“They worked together. She asked him out. He said no,” I tell her. I glance out the window, making sure no one is standing outside. Who knows? Maybe the walls are thin, and I don’t want Jasper to hear the conversation.
But I know I’m being paranoid.
“Wow,�
�� Georgia breathes. “I can’t believe Mel never told us.”
“I apologized. About bullying him.”
There’s another short pause. “June…”
“I was wrong, Georgia,” I say. “You used to say it too, in the beginning when we were freshmen. I remember. You would ask what he had ever done to us, and I always laughed it off, but I know now. I know it was wrong. It was all wrong. I should’ve never gossiped about or bullied anyone.”
“I’m…” Georgia trails off. “Wow, I think I’m kind of proud.”
I laugh, though it’s shaky and quiet. “I can never be as kind or considerate as you are.”
“But I know that you can be that person,” Georgia says, soft. “You have always been that person to me. And to April. Even when Melanie is being horrible, you’re still that person to her. Don’t think you’re not.”
“Maybe I need to be that kind of person to everyone, then.”
Georgia makes a sound of agreement. “So… tell me about the museum with Jasper then.”
I don’t know what she’s getting at because I hear something in her tone, but I tell her anyway. I’m hesitant at first. Wondering how Georgia will respond to all this, I tell her about preventing Jasper from dying of boredom at the museum—she takes offense to this, even if she doesn’t say it aloud and even if she’s never even been to the Coca-Cola museum. Then I tell her about lunch after and how it was nice to just sit down, not hate each other, and have the banter be playful instead of serious.
“You know that sounds like a date, right?”
My storytelling stops in its tracks, breaking to a screeching halt. “Georgia.”
“What? I’m calling it what it sounds like.”
“We hate each other—”
“That’s no longer an excuse. You just got finished telling me how well you guys get along now.”
I drag my hand through my hair, not quite pulling at it, but almost. “Georgia, we’re stuck in this car together. There’s no one else to hang out with.”
“Okay.” She doesn’t stick to a one-word response, though. “But you don’t hate him anymore. You even like him.”
A loud, firm knock on the hotel room door startles me. I jerk, almost falling off the chair.
“You okay?” Georgia asks.
“Hold on.” My hold on the phone is a death grip as I stand. When I open the door, it’s Jasper.
He’s wearing this small smile, hands in pocket, stance laid back. It’s typical Jasper, except now he looks happy when his attention is on me, instead of the careful, wary expression he usually wears or the simple unhappy, blank one.
“You ready?” he asks. “I think the museum closes soon.”
Over the line, Georgia whispers, “It’s even like he’s picking you up for a date.”
A sharp intake of breath. I focus on Jasper, drawing the phone away from my ear. “Give me a minute? I’m talking to Georgia.”
“Sure.”
I nod, and I can’t meet his eyes when I close the door and run to the room’s bathroom, closing that door too. There’s no way I’m going to risk him being able to hear me through only one closed door.
When I refocus, I hear Georgia laughing.
“It’s not funny,” I snap, though there’s no power behind it.
She quiets, but I still hear her amusement when she says, “I won’t bother you about it, girl. I know you and Jasper are finally getting along, and I’m happy.”
“Uh-huh,” I mutter.
“Have fun,” she says. “You’re finally arriving in Florida tomorrow?”
I’m still suspicious of her, even if she’s changed the topic. “After a whole morning of driving, yes.”
“Well. Have fun,” she repeats. I practically hear her wink.
“Bye, Georgia.” The only satisfaction I get from the end of this phone call session is that I get to hang up before she does. Still, I imagine her cackling on the other side of the phone, aware that I’ve hung up on her. I know she’s doing it too. People with childhood friends have a sixth sense about these things.
I put my phone into my purse, sitting on the tiny table, and tug once, hard, on my hair. Then I place my hands on my hips, taking a deep breath and willing the nervousness to stay coiled at the bottom of my stomach.
I’m having fun today. It’s been good. I’m not going to let Georgia make me over-analyze it.
I open the door and find Jasper leaning against the hallway’s opposite wall, scrolling on his phone. He straightens as I emerge, closing the door behind me.
“Ready?” he asks.
I breathe in a steady breath, nod at the doorknob, and turn around. I’m strong. I meet his eyes. “Ready.”
~.*.~
The Center for Puppetry Arts is closed.
We both take our turns trying the door, but it doesn’t budge. The inside lights are dim, and the lock holds tight. We’re not getting in.
“Did you…” I start, seeing that the museum’s hours are posted beside the doors. The hours declare five o’clock as the closing time each day, and it’s past six now. “… Check what time this place closes?”
“Uh…”
“Jasper, come on.”
“What? You can’t tell me your planning skills are any better than mine. You didn’t know anything about the Coca-Cola museum. We just walked right in there.” He doesn’t actually sound offended, so I don’t take offense.
I slip my hands into the pockets of my light jacket, and I can’t help but smile. “I’m actually so relieved.”
And Jasper does laugh. “I really didn’t want to go to this museum, either.”
“Just wanted to spite me, huh?”
We turn away from the doors and start walking in the direction of the hotel, but Jasper stops me with a hand on my arm.
When I look at him, he lifts his chin to indicate a building across the lot. “Do you like Chinese food?”
“Didn’t we eat like two hours ago?”
“I’ve seen you eat. You’re a monster,” he deadpans.
I scoff. “This coming from the guy who dared to ask if I’m scared of getting fat.”
He shakes his head, rolling his eyes. “We didn’t have breakfast or snacks today. We need at least two meals a day.”
“I’m pretty sure it’s three.”
“Come on.”
He drags me to the restaurant, though there’s no pulling on my arm because I go willingly. When I focus on the restaurant’s name, proclaiming it to be an authentic Asian restaurant, no one has to ask me twice, least of all Jasper. We really do think alike when it comes to food.
I tell the woman behind the counter we’d like our food to stay because really, what else are Jasper and I going to do tonight? It’ll be better to get a good night’s sleep because we have to wake early in the morning to make it to Jacksonville by early afternoon. But then Jasper steps forward, shaking his head, and says, “No, we’ll take it to go, please.”
“You want to eat at the hotel?” I ask, looking up at him. Silently, I like this idea. Georgia’s assertion that today sounds like a date to her has made me freak out about once again going out to eat with Jasper. Just like it’s an actual date.
Because it’s just me and him.
Having fun.
“I figured we can walk around with the food,” Jasper says. Because we stand so close, he has to lower his head, eyes looking down at me. Usually, we stand far apart, especially at the beginning of the road trip, but now… as friends, we stand closer. Because we don’t hate each other.
And sure, maybe it’s a little gratifying to stand close to a guy who’s tall and has to look down at you. Even if it’s Jasper King. Even if the only reason I acknowledged he was attractive was because of some random receptionist in Connecticut who blushed when she was talking about him.
It’s not a date.
“Why?” I ask. It doesn’t come out as a squeak.
“Because we sit around in a cramped car half the time, and I’d rather stretch m
y legs.” He turns back to the woman and pulls out his debit card, handing it over. At my raised eyebrows, he says, “My uncle transferred some more money an hour ago.”
Awesome, now he’s even paying for the food. “I’m going to the bathroom. I’ll be right back.”
And when I’m back, taking longer than I should have in the bathroom—because after running my hands through my hair and tugging so much like a crazy woman, I had to fix it—Jasper’s carrying two take-out boxes. He hands one to me.
I love the smell of Asian food. “Lead on, King.”
He pushes the door open, looking over his shoulder at me as I trail behind him. “What, you’re just going to follow?”
“I can’t eat and walk at the same time.”
He makes a sound that’s similar to a laugh but more like a snort. “I thought you were coordinated. Aren’t you going to be varsity soccer captain this year?”
I shrug. “Once, when I was eight or nine, I was stuffing my face with a hot dog my dad bought from a food stand. We were walking down the sidewalk and then smack.” I hit the side of my purse to imitate the sound of something falling to the curb, though it’s a poor imitation. “I tripped over a crack or something and went sprawling. I broke my ankle.”
We start walking down the side of the road, which runs along a highway. As the cars zip past us, I pause to demonstrate rolling the right ankle that I broke. “This one. It’s never felt the same.”
Jasper raises that one eyebrow. “You’re okay to play soccer?”
“I just have to make sure I take care of my ankle,” I tell him. I don’t add that sometimes I obsess over it. I love playing the game, and it would break me if I had to quit because of a stupid injury from when I was in the fourth grade.
Jasper opens his take-out box, motioning for me to do the same. “Go on, eat. I’ll keep a lookout then.”
I laugh, pulling apart the wooden chopsticks and opening the take-out box. “If you fail me, you’re going to have to tell my coach why I can’t play this year.”
Cross Country Hearts Page 18