Just Friends Read online

  “You need a cat.” Josh follows her down the hallway. “Charley Patton’ll watch anything. Especially if there are chips and salsa involved.”

  “Charley Patton?” Her smile is uncertain. “That’s your cat’s name?” When she was little she had had a cat called Fluffy because it was. He explains that Charley Patton’s named after one of his musical heroes. “Because he really plays a mean guitar.”

  She’s laughing as they enter the kitchen, where the General is putting a six-pack of beer into a cooler bag.

  “You remember Josh,” says Jena. So brightly you’d think that might be a good thing.

  Her father nods at Josh, making it clear that he remembers him vividly and that he’s being polite because he loves his daughter, his smile slight enough to be considered no more than a suggestion.

  If Josh were any more nervous, he’d probably pass out. He doesn’t want to do anything to give the General a reason to ban him from the house, so tries some politeness of his own. “It’s nice to see you again, General Capistrano,” he lies. And has to stop himself from adding a line he must have heard in some hokey old movie, Don’t worry, sir, I’ll take good care of your daughter.

  The way Jena’s father is eyeing him, Josh expects him to ask if he’s climbed any more trees lately, or why he doesn’t cut his hair or take up kickboxing. Instead he asks him what he thinks about the Packers’ chances in this season’s Super Bowl. Josh doesn’t really hear the question, just Super Bowl. Football – he’s asking him something about football. He might as well ask him who won the Miss America title in 1974. Which isn’t to say that Josh isn’t aware of the Super Bowl – there isn’t a blade of grass in the country that hasn’t heard of the Super Bowl – but he has never watched it or any other football game – and is so thrown by the question that he can’t think of any reply. He just stands there, looking like an ad for teeth whitening.

  Jena rushes into the silence. “Josh is captain of the chess team,” she says. “He’s not really into sports.”

  The General puts on his baseball cap. “Somehow that doesn’t surprise me.”

  He has to say something – something to correct the impression that he knows nothing about the sweaty, bloody world of real men. “You know,” says Josh, “Napoleon played chess.”

  Both Capistranos look at him blankly, as if the words came out in the wrong language.

  “Bonaparte,” clarifies Josh. “Napoleon Bonaparte played chess. The French general?”

  “Did he?” General Capistrano picks up his cooler bag and gives Jena a kiss on the cheek. “I better get going.” Does he raise his voice slightly? He glances at Josh, the grinning fool with the ponytail. “Don’t want to be late,” he says. Is there a warning in his tone? Make sure you behave yourself – or else.

  Neither of them speaks as the General marches from the house, the back door slamming behind him, their eyes fixed on the spot where he was only seconds ago, as if he might suddenly return. Not until they hear the engine start up do they look at each other.

  And now they’re alone. Really alone for the first time. Alone without a room full of people around them or her father lurking outside. No Tilda Kopel giving him stink eye when he speaks to Jena or acting as if his voice is the same as silence. The emptiness of the house surrounds them. Jena is definitely not one of the guys – for one thing, none of them wears slippers that look like turquoise Tribbles – and there’s no way Josh can pretend that she is. He doesn’t know what to do with himself. If he had his guitar with him he’d probably start playing.

  She’s the first to break the silence. “Hey,” says Jena. “Let’s get the snacks and start the show.”

  He watches her open a cabinet and take two bags from a shelf he couldn’t reach unless he was standing on something. Then he starts looking around, noticing things he didn’t see the first time he was here; he was too busy looking at her. Jena opens another cabinet, takes out two bowls and turns to find him staring at a photo held to the door of the fridge in a magnetic frame. It’s a picture of her and her parents, standing in front of palm trees. The sun is shining and they are all smiling like nothing bad could ever happen to them.

  “That was taken a couple of weeks before the accident,” says Jena, in a faraway voice he hasn’t heard before.

  He looks at her, but doesn’t know what to say that wouldn’t sound as if he was reading it off a greeting card. There is a similar photograph on the mantelpiece in the Shines’ living room. Josh, his mother, his father and Charley Patton sitting on the sofa the day they brought Charley Patton home from the animal shelter. Josh’s father isn’t in the photograph of Charley Patton’s birthday celebration a year later.

  “You know, it’s funny …” Jena’s eyes are on the snapshot in its plastic heart-shaped frame, “… but even though it’s different now” – she puts the bowls on the counter so softly they might be made of foam – “you know, the missing her and everything – it doesn’t really get better. It’s like I have a hole in my heart.”

  This he does know.

  Josh nods. “Some days I still can’t believe my dad is dead.” On worse days he can.

  She turns away and starts opening the bags, concentrating on getting the chips and pretzels into the bowls without any of them escaping.

  He has to change the subject; if they keep on like this they’ll both be so depressed he’ll wind up going home.

  “I notice your dad goes for the minimalist approach to interior decoration,” says Josh. There is nothing on the walls of the hall, and the living room looked to be mainly furniture. “My mom’s the opposite. She even has things on the ceilings.”

  Jena laughs. “We’re still not totally unpacked. We have boxes of stuff in the cellar and the attic, but we haven’t had a chance to get at them somehow. There’s always other stuff to do.”

  “You haven’t really been here that long. Plus your dad must be pretty busy with his new job and everything.”

  “Too right. He’s, like, super not used to the civilian world. He’s having some adjustment issues.”

  Josh bets he is. The General probably can’t figure out why no one salutes him any more. The civilian world is probably having some adjustment issues of its own.

  “And you have plenty to do just settling into school. I’d hate to have to move like you just did. I’m really impressed by how quickly you’ve made friends.” She has a lot more friends than he has. “It can’t be easy, starting all over in a new town where you don’t know anybody or anything.” He makes the face of the boy who sat by himself, walked by himself and ate by himself on the third-grade trip to the natural history museum because Carver was out with the measles. “God knows I’ve always found school life hard enough, and I’ve known most of these people for years and years.”

  He would probably go to school dressed as a chicken if it meant he would hear Jena laugh.

  “I guess I’m kind of used to it. You know, starting at a new school. I mean, I’ve been doing it all my life. I was like the professional new girl. I could’ve written a book. But this time was different, because, technically, I did know someone. Kind of.” It turns out that the move to Parsons Falls wasn’t random. Tilda’s mother and Jena’s were college roommates and the two had always kept in touch, though the families had never met. Mrs Kopel attended the funeral, and when she heard that the General was planning to retire she suggested he and Jena should move to Parsons Falls. At least they would know someone. “So as soon as we got here the Kopels had us over and I met Tilda. We clicked right away.” She crumples the chip bag into a ball and drops it on the counter. “And this time’s also different because we’re staying put. Before I never really made friends or got involved in things because I knew we’d be moving again. But not any more. That’s why I’m really working hard to fit in and belong.”

  “So is that why you joined the drama club? To meet people and be part of things? Get a whole crew of new friends in one go?”

  “Not really. Mainly I joined beca
use of Tilda. I mean, I’m so lucky Tilda likes me and right away wanted to be my friend. I mean, can you imagine if she didn’t?”

  He has no trouble imagining that.

  “I mean, what would I have done?”

  If she didn’t just not like you but actually disliked you, you would have wished your father had stayed in the army and been stationed at least ten thousand miles away.

  “Anyway, Tilda wanted me to go in for drama. She believes in being out there, you know?” Oh, he knows. She’s the girl who could upstage the corpse at a funeral. “Of course, she’s a terrific actor and I’m not. I didn’t even get a non-speaking part, that’s how bad I am. I’m a stagehand.” She passes him the bowl of pretzels. “But I’m glad I let her talk me into it. Because I never realized before how really amazing acting is. And it’s a really fun play. They haven’t started rehearsals yet, but I’ve been helping Tilda learn her lines and I really envy her. You know, because even if it’s only for a little while it must be such a relief to be someone else for a change.”

  How many times has he wished he was someone else? Not with a different family or anything like that. And he’d still love his music and be good at math and have the same friends and a large grey cat with a bent ear named Charley Patton who loves blueberry jam, but he’d be different. Socially confident. Always sure of himself. Never gawky, graceless or the object of peer disapproval. Better-looking. Taller.

  The story goes that the great bluesman Robert Johnson met the Devil at a crossroads and sold his soul in exchange for his legendary musical gift.

  Josh Shine is at a crossroads of his own at this moment as he and Jena stand together in the Capistranos’ kitchen. He can ignore what she just said about what a relief it must be to be someone else. Or he can see it as a connection to her that he never hoped for. A much deeper connection than liking the same music. She’s just like me.

  He chooses not to ignore it.

  Friends

  Sunday morning is bright and clear, and Josh’s mood is just as sunny. This is the happiest he’s felt in days – since he first saw Jenevieve Capistrano and started to realize that the guitar was not going to be his only passion. He and Jena watched two movies together last night – flopped side by side on the couch with the snack bowls between them – talking and laughing as if it was something they did every week. He can’t stop thinking about it. They might even have gone for a triple-header, but the General came home and, without actually saying anything more than Getting late, isn’t it?, threw Josh out.

  Now, doing something he does do every week, Josh leaves the yoga centre with Ramona. Ramona, who also can’t stop thinking about last night, is unusually quiet. If Josh is a day of blue skies and sunshine, Ramona is overcast, grey and deciding whether to rain or not. Josh doesn’t notice. He’s too busy telling her about his latest disagreement with Mr Burleigh. Mr Burleigh is taking the class to see a play in the new year, and Josh suggested that instead of a standard performance they go to a production by the National Theater of the Deaf. “I just think it would be a more powerful and significant experience,” Josh is saying as they cross the street to the Laughing Moon. Ramona nods. “There are whole other experiences that we never think about,” says Josh. “Nobody in the class even knew there is a National Theater of the Deaf. I think that’s pretty sad.”

  Ramona says, “Um”, and opens the door. It isn’t until they get their drinks and find a table that Ramona finally speaks.

  She looks at him as he gets ready to sit and says in her I-don’t-play-games way, “So what’s going on with you and the army brat?”

  Tea sloshes over the rim of his cup as he sets it down. “What?” He wasn’t expecting this.

  “I saw you go into her house last night.” Her gaze is steady as a boulder. “So, you know, I was wondering.”

  Though, given his views on the ironic nature of life, maybe he should have been expecting this. It probably wouldn’t matter what time he’d gone over to Jena’s – or if there was a hurricane and he’d crawled up the street on his stomach with a sombrero on his head – at the exact moment he reached the Capistranos’, Ramona would have been looking out the window and seen him.

  He tries to make a joke of it. “Ramona Minamoto, were you spying on me?” Ha ha ha.

  She doesn’t laugh. “If I was spying on you I’d’ve been outside the Salcedos’, where you usually are on Saturday nights. And not in my house, where I usually am.” She does, however, smile; an exaggerated, say-cheese grin. “Anyway, I could be wrong, but Jena doesn’t seem like the chess club type to me. Does that mean she joined the band?”

  He doesn’t know what she’s talking about. Who mentioned the band or the chess club? “What?”

  Ramona shakes her teabag over her cup before dropping it onto her saucer. “Sal said you bailed from movie night and he thought it was because of either the band or the club. So I was wondering which Jena joined.”

  Ah. So that’s who mentioned them. Sal, the master of communication. He should probably have known that too.

  “Well, Sal was wrong and you’re not funny.” He mops up the spilled tea with his napkin.

  “You still haven’t answered my question.” No one has ever accused Mo of giving up easily. “What’s going on with you and Jena?”

  “Nothing’s going on. We’re friends.”

  “Really?” She looks back at him as if she has telepathic vision, straight into his devious mind. “I thought you said she was just someone in your class. I didn’t realize you’d become friends.” Making it sound as if she just found out that he’d joined a cult.

  “Well, we have.” He puts both his hands around his cup. “And, not that it’s any of your or Sal’s business, her dad was going out and she doesn’t like to be alone at night so I said I’d keep her company.”

  Ramona comes close enough to scowling to make it obvious that she isn’t impressed by his altruism. She knows it isn’t any of her business. Not really. He can do what he wants. But still. “So how come you got to be the cavalry? What happened to Tilda and her other pals? They all get sucked into the vortex?”

  “I don’t know what happened to Tilda,” Josh lies. “Jena asked me over and I said yes because I felt sorry for her. She really hates being alone. I don’t know why you’re making a big deal out of it.”

  “I’m not.” She shrugs. Nonchalantly. Exactly as if she hasn’t been making a big deal of it. “I was just kind of curious. You didn’t mention that was why she wanted your number. You said it was about homework.”

  And when did Ramona decide that she doesn’t want to be a costume designer, she wants to be a prosecuting attorney?

  “Have I been taken in for questioning or something? Have you started working for the CIA?”

  She laughs. “You know me. I’m anti-establishment but I do have an enquiring mind.”

  Josh laughs, too. Maybe they are just joking around. “You mean, you’re really nosey.”

  “That too.” Ramona’s smile is like a hug. “It’s just … you know … you’re my friend … I like to know what’s going on.”

  “I told you, nothing’s going on.” His smile is like a nudge. “Get real, Mo. Do you think a girl like her would be interested in me?” He opens his arms. “Me? Really?”

  She shakes her head. “No. Not in a million centuries.” Dishonesty has never been one of Ramona’s traits. “I’m surprised she ever started talking to you.”

  “I was in a tree. You know, the one in front of their house?”

  “Oh, in the tree. Of course.” How could I be so dim? “Now I understand completely.”

  “That’s how we got to be friends. And that’s all we are.” Which, whether he likes it or not, is true.

  Ramona gives him another smile. She really wants to believe him.

  * * *

  When she saw Josh at the Capistranos’, Ramona wondered what Tilda Kopel would think of him and Jena hanging out together, which makes it almost a shame that Ramona is watching a sixties movie
with Sal this afternoon and not at the Capistranos’ where that important opinion is about to be given.

  Because the General is home, Jena and Tilda have gone to her room to change the colour of their nail polish and discuss Tilda’s date with Anton Chersky. This was their third date, and they are now officially seeing each other. “And this is good news for you, too,” Tilda is saying. “Anton has lots of friends who are almost as awesome as he is. We’re guaranteed to find someone perfect for you.”

  “Me?” laughs Jena. “Anton’s friends aren’t going to be interested in me.”

  “Of course they are.” Tilda has never been burdened by a lack of confidence. “You’re my bezzie. They’ll be interested.” She leans back against the pillows. “So what’d you wind up doing last night?” And then, because she can’t imagine anything that wouldn’t be improved by her presence, adds, “I hope you weren’t too bored.”

  “No, I was fine.” Jena picks up her soda from the table next to the bed. “Josh came over and we watched a couple of movies.”

  Tilda’s smile is so constant that it might be painted on like a doll’s, but now it slips ever so slightly. A doll that’s been left out in the backyard all winter. “Who?”

  “Josh,” repeats Jena. “You know. Josh Shine? He’s in Mr Burleigh’s class?”

  “What?” Tilda laughs, a sound reminiscent of a small animal being choked. “Josh Shine? You’re kidding, right?”

  Jena hasn’t yet learned to read every look, gesture and inflection of Tilda’s, and so has no idea that she is about to give the wrong answer. “No. You know I hate being by myself. So he said he’d keep me company.”

  “Josh Shine.” Tilda speaks slowly, one word at a time. “You hung out with Josh Shine last night.”

  Since it’s unlikely that Tilda has suddenly gone deaf or insentient Jena sits up a little straighter. “And? What’s wrong with that?”

  “Oh, nothing.” Tilda stares back at her, wide-eyed and innocent-looking as Bambi. “If you don’t mind hanging out with weirdos.”