Juniper Lemon's Happiness Index Read online

  YES. Finally, some luck.

  I nod at the camera in her hands. “Did you want a picture?”

  She grins and lifts the strap from around her neck. “Would you mind?”

  “Not at all.”

  I take it from her and Angela prances behind the poster (yes, “prances”—her actual giddiness is ten times the strength of mine feigned) to mimic the world-renowned smile.

  “And . . . got it.”

  Angela prances back and checks the screen. “Thanks, Juniper.”

  “Sure.” Glancing around: “You here by yourself?”

  “Yeah. I mean—” She smiles sheepishly. “I don’t usually do stuff like this alone, but I found this ticket in my locker Friday, and of course there were only two days left in the exhibit . . .”

  Kody, who wears an amused expression (I assume because she did not think it possible to find anyone here more enthused than I’ve been pretending to be), says, “What a coincidence. Juniper’s mom just won tickets from a drawing. Good thing we were all free this weekend.”

  “You guys know each other?” I ask, inwardly dancing as my plan comes together. “Kody, this is Angela. Angela, Kody.”

  The two exchange nice-to-meet-yous and our parties converge. Unfortunately, my prediction soon proves accurate; we round a corner and the end of the exhibit is in sight. All that remains are a few plaques and a crowded station.

  “Oh!” ejects Angela. She nearly gallops into the lead. “I wondered when they’d get to this.”

  The table ahead is furnished with hardcover journals, pens, and hand mirrors. When one of the visitors aims a mirror at what she’s written, I realize that what I’ve mistaken for guest books are actually part of the exhibit. I spot the sign as we circle around: “Mirror Writing.”

  “Da Vinci was a freakin’ genius,” Angela gushes. “He wrote left-handed, from right to left, and backward.”

  “What?”

  Kody and I regard the table again: the sample pages, the hand mirrors, a couple trying and grotesquely failing to write I LOVE YOU more legibly than five-year-olds. In other books: “Aki rules,” “I HAVE TO PEE,” and “Jessica was here.”

  The last sparks an idea.

  “Some say he was dyslexic, but others think he was trying to protect his ideas in case someone got their hands on his journals.”

  I flash to 65, my deepest secret laid bare in plain English. I have a sudden new respect for Mr. Renaissance.

  Angela takes a marker. “Ever try it?”

  She flips one of the books to a clean page, smoothly writing HI, I’M ANGELA in backward capitals, then holds a mirror up to it. Sure enough, they are the flawless work of someone who’s done this before. Kody and I exchange glances.

  “This gives ‘the da Vinci Code’ a whole new meaning.”

  We uncap Sharpies, trying to emulate Angela’s smooth penmanship. We fail. Miserably.

  “You know,” I say, struggling to picture which way an s should go, “you would think I’d be better at this. In elementary school my sister and I had a new secret alphabet every other week.”

  “My brother and I have a code.” Kody nods, squiggling several confused e’s. “We knock. One knock means ‘Dinner.’ Two knocks means ‘NOW.’ Three means ‘GET OUT OF MY BATHROOM AND STOP STEALING MY BRAS, BUTTMUNCH.’”

  “Siblings,” sighs Angela. “Can’t live with ’em, can’t live withUHHHH, I mean—”

  “It’s all right,” I tell her quickly. “It’s a good saying.”

  Angela holds her breath, perhaps waiting to make sure I won’t explode into tears in the next several seconds. When I don’t, she closes her mouth and studies me.

  “You must get tired of hearing that,” she says after a moment. “I mean—of people censoring themselves around you.”

  Waiter? An extra-large YES, please.

  I shrug. “It’s not the worst offense.”

  “No?” Angela chews her lip, like maybe she wants to ask what is.

  I tell her, “Someone at a support group once told me ‘You should be grateful. Your sister is with God now.’”

  It was the first and only time I ever attended a support group.

  Angela’s jaw drops. “No.”

  “Oh yeah.”

  She shakes her head, at a loss for words.

  “AND ON THAT NOTE,” says Kody, loudly patching over the heaviness, “I vote we all pick up one of those fluffy sunshine, rainbow-lens lattes and eat pastries and play Find the Hot Boy now. Who’s with me?”

  Angela raises her hand.

  “Juniper?”

  I smile.

  Couldn’t have planned it better myself.

  We cap our pens and take up our bags again, and, to the tune of Angela’s eager da Vinci facts (“Did you know Bill Gates bought one of his journals for over thirty million dollars? The Codex Leicester. ‘Leicester’ came from an earl . . .”), leave the exhibit behind us.

  At the writing table, in an open book, the page I have left says half forward, half backward, and very illegibly:

  - 109 -

  In art class on Wednesday, I finish carving the same words on my linoleum sheet for printmaking. Well, not the words, but the areas around and between them: the negative space. Ms. Gilbert warned us that with linocuts, you have to think in terms of positive and negative because anything you cut will show up white, while whatever you leave will grab ink and print on the page.

  That’s exactly what happens when I roll a brayer of red over my work and press a sheet of paper down on top of it: I lift the page back, and what peels up is a red-and-white Dala horse, the words CAMILLA WAS HERE inked below.

  It seems paradoxical, doesn’t it?—that the positive image—this challenge to Cam’s absence—was only possible through the act of carving empty spaces?

  - 110-

  When Nate and I meet after school the next day to continue our soliciting work for Booster, there are four Camilla Was Here prints in the front of my binder. Nate sees them sticking out and asks:

  “Are those fliers?”

  I start to say no—that the prints were something I made for myself and have no intention of putting up like ads or campaign posters—but then I hear what I am thinking and stop short because that is effing brilliant. Why not put them up? How better to reassert my sister in the world?

  “You’re a genius,” I say instead, and promptly start from the flagpole toward Pippa’s.

  “Hey!” Nate jogs to catch up with me. “I thought we were hitting the library today?”

  ∞

  At Pippa’s, I find my Dala horse keychain exactly where I left it last Thursday—mercifully. I don’t know what I’d do if even that was gone, too.

  Nate watches, bemused, as I set my binder on the counter and pull out one of the prints I made. I lift the keychain just long enough to pin the inked horse under the wooden one.

  “Camilla was here,” Nate reads.

  “Because she was,” I explain.

  Nate considers me with a head tilt. I can’t tell if he’s unsure what to say, waiting for elaboration, or trying to decide if I’ve lost it.

  But before I blurt something even weirder about holes or the museum or what I realized in the video room last weekend, he saves me with a nod. “So she was.”

  Across the way, several voices whoop with laughter. I glance toward them and see four boys—Brand and the rest of Muffin Wars—at a booth heaped with backpacks and instruments. Two of them are aiming French fries at a third’s—Keegan’s?—open mouth and cheering.

  Brand is watching me.

  When Nate turns to see what I’m staring at, he looks away.

  “We should go,” I hear myself say. “I told the librarian I spoke with that we’d be coming in straight after school.”

  “Sounds good. Let’s boogie.”

  �
�

  The Fairfield Public Library is crowded when we get there. Nate and I take our place in line behind some other students, a woman with children, a man whose basket is full of hardcovers, and—

  “Lauren.”

  She’s just leaving the counter. I spin away to a display of free bookmarks: Rush Hollister again. This time, I take one and eagerly examine it.

  When I judge she is gone, I glance up front again. Safe.

  But when I face back, I see her by the entrance: stopped to hold the door for someone. Lauren looks inside to be sure they’ve cleared it—

  And sees me.

  And then pretends she doesn’t.

  I look away just as quickly.

  “So,” says Nate. He can’t have missed that painful exchange.

  But he doesn’t comment on it.

  When he says, “Tell me something you remember about her here,” I’m pretty sure he means—

  “Camilla?”

  “Yeah. If you want.” He gestures at the queue in front of us. “We’ve got the time.”

  I consider the offer. It did feel pretty good to share the Valentine’s story at Pippa’s last Thursday.

  I look down the checkout line.

  “In third grade,” I remember, seeing the wait, “Camilla saved my butt. I had checked out Coraline and dropped it in this Jurassic crater puddle at the bus stop—completely ruined it.”

  “Eeek.”

  “Yeah. So, the next day, my mom made me bring it back here. I was mortified—had the book in a plastic bag like dog poop or something the cat killed. So there I am, sweating bullets and nervous and gripping the sad, soiled sack for dear life—but then just as I’m walking up to the counter, Camilla swoops in and plucks the bad news from my hands and says she’s the one who dropped it. She even paid to replace it—with what was probably a few weeks’ allowance back then.”

  “Awww.”

  “I know! I think my mom lectured her about depriving me of my chance to be responsible, but you could tell she was proud, too. She took us out for ice cream after.”

  Nate smiles as the line migrates forward. “That’s sweet.”

  “It was. Is.” I draw an unsteady breath. “Thanks, Nate. For listening again.”

  “Sure. And you know, you don’t have to thank me—especially if we make a habit of this Thursdays.”

  “You . . . actually want to? I mean—you don’t mind hearing all my sad girl sister stories?”

  Nate shifts a little—almost like a flinch.

  “If . . . if it helps,” he says at the floor.

  I feel my brows come together. What’s with him all of a sudden? Nate’s looking away like he’s upset, or—

  Or hiding something.

  What if there’s another reason Nate wants to hear my Camie stories?—like because he secretly dated her?

  Now I have trouble meeting his eye. “Of course it helps.”

  The line moves forward. We walk with it in silence. Am I projecting here? I didn’t just imagine that dishonest vibe. But I don’t see how Nate could be YOU; he just moved here from Eugene, and Cam’s letter made it clear that her relationship was local, or at least not long-distance. The Lemons would’ve noticed if she’d been making any two-hour road trips.

  He’s probably just being kind to me.

  Or maybe Camie’s not the sister he’s interested in.

  “I can help you over here!”

  We’re summoned to a check-out desk.

  “Hi,” I greet the librarian behind it. “We’re from the Fairfield High Booster Club. I spoke to Inga about going through donations?”

  “Oh yes!” The woman who called us over checks a sticky note. “Juniper and Nate? She said you’re welcome to come back and look. She’s gone through them already, so if you find a book you want, it’s yours.”

  “Awesome. Thank you!”

  Nate and I start for where she indicates, but then I glimpse the countertop and stop again.

  “Question?” asks the woman.

  “Y . . . eah.” I glance around at the other desks. Every one of them displays photos, book lists, and events news beneath a clear sheet of glass. “Would it be possible to borrow some real estate?”

  The librarian raises a brow. “What did you have in mind?”

  I unshoulder my backpack for a Camilla print. But on a quick search inside—

  “Shoot,” I realize. “I think I left my binder at Pippa’s.”

  Nate nods at the exit. “Let’s go get it, then.”

  With apologies and thank-yous, we tell her we’ll be back.

  ∞

  Back at the bakery, getting my binder is as simple as asking the first employee I see—Pippa herself—for it.

  What I don’t expect is the scoop that comes with it.

  “One of the boys over there saw you leave that,” she explains as she passes it back to me. “He handed it in right away.”

  I don’t have to turn to know that she means Brand, but I do, anyway.

  His eyes cut up at me.

  Pippa nods at the prints in my hands. “Did you make those yourself?”

  I pull my gaze from Brand. “Yeah. They’re from a block I carved in art class.”

  “They’re very good. I think your classmate thinks so, too. He was admiring the one up there for some time.” Pippa tips up her chin at the bulletin board. I glance at the print there, then back at the boys’ table. Funny.

  Now Brand won’t look at me.

  First he avoids me ’cause I’m reading the Auden book; now he’s interested in my Camilla prints, but doesn’t want me to know about it?

  Am I collecting coincidences here—

  Or am I starting to glimpse YOU?

  110

  Happiness: 5

  Lauren at library (–).

  Brand as YOU?? (+/–) (If I find 10 coincidences, do I get a piece of evidence free?).

  Remembering with Nate (+).

  Prints left at lib. and Pippa’s (+).

  IDEA: can use Camilla Was Here prints to strengthen

  Camie’s presence in the places she was?? (+++)

  MAKE MORE PRINTS

  Instructions for Remembering Your Sister

  1. Visit somewhere she’s been. Recall a memory of her there.

  2. Leave a token of her (Camilla Was Here print) on scene.

  3. Take something found on site. Ex: “Things I Just LOVE About Valentine’s Day” list, da Vinci ticket, library bookmark.

  4. Use souvenir to keep that memory closer.

  -117-

  By the end of our third Thursday soliciting for Booster—this time to secure Grimaudi’s pizza for a tailgate party—it is no longer a question of if, but where Nate and I will remember Camie next. I show him a list of Places She Was I’ve drawn up, and Nate offers to work through it with me: one stop, one Dala horse print, one Camilla story at a time. At least, when the places are local and can be looped in with Booster work. I’m too grateful to refuse, even if I do still question his motives.

  I can’t think of anyone who’d want to hear my Camie stories more than YOU.

  - 119 -

  Brand may have been skeptical, but only two weeks after my da Vinci scheme, Angela and Kody and I are all playing Truth or Dare in Angela’s attic and eating junk food in a ring of beanbags and candles. The occasion?

  Halloween.

  “Angela. Truth or dare?”

  Angela and I are still howling, tears squeezing from our eyes. Angela dared Kody to call Nate with the cheesiest pick-up line we could find (“Hi, this is [prank alias]. We met last night?” “Huh?” “. . . In my dreams?”) and not only was Nate home; he called back. Three times. I guess “Alicia Pepper” really made an impression.

  Kody is unamused.

  “Angela.” She whac
ks her with a pillow. I squawk and have to hold my stomach as Angela goes face-first into a bowl of Cheetos.

  “Okay. Yeesh.” Angela rights herself and picks puffs from her sweater. It takes a few tries, but eventually she says, through her laughter, “Truth.”

  Kody: (eyes narrowing in vengeance) “Who do you like at Fairfield?”

  Angela stops laughing.

  “Nobody,” she says too quickly.

  Kody and I exchange glances.

  “Is it Nate?”

  “What? No!”

  “The Bod?”

  “N—” Angela reconsiders. “Handsome, but not my type.”

  “What is your type?”

  “Mm—” Angela sighs at the ceiling. “Well, I thought it was dinosaur, but—”

  “Dinosaur?” Kody wrinkles her nose. “Prehistoric?” I know what she means, but Kody hasn’t read her notes to Leo and Oscar.

  Angela beans her with a doughnut hole. “Not old. I mean extinct! How many juniors do you know with the passions of da Vinci, the wit of Wilde, the sensitivity of an Auden or Frost?”

  “None?” Kody ventures.

  “Exactly.”

  “But you do,” I realize.

  Angela folds her lips in. I study her intently. What modern genius has managed to catch her eye?

  At last she winces. “Please don’t make me say who. Every time I admit to liking a guy he turns out to be gay. It’s like a curse or something.”

  Kody cracks a grin. “Are you sure they just don’t like you?”

  This time Angela throws a whole doughnut at her. Kody yelps as it glances off her cheek, smearing chocolate and rainbow sprinkles in its wake.

  She checks the candied smudge and gasps as if it’s blood.

  “Oh, it is ON!”

  She grabs the rest of the box. Angela shrieks and shields herself with a blanket as Kody aims doughnut holes at her, the powdered sugars leaving dust prints on the fabric—although after a few Angela thinks better of it and gropes along the floor for the pizza, which she finds and pulls in with her and arms herself with.

  “You guys do realize that if you throw the food, we can’t eat it, right?”