Juniper Lemon's Happiness Index Read online

  Brand tosses back his bangs. “And I didn’t ask your permission.”

  “Brand—”

  “Jesus Christ! Look, Lemon. I’m trying to do you a favor. Why don’t you just stop being an ass and let a good thing happen?”

  I scoff. As if Brand Sayers “helping” were a good thing.

  “Seriously—what’s the big deal? You know I can keep a secret. I didn’t tell anyone about all that pottery, did I?”

  My mouth opens, but no retort comes. Brand cocks a brow, waiting.

  “. . . Yet,” he adds, impish.

  My stomach drops. “You wouldn’t.”

  “Only one way to find out. Feelin’ lucky, Lemon?”

  I hold his gaze, challenging. Damn that mischievous smile!

  “Fine,” I concede again, irritated. “You want to dig through the trash with me? Be my guest.”

  I throw my bag down on the ground, grumbling. By the time I climb out after it, Brand’s pompous smirk is gone, replaced by a dutiful grimace as he smears something thick and caramel-colored from a finger onto a napkin.

  “So.” I look away as his eyes shift to me again. “If you won’t tell me what’s on this secret card of yours, how am I supposed to know it when I see it?”

  “I don’t know. You signed up for this.”

  He shoots me a dirty look—or what would be a dirty look from a normal person, but from someone with Brand’s cheekbones, mob relations, and affinity for fire is decidedly more like a death threat.

  “It’s only the first week of school,” I add, voice rising a little. “How many index cards can there be?”

  As it turns out, there can be plenty. As I comb my own bag for 65, Brand appears to have found one from the first day of Health I. He pauses frequently to read aloud anonymous questions like “Can you catch an STD from a toilet seat,” “What is the functional purpose of armpit hair,” and “If a guy died having sex, would he still be saluting, and how would this be dealt with at the funeral?” from the boatload he finds there. He snickers after each and asks if the card it’s written on is mine. I roll my eyes.

  There are cards in his next bag, too. Fortunately those turn out to be just reading responses to Great Expectations. Brand seems disappointed: no more ammo to annoy me with.

  Just when I think he’ll shut up for a while—god, I liked him better as the strange and silent type—he says, “So hey, not that it’s any of my business, but uh—what was all the rage about?”

  I don’t look up at him. “Rage?”

  “The pots and shit? That wasn’t just because you lost something. You were angry.”

  My hands stop, tightening around a fistful of quizzes.

  “My sister is gone,” I say quietly. “How am I supposed to feel?”

  To that, Brand says nothing.

  I wish he hadn’t asked. Now the silence elongates, oppressive.

  Out of nowhere—perhaps of a need to fill it in again—I look over my shoulder and say, “I found something.”

  Brand stops digging. “What?”

  “Not here. I mean—of hers.”

  “Your sister’s?”

  I nod, not sure if I can trust him. How much can I share? “It was something she kept from people.”

  “We all have secrets, Lemon.”

  “Sure.” I turn all the way around to face him. “But not like this.”

  “Like what?”

  It isn’t my secret. But I can’t exactly talk to Camilla about it, either.

  Or anyone else.

  “The other day I found this . . . letter.”

  I don’t tell him everything, but I hit on the important stuff: the use of “You” and “Me,” the fact that Camie was “leaving him in high school,” and oh yes, let’s not forget—that she was breaking up with him.

  “She had this whole . . . secret relationship with someone. Probably right here at Fairfield.”

  For a moment Brand and I just look at each other, and then abruptly, as if released by some spell, he shifts and returns to his bag.

  “And what would you do if you found this guy?” he asks, sifting. “Guy?” he adds for verification.

  “Think so. I’d give him the letter. Then . . .” I frown and lift my shoulders. Brand waits for me to complete the thought, but I just shake my head. “I don’t know, maybe I’m sticking my nose where it doesn’t belong. Maybe it’s after the fact, and it doesn’t matter. I mean, Camilla’s already—” My throat walls up and I close a hand. Brand knows what she is.

  I switch gears instead. “Do you think a breakup letter would just be a kick in the nuts?”

  A crooked smile. “You said ‘nuts.’”

  I scowl.

  “But no, if you want my opinion—I don’t think it’s after the fact. Just the opposite. You still miss her, don’t you?”

  “What kind of question is that? Of course I miss her.”

  “Well—dude she wrote that to probably misses her, too. If anything, I bet the letter’d give the poor sap some closure. Hell, delivering it’d probably give you closure.”

  Or make up for something terrible.

  “Probably. But how am I supposed to find this ‘YOU’ guy? I’ve already done some asking; one of Camie’s best friends knew nothing, and the other isn’t talking. If I can’t get any leads from them, then—”

  But Brand has stopped listening. He is staring at something in front of him.

  A card.

  Hope and fear vie in my chest—I knew I’d last seen it in Great Expectations! I must’ve dropped 65 in English after all.

  But when I take it from his hands, the smile falls from my face.

  Brand’s found a secret, all right. It just isn’t my secret.

  It’s worse.

  Below a discussion question (“Who changes most over the course of the novel? Explain.”) is a paragraph that’s been violently scribbled out. Under it, in tiny writing:

  FUCK IT

  I’ve had enough. I really thought this year was going to be different. (It is: It’s WORSE.) How can people be so cruel? Tomorrow I’m cleaning out my locker. Saturday I’ll end this misery once and for all.

  “Is it just me,” says Brand, “or is that last bit kind of morbid?”

  I turn the card over. A name has left impressions in the paper, and I squint and make it out just before I spot the silver Kisses in Brand’s trash bag.

  “Kody.”

  If the whispers in the halls are true, her locker isn’t the only place she’s been finding little presents the last few days: chocolates. Sugar substitutes. Diet sodas and weight loss shakes. All part of a balanced Morgan plot against her. I heard one girl in history say that they’re passed to Kody from the front of the room every time the teacher sends back handouts.

  Horrifying.

  “Kody Hotchkiss?”

  Brand has heard, too, apparently. I suppose he learns a thing or two during all those classes he cuts.

  “Yeah.” I read the card again. “We have to do something.”

  He folds his arms. “And just what would you suggest?”

  “Anything! Call her house. Tell a teacher. Talk t—”

  “Hold your cape, superhero. Kody will have to live with the consequences.”

  “Isn’t that kind of the point, though?—That she lives?”

  “You’re not hearing me, Lemon. Intervention is tricky. If it goes badly for her, Kody could end up even more miserable. This has gotta be handled delicately.”

  “Delicately?” That’s rich. What would someone who goes around destroying things with a lighter and box cutters know about being delicate?

  “That’s what I said. Seems to me young Kody could really use a friend right now.”

  “So—what? We invite her to eat lunch with us or something?”

  “Uh,”
says Brand. “You invite her. I can’t go around befriending people. Bad for my image.”

  “What?” This is the guy who signed everyone’s yearbooks “Go to hell” last June, isn’t it? “I thought you didn’t care what people think.”

  “No—I don’t care what anybody thinks. Singular.”

  “What’s the difference?”

  “What people think—collectively—shapes reputation. If people think I’m a softie, it’s bad for the band.”

  “Well—are you?”

  Brand’s frown deepens. I step back, seeing the haircut, the jeans, the cigarettes, the guitar—even the aloofness in new light. “Oh my god, you totally are!”

  I grin. Brand says, “Fuck off,” and starts away from me, hands shoved tight in his pockets. His defensiveness makes me grin even harder.

  “You know—” He spins back without stopping. “I would’ve expected a little sympathy from the girl who headed straight for Ghost Town Central at the Club Fair.”

  That gives me pause. “What do you mean?”

  “Your choice of club? Don’t tell me you weren’t avoiding people when you joined—”

  “Oh my god—Booster!” I wrestle off a yellow glove to check my watch.

  Great.

  I’ve just officially missed the first meeting of the GSBC.

  - 69 -

  On Friday, I do it.

  I brave lunch in the cafeteria.

  It isn’t for me, you understand; it’s for a better cause. A better cause named Kody Hotchkiss.

  I find her near the wall by the milk machine. She sits at a small round table, alone, poking at a Tupperware salad and reading. I squint and catch the title of the book in her hands: Lucy Killman: Underling. What else? And oh, look what shirtless wonder graces her lunchbox.

  I walk as if toward the milk machine, then veer close like something’s caught my eye.

  “Is that Rush Hollister?” I ask, indicating the lunchbox in question.

  Kody looks up from her salad. “Guilty.”

  I gesture one sec, buy a bottle of strawberry milk I have no intention of drinking, and return to the table.

  “What’re you reading?”

  I slide into a seat.

  Kody looks around like she’s not sure she’s the one I’m talking to. “Um. Lucy Killman. I’ve already read it four times, but I wanted to read it one last time before . . .”

  My breath catches.

  “Before I see the movie. My parents wouldn’t let me do the midnight premiere, so I’m seeing it tonight.”

  “You are?”

  Shit. What if Lucy Killman is the last thing standing between Kody and a toaster in the tub? Her card said Saturday.

  “Yeah, the late show. I heard people are dressing up.”

  But if I got her to go later—

  “Kody,” I start, tentative, “I know this is kind of sudden, but I was hoping to see it this weekend, too, and—and the thing is, I haven’t really been tight with my best friend lately. You know, since Camilla . . .” I pause to see if she understands. Kody nods. “And anyway . . . do you wanna maybe, go together?”

  A wedge of cucumber falls from her fork. “Together?”

  I smile and nod, a silent prayer the pity card will work for me.

  “Uh . . .” Kody straightens and tucks a wisp of hair behind her ear. I have caught her totally off guard. “Yeah. Sure. I guess.”

  “Really?” I light up like a carnival. Camie used to say I could turn on the charm when I really wanted to. “Thanks, Kody, I’m so glad! But oh, minor detail. I promised the neighbors I’d babysit for them tonight, so would you mind if we waited until tomo—”

  The lie dies on my lips.

  Walking toward us is Lauren. She’s tapping at her phone and doesn’t see me, but I can’t look away. Hide or say something, hide or say something?

  Kody frowns at me. “Juniper?”

  When she hears my name, Lauren looks up.

  Say something.

  “Uh—hey, Lauren,” I offer.

  Lauren blinks at me. “Hey.”

  For a moment, the exchange feels normal: eye contact. Acknowledgment. Relative ease.

  But then, like our last encounter, after a few seconds, neither of us really knows what to say to each other.

  “You . . . know Kody?” I venture, at last unable to withstand the silence.

  “Hi.” Lauren lifts an awkward hand with a smile. “Are, um. Are you . . . ?” Her eyes stray toward our former table.

  Does that mean she actually wants to eat together?

  “Kody and I were just making plans for the weekend,” I volunteer, miraculously more casually than I feel right now. “Do you . . . want to sit with us?”

  Hope knots in my chest.

  “Really?”

  She sounds surprised. I can’t tell if it’s good surprised (“Wait—you actually want to sit with me?”) or bad (“Wow—you’re really going to make me answer that?”). Maybe neither; maybe Lauren’s just shocked to hear I still do things weekends.

  “What, um,” she starts. She looks down and adjusts her handbag. I can’t think of a goodbye that starts with “what,” but I’m sure she’s about to leave.

  Until she hangs the bag on a chair and sits in it.

  “What did you guys have in mind?”

  And my chest fills up with such sudden, intense joy that for a moment my eyes water.

  I cut a glance at Kody to make sure she’s on board with this and incredibly, she is. Her smile is sympathetic, her raised brows encouraging.

  Funny. When did she become the one helping me?

  Lauren compliments Kody’s lunchbox. Kody beams and asks her if she’s read the books, and they get to talking, and all at once I see past swirl with present: a year of new traditions at a new lunch table, or maybe even off campus—we could induct Kody with a “toast” at Pippa’s. Maybe Kody is into musicals and will join our obnoxious singing sleepovers. Maybe I’ll end up liking the Killman books. It sounds like Lauren’s gotten into them this summer—maybe we could all even see the first movie together?

  I open my strawberry milk, and am about to make the suggestion when Kody suddenly stops smiling.

  “Hello, Kisses,” says a voice behind me.

  I turn in my chair. Beside us, smiling evilly, stands Morgan with her latest cast of minions.

  “Rachel noticed you left your present in the locker room,” she observes, “so I thought I’d bring it back to you.”

  Something lands on the table in front of Kody: a full package of the silver-foiled candies.

  “Do try to remember it this time. It hurts when you’re so careless with my gifts.”

  The girls make kissy noises, then erupt in laughter and turn to leave. Kody flushes and tries to disappear into her hair. Lauren looks as if she’d gladly do the same.

  “Hey.”

  The posse stops and looks back. I realize I am standing and have challenged her without a plan.

  Morgan sneers. “Do you have something to say to me, Juniper?”

  She starts back to the table.

  “Just . . . that . . . I think you’re an awful person, and maybe you should keep your insecurities to yourself.” I snap the bag of Kisses back at her. She catches it with a flinch, and then closes her eyes as if relishing the glove thrown.

  When she opens them, she laughs.

  “That’s sweet, Juni. Shame you don’t have quite the eloquence your sister did. Maybe you should leave the heroics to her. Oh wait, you can’t—she’s dead.”

  I feel my milk bottle crunch in my hand.

  “That’s low.”

  “No, Juniper. You know what’s low?” Morgan slides closer but makes no effort to lower her voice. “Your sister two-timing Shawn. I heard that was why he broke up with her—caught her cheati
ng with another guy. Slut needed two boys to—”

  Splash.

  Strawberry milk runs down Morgan’s nose.

  “Don’t. Talk about my sister that way.”

  I feel unstable: head sick with adrenaline. Kody’s slowly rising like she might need to restrain me; Lauren is receding, folding down, down, down into her conflict-free shell. Even now she has nothing to say?

  “What way?” Morgan challenges. “‘Sluuuut’?”

  A strangled sound rips from somewhere—me, I realize—and in the next moment Morgan is on the floor and I am on top of her, not punching or clawing or pulling hair—just shaking her. I don’t even hear the chants of “FIGHT, FIGHT, FIGHT!”—I just watch her head snap back and forth, back and forth.

  Eventually strong arms pull me up and I see Morgan sprawled on the tile, small and winded and covered in strawberry milk.

  “What’s going on here?”

  The demand is the first thing to register. More hands help Morgan up.

  “Are you all right?” the voice asks her.

  Morgan recovers and smoothes out her blazer. Then:

  “Mr. Bodily!” she gasps. “Ju . . . Juniper attacked me!”

  Mr. Bodily looks from her sopping face, to me, to the mostly empty bottle of strawberry milk on the floor. “Is this true?” he asks.

  I know how it looks. I’m too furious to care.

  “Come with me,” he says.

  I take my backpack and follow him out.

  ∞

  The adrenaline ebbs as we navigate the halls. I expect to be marched straight to the principal’s office, but feel only hollowness as we move past it and toward Bodily’s own classroom.

  When we arrive he draws a chair for me before his desk.

  “Have a seat.”

  “Am I in trouble?” I ask, but more out of reflex than actual concern.

  “Please, sit,” he insists. I do. Mr. Bodily lowers himself on the other side and considers me gravely, chin atop folded hands. “I’m afraid detention is inevitable,” he says at last. “That kind of attack on another student can’t go unpunished, regardless of how provoked. Or merited.”

  “Merited?” I raise my eyes from the desk. “Are you saying Morgan deserved it?”