I don't own 1-800-WHERE-R-YOU, or any of it's characters... Meg Cabot does.
For the first time, I realized how different New York was, compared to Indiana. In Indiana, you don't usually walk anywhere. In NYC, you walk everywhere. If you even have a
car—most people don't—you don't really use it unless you're going out of the city. I guess that that's because the traffic in New York is horrible. Taxis and delivery trucks block the streets, keeping traffic pretty much at zero miles per hour. I'm not even kidding.
From what I can tell though, there's no place that a car can take you that a subway can't. Also—from my experience (the airport to Jess's apartment)—everything that you hear about a subway being dangerous… not true. If anything, the subway is the best place to go if you're a tourist. Just stay alert. If you ask a New Yorker for directions, they pretty much escort you to where ever you're going.
It was weird, walking down the sunny, tree-lined streets of New York City with Jess. It was something that I had never pictured in a million years. Not even once.
I decided to keep quiet. If I opened my big mouth now, I would regret it later. Jess didn't say anything either, so I just assumed that she was okay with it. The silence I mean. We just walked down the busy sidewalk in complete silence.
The silence lasted too long. I was about to say something when Jess chimed in for me, "There's a decent Mexican place around the corner."
God, she just had to say something that I couldn't think of a response to didn't she? I just nodded, and let her lead the way. I knew that this was going to be hard for me… but I didn't think that it would be too hard for her. Man was I wrong.
We finally got to the restaurant that Jess had mentioned, the Blue Moon. We walked inside, and Jess led us to a small table by the window. That was probably where she and Ruth sat when they came here. Soon, a waitress came by who was apparently well acquainted with Jess.
"Hey, Jess" she smiled, as we took our seats. "The usual?"
"Yes please," Jess smiled back halfheartedly. It was painful knowing that she would rather be back at her apartment with Skip of all people.
The waitress, who's name was Ann, looked at me expectantly. "Just a beer," I told her, not thinking straight. When Ann listed a bunch of brands, I just chose some random one, to get her away form the table so that Jess and I could talk.
I noticed that Jess and I were the only ones in the restaurant, except for the staff. Jess just stared blankly out the window, watching people walk by.
I was nervous. There, I admitted it. I kept rearranging my silverware, fork, knife, spoon, then knife, spoon, fork, and so on. I was almost at the point that I was going to shred up the pathetic paper napkin.
I took in my surroundings, there were sombreros on the walls, and chili-pepper lights around the bar. Actually, I think that I had looked at everything except for the person sitting in front of me… Jess.
Thankfully, Jess took the liberty of breaking the silence. "So, how's your mom?" she asked… trying to start a conversation. I didn't think that she cared about how my mother was doing though.
"My mom?" I said, making sure that I actually heard her correctly. "She's fine. Fine."
Jess nodded, "Good," she replied, relieved. I decided that I probably shouldn't tell her that my mom had sold me the house and barn, so that she could move to Florida with Gary. I bought the house from her, and then bought my uncle's garage too. Jess didn't need to know all of that though. "My dad says she quit a while back."
Okay, maybe I should at least tell her about my mom's move. She had a right to know. "Yeah, well, what happened was, she moved to Florida." Hey, she didn't need to know all the details—unless of course she asked. Which she did.
"She did?" she asked in disbelief. "Florida?" I laughed mentally. Was it really that hard to believe that my mom had moved to the sunny state of Florida?
"Yeah, um, with that guy. Her boyfriend. Gary. Did you meet Gary?" Stupid question. Stupid, stupid question. Of course she met Gary. He was over at my house on Thanksgiving the year before Jess left. The night that she told me that she loved me.
When she was quiet, I continued, "Her sister lives there, my aunt. And things were tight—you know, back home. Gary got a better job down there and asked her to come with him. So she said she'd try it out for a while. And she liked it so much, she ended up staying."
She just said, "Oh." Well, I couldn't really blame her… I mean, I just told her everything about my mom's life. "Well, I'm happy for her, I guess. For you both. That things are going so well." She still didn't know that I didn't live with my mother any more.
"Thanks," I nodded—still not telling her all of the details. The waitress came over to our table with our drinks and some chips. Saying that I was surprised when she set down a strawberry margarita—with an umbrella in it—in front of Jess would be an understatement.
Jess saw my confused look, and answered half of my questioning look. "It's virgin."
"Oh," I said, still confused. "It has an umbrella in it."
She shrugged, and stuck the little umbrella in the pocket of her jeans, "Yeah? So what?"
I laughed silently to myself, she took these things so personally. "I just never would have pegged you for an umbrella-drink kind of girl."
She said, "Yeah," again, and then continued, "Well, I'm full of surprises."
I didn't ridicule her drink choices again after that. When Ann came back to take our order Jess and I both told her that we wern't't ready to order yet. The waitress walked away, leaving Jess and I alone once again.
I decided that I would break the silence this time—save Jess some self control. "And your folks?" I asked, "How are they doing?" I already knew the answer of course. Doug and I had become pretty close after Jess left.
She stared at me for a second before answering, "They're fine." Well, at least she was staying in touch with her family enough to know that there hadn't been any problems.
"Yeah," I agreed, "I see Doug from time to time." Crap! I was not supposed to say that. Now she would know that I had been talking to Douglas about her behind her back. "He told me Mike was spending the summer with you… Ruth's brother too, I see. Or is he just visiting?" Damn it! Why did I have to keep talking? Surely she knew by now that I had been asking about her.
"No, he's with us until September," Jess informed me. "They're both crashing—he and Mike—while they work internships in the city. So did your mom sell the farm? I mean, when she moved to Florida?" There it was… the question that I really didn't want to answer.
I tried to think of a way to change the subject, but nothing came to mind fast enough. I had to tell her that I owned the farm now. "No," I started, shaking my head slowly. "We've still got the farm. Or, should I say, I've got it. I bought it—and the house—from my mom."
Jess was shocked. After the information settled into her mind though, she continued, "And are you still working at your uncle's garage?" Once again, a question that I really didn't want to answer.
I squeezed the little slice of lime that came with my beer into the little opening at the top of the bottle before answering, "Yeah," and then gave her the other information that she would eventually have to find out. "Only it's not his garage anymore. He retired. So he sold it."
She took this information better than the house—but she still didn't know that I was the one who bought the garage. "Oh," she sighed, and then continued, "Well, that must be weird. I mean, working for somebody else after working for your uncle for so long."
"Not really," I chuckled, taking a drink of beer, "Because he sold it to me."
This time she was really surprised. It took longer for this to penetrate her mind than anything else had. "You bought your uncle's garage?" she asked. I simply nodded—due to a lack of words.
Jess just sat there quietly, not able to say anything. Then I remembered her scholarship to Juilliard, and decided that that was a good question to ask. How did she like school?
"What about you?" I asked, needing to know more about her new life. "How are you liking school out here?"
Poor Jess still wasn't completely ready to talk again, so she just muttered, "It's okay," and then went back to staring at me.
I decided that since she already knew that I had asked Douglas about her, I could continue to use the information that he gave me. "Doug says that you're doing really well," I said, rearranging my silverware again. I wasn't used to having my hands still. They were always moving when I was at the shop. "In school, I mean. First chair in orchestra, or something?"
"Yeah," she sighed, sounding bored. "But I'm taking a break for the summer."
That's right, Doug had said something about a job with Ruth. "Right," I answered, "Doug says you and Ruth are doing some kind of summer arts program for needy kids?"
I started to realize then that she was probably going to get mad at Douglas for telling me so much about her. I would have to remember to ask her not to put the blame on him.
"Yeah," she nodded, "It's pretty cool. I like it a lot. Better than playing in orchestra, actually. The kids are fun."
"You always did like kids," I said, remembering the one summer when she was a counselor at Camp Wawasee. The kids there loved her, especially Shane, the one that she saved. "You were always great with them, too."
Jess didn't say anything, and neither did I. I just sat and thought about the day that she called me from camp. She said that she needed me to drive out there, to pick her up. Since it was three hours away, I told her that I couldn't… at first. Then she told me that it was okay that I didn't want to pick her up myself, that there were other guys who could take her where she needed to go.
That's where I drew the line. I went and picked her up from that camp right away. She took me to the house of some little girl, whose mom had kidnapped her. The guy that the mom was dating was abusive, and the girl needed help to get out of there—fast.
We came up with a scheme… Jess and I would pose as high school students, and ask the mom some random questions. Jess would pretend to forget something, and then go get the kid from the back yard.
Our plan worked perfectly until the abusive boyfriend caught Jess. She kicked him in the face—breaking his nose—and then got out of there as fast as she could. We returned the girl to her father, and then I took Jess back to the camp. It was great. Jess had saved another helpless child, with me by her side. Why did she have to leave?
"That's kind of why I'm here actually," I told her, breaking out of my memories.
Jess peered at me over the rim of her martini glass, "What? Because of… kids?"
"Yeah, basically," I clarified, watching her carefully.
She took a huge drink of her martini, and got a brain freeze. And then, she choked a little. "Whoa," I warned, concerned, "Slow down there slugger."
Jess winced, and said, "Sorry." She probably gave herself a headache, or something.
I couldn't read the expression on her face… most likely because of the ice-cream headache that she had just given herself. It looked like she was afraid of something, but I couldn't imagine what there was to be afraid of.
I leaned forward a little in my chair once her headache seemed to have passed. I didn't want anyone overhearing the rest of our conversation. "The thing is," I started, "I know that things have been…" how do I put this? "Well, weird between us. You and me, I mean. The past two years or so."
Yeah, the past two years of my life that have been hell.
"But we're still friends, right?" I had to know what kind of terms we were on before I could ask this favor of her. There was no way that I would ever ask her for this if she hated my guts. Kind of like her mother. "I mean… maybe we aren't—whatever we were—anymore."
I watched her face closely, trying to detect any kind of emotion in her features. There was none. There was no emotion what so ever in her face… at all.
"But we'll always be friends, won't we?" I asked, trying to pull an answer out of her mouth. "I mean, after everything we went through together." From fighting off rapists, to avoiding the FBI, and even sitting through detention. "Detention at Ernie Pyle High. That's gotta bind people for life, right?" I needed to see her smile, just once.
And my prayers were answered. She smiled. It wasn't too terribly noticeable, but it was a smile all the same. "Yeah, I guess so," she agreed.
"Good," I sighed, totally relieved. I could at least ask her to help me find Hannah. "Good. Okay. So, we're still friends." Even if I wanted to be so much more than just her friend.
"Still friends," Jess echoed, taking another sip of her umbrella drink.
"Then it'd be okay if I asked you," I began, nervous as to how she'd react, "I mean, as a friend—" I took another deep breath before I continued, "So, here's the thing…" Jess took a deeper breath than I had, and held it.
I didn't want her to pass out due to a lack of oxygen, so I cut to the chase.
"Jess. I need you to find my sister."
Okay. there it was. the third chapter. you know that you want to leave a short and choppy review, so go ahead and leave me a long and detailed one. I love getting reviews, and I know that you love to leave them for me. press the "go" button, and REVIEW!