Chapter 21

“Where are you going now?” Meadow Lark asked the next day.

“No place special.”

Meadow Lark had caught me just as I’d gotten my bike down from the hook in the garage. I wanted to go by myself, without Meadow Lark tagging along, but I hadn’t moved fast enough.

“Just tell me where you’re going,” she say.

“I’ll be back in a few hours.”

I’d listened to what Mama told me about friendship, and I tried not to let anything come between Meadow Lark and me. But something still bristled inside me and made it hard to tell Meadow Lark everything

I threaded my arms through my backpack and adjusted the straps. It felt heavy loaded with Mama’s spade and garden gloves and the watering can.

“What do I tell your mama? She won’t like that you left.”

“Well, I have to do this, so tell her I’ll be back in a few hours. When she finds out where I went, she won’t mind.” After our talk the day before, I knew Mama would understand.

First I rode to Pike’s Nursery and picked out a pot of lilies.

“They’re on sale today,” Mrs. Pike say. “Buy one, get one. How about it? Your mother likes lilies. You want to make her happy, don’t you?”

I was convinced. “More than anything,” I say.

She set both pots in a paper shopping bag, which I hung on my handlebars as I rode to the cemetery.

After Mama told me about June, I’d wanted to visit her on my own, without Mama and Daddy. That she was Mama’s best friend and that Daddy had tried to save her life made her feel like a cousin. Because Mama loved June so much, I wanted to love her too, and being nice to June would be like being nice to Mama. So I figured that taking flowers to her today would be a good start.

I set my bike against a tree and carried the bag over to June’s stone. Then I knelt down and pulled out the watering can, the gloves, and the spade, and began digging out the daffodils that Mama planted the last time she come.

I turned one of the lily pots upside down and eased the flower and the root ball out of the pot, just like I’d seen Mama do a hundred times. Then I put the lily in the hole the daffodil come out of. It made my shoulders ache, so I sat straight up and rolled my head and shoulders. When I looked up, I saw Meadow Lark pushing a big bike up the gravel path.

She waved at me and called, “River!”

“Great,” I muttered. I’d told her I wanted to be alone.

Ignoring her for a moment, I bent back down and put the dirt over the lily. Meadow Lark parked her bike and walked over to me. “Your mama thought you’d be here.”

That made me feel good. It meant Mama knew what was important to me.

“Then she went for a walk,” she say, “so I couldn’t ask her which bike to take.”

I glanced at the bike she had parked next to mine. “That’s Theron’s bike! You can’t touch that bike—no one can. You have to take it back, Meadow Lark.”

“Sorry—I didn’t know. It was just the first one I saw.”

My heart was bloated with anger at her, and I couldn’t keep it in anymore. “You took my room, you took my mama, and now you’re taking my brother’s bike. Why don’t you just move in and take over my whole family?”

“Oh, if I did that,” she say, looking puzzled, “would you still be there?”

“Meadow Lark . . . I thought we were friends.”

“But aren’t we?” she asked.

“Sometimes I’m not sure.”

“River,” she say, kneeling down beside me, “I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean to do any of those things, honest. I’m just not good at being a friend. I’ve never really had one because we move all the time.”

“Wait,” I say, “does that mean you’ll move away from here, too?”

“I hope not, but we might. My dad’s job moves us all over the place.”

“Well, I don’t want you to leave,” I say. I just wanted to be friends with her. I wanted everything to be okay between us.

She turned toward the bike and say, “I’ll take it home now.”

“You’re here now, so you might as well stay,” I say. “But take it straight home when we’re done, okay?”

She smiled. “Okay, good,” she say, and in that moment I knew we were friends again. Meadow Lark didn’t mean to do the things she did—it was just her way.

“Who is this?” she asked, turning to June’s headstone.

“She was Mama’s best friend, but she died.”

“Obviously,” she say, and laughed a little.

I laughed too, and then say, “I’m almost done planting the flower, and then I just need to water it.”

“I’ll get that,” she say, and filled the watering can from the faucet poking out of the ground. With me planting and her watering, we took care of June together.

“Where are you going to plant that one?” she asked, pointing to the second lily.

“Nowhere. It was an extra.”

“Someone should get it, right?”

“Mama always takes the extras to the hospital,” I say, and thought. “Meadow Lark, can you take my backpack home? I have somewhere else to go first.”

“Sure, but why are being so mysterious?” she asked.

“I’ll tell you when I get home.”

“Is Benjamin still here?” I asked at the nurses’ desk.

“Last name?”

“You know—that boy with the big cast.”

“Dunne, Benjamin . . . yes, he’s still here, but he’s waiting to go home, so you’d better hurry.” Then he stared very obviously at the lily pot.

“Thanks,” I say, and hurry down the hall to Benjamin’s room.

Benjamin was sitting up in a chair when I got to his room. His leg, now in a black boot up to his knee, was propped on the edge of the bed, and he was reading a comic book of Treasure Island.

“Hello, River,” he say.

“How’s your leg?” I asked.

“Password?”

“Jim—too easy.”

“Amazing. It’s almost good as new,” Benjamin say, and tapped the boot.

“You heal fast,” I say.

“Will you have a seat?” he asked, waving to another chair. “I’m afraid I have nothing to offer you for refreshments, as I’ve been discharged.”

“No, thanks. I just come here to ask you a question.”

“You still have that charming way of speaking,” he say, and smile. “What’s your question?”

“Have you ever tutored anyone before?”

“I have. I’m especially good at science and math and literature, and not as good at history or other languages, except Latin. Do you need a tutor?”

“Not me. Do you remember Daniel, the boy across the hall?”

“The boy who almost died. I scared you then, didn’t I? I apologize for that. But actually, he did seem a bit lifeless for a few days.”

“So you can tutor Daniel in science and math?”

“Certainly. If he’d like me to.”

“Good,” I say. “These are for you.”

“And if I’d said I wouldn’t tutor him?” he asked.

“They would still be for you.”

Just then, the feather I’d caught the day before started prickling me through my shorts. I set the lily on his rolling tray and scratched my thigh.

“Thank you,” Benjamin say. “As you can see, my room has no flowers, so thank you for these. . . . Is something wrong?”

“No . . . yes,” I say, and pulled the feather out of my pocket. “This was poking me.”

Benjamin studied the feather in my hand. “If I were you, I would take note of that. Poking generally means your attention is desired.”

“It’s a feather, Benjamin.”

“Ah, but from what . . . or whom? Do you know someone with white feathers?”

“Only Mr. Tricks.”

“Then perhaps Mr. Tricks is trying to tell you something,” he say. Then he picked up his comic book and continued reading it.

Was Benjamin right? Was Mr. Tricks trying to tell me something?

If the feather come from across the river, I thought, maybe that’s where Mr. Tricks was. But that would mean I’d have to cross the bridge to get there.