Cross Country Hearts by Suzanne August

Four

“Don’t be smart with me, Judith Rae.”

My mother is disappointed, which is worse than what I thought she would do— kill me.

“What happened, June?” she asks, and the deep undercurrent of worry that I hear in her voice cuts me. “Are you all right?”

I sit on the bed in my motel room, which I’m thankfully not sharing with Jasper. I made it to the motel’s front desk only moments after him. After I found out he had only enough money for one night in a room, I’d paid for the both of us. It put me in an even worse mood, if possible. The room is small, and the furniture is old, and although there’s the faint smell of cigarettes, it’s comfortable.

“I’m okay,” I say to her, then I bite my lip and tell her what happened. When I get to the mechanic and how much it’s going to cost, I hear my mother take a sharp breath. I clutch the phone tighter in my hand. “Mom—”

“That’s a lot of money,” she says, interrupting me. “You just popped a tire a few weeks ago.”

“Yeah, I know. I’m sorry.”

“Are you sure you’re okay to drive the rest of the way to Florida?” she asks. “If you’re only in Connecticut, you could go back to Boston tomorrow, and I’ll figure out something else.”

I feel a sharp pain in my stomach, but I know nothing is stabbing me. I cover my face with my free hand and try to take deep breaths. What’s always worse than seeing my mother’s expression of disappointment is hearing it. April has always been the overachiever and success story. My mom has always looked at me and wondered if I’d make it out in the real world.

During my first two years of high school, I snuck out at night and skipped school during the day. I am a star soccer player and will even be soccer captain next year, but oftentimes my mother would get the call that if my grades slipped any further, I’d be kicked off the soccer team. She’s always disappointed in me.

It’s only been during my junior year when my teachers and my mother sat in a room with me and explained how these actions would affect my aspirations for soccer—and maybe the threats my mother made about sending me to a different, private school helped too—did I decide for myself that things needed to change. If not so I wouldn’t be perpetually grounded for life, then for soccer and for staying in the same school with the same friends I’ve had since childhood.

And hearing my mother now, sounding worried but at the same time as if she’s doubting me all over again… I take another deep breath. “We’ll be okay, Mom. We’ll get to Jacksonville.”

“Okay,” she agrees. “But you know, I can’t afford to pay for new tires and the mechanic every other week.”

“I’ll pay you back,” I promise, and this time I feel annoyed. Her doubt makes me feel guilty, but at the same time, it’s so familiar to me, so consistent, that I can’t help how I feel every time I hear it.

My mother must catch my tone because she says, “Don’t be smart with me, Judith Rae.”

I roll my eyes. “I promise I’ll pay you back.”

There’s a pause on the other line as if my mother is debating whether or not I’m sassing her before she finally says, “I need you to keep me updated. If you don’t get to Jacksonville tomorrow, make sure you’re here on Monday, all right?”

“Yes, mom.”

“Don’t use that tone with me.” She scolds me like I’m a kid and not someone old enough to drive her car.

“What tone?”

“That one. The one you’re using right now.”

“I’m not using a tone!” I say, incredulous.

“Watch yourself,” she warns. Her tone, laced with worry and disappointment, now has an added element of annoyance. It matches mine.

“Mom, I’ll be there. I won’t miss April’s wedding. I wouldn’t ever.”

There’s another pause over the line. I imagine my mother, one hand on her hip, stance rigid, as she contemplates the conversation we’re having. She’s disappointed and has worry lines on her face, but her mouth twists in irritation. This is how she always looks when we talk to each other.

Now she says, almost too calmly, “Please be careful.”

“I will be.”

Another pause. “You’ll tell me if anything is wrong?” This is a tad softer, her rigid calmness melting.

“Yes, Mom.”

“Do you promise that?”

“Yes.”

“Judith.”

“I said I promise,” I grit out.

“All right. Good. I’ll be seeing you in two days, right?”

I hear the warning in her tone. “Yes.”

“Good.”

She hangs up. I throw my phone onto the bed and tangle my hands in my hair. I suck in another breath and hold it before letting it out slowly. I had thought my mother would be angry, but her disappointment in me is worse. It’s like a permanent emotion she has when she’s around me. Like it will never go away, and I’ll always just keep doing things that don’t measure up to April.

I love April. My sister is one of the closest friends I have, yet it stings that she’s the favorite. That I’m always going to come second to her, not only in the order of birth but in the eyes of our mother, too. It doesn’t matter how I feel about something as long as it benefits April.

I’m my mother’s troubled child. She’s never said it to my face—she never would—but sometimes I see it in her eyes or her expression when she can’t deal with “my antics.” She’s never had that look on her face when she talks to April.

I go out too much, and I don’t focus on my schoolwork like I should—like April did when she was in high school. I don’t get all-around good grades, and I have friends my mother doesn’t approve of. April was the opposite at my age. It’s easy to see why she could be the favorite. She was the easier daughter to raise.

And still, it stings.

I bite my lip again. I need some fresh air. Not only did the argument with my mother give me a headache, but the faint smell of lingering cigarettes is getting to me. I swipe my phone from the bed and grab the motel key card on the way out the door. Out in the open hallway, I’m met with cool air and sky painted in the dusk. The balcony overlooks the motel’s parking lot, but I rest my arms on the railing and admire the view anyway.

April has always told me that nothing I could ever do would ruin her big day, even when I jokingly insinuated that I might get ridiculously and embarrassingly drunk at her wedding reception. She wouldn’t doubt the joke for reality, either.

The thing about April and me is that we’re not close in age, and because of that, we’ve always been at different life stages. We’ve never stood on the same ground in our lives. She’s one of my closest friends, but we could never have a heart-to-heart on equal grounds when our lives are so different simply because the gap in our age means that—right now at least—our lives are in two different worlds. She’s been to college, she’s snatched a good man, and she’s settling into a career while I’m still discovering myself and have no idea what’s going to happen after high school.

And yet, despite it, she’s always promised that I would be a bridesmaid at her wedding. Even before April got her first serious boyfriend her junior year of high school, she’s always said it. I never believed her. I’d wave it off and laugh because bridesmaids are supposed to be there for the bride and organize anything that doesn’t have to do with the wedding itself. Who would ever trust me to do that? No one can even count on me to remember a wine opener when I promise I’ll bring it.

Yet, one day last year, she called and told me I was finally going to be a part of her wedding.

For the past few years, ever since April and I have gotten closer because the distance between us made us realize how much we mean to each other; I’ve always tried to be there for her.

I sigh and lean into the railing. The sun has settled into the mountains in the distance, setting everything in shadow and brushing the blue sky around the mountains with light pink and soft purple hues. It’s a beautiful view despite the parking lot immediately at its forefront.

Behind me, the sounds of footsteps climbing the stairs draw my attention. I tear my gaze away from the view and catch Jasper just before he enters his hotel room. He freezes mid-step when he sees me, an unlit cigarette hanging out of his mouth. He’s wearing another black shirt that’s not the same as the one he had on earlier. This one has a logo of some band I’ve never heard of. His dark brown eyes watch me warily, and he’s carrying a bag of what smells like Chinese food.

I glare at him. I still haven’t gotten over the argument—or all the arguments—we had today. And after the conversation I just had with my mother, I’m in no mood to see him.

“What?” Jasper says, and he already sounds irritated.

It’s good that we’re on the same page with our feelings about each other. I roll my eyes. “Nothing. I just turned to see who was coming up the stairs.”

Jasper takes the cigarette from his mouth and leans casually against the motel’s wall, almost like he’s interested in what I have to say, though we both know he’s not. He asks, “Finally finished with your fight?”

He doesn’t say this awkwardly like he would if he felt embarrassed about revealing he’d listened in on my phone conversation. I scowl. “Eavesdropping, King?”

He doesn’t react to my use of his last name, just easily replies, “No. They put me in the room next to yours. The walls are thin.”

“So, you thought it was okay to listen in while I talked to my mother?”

Now he rolls his eyes. He holds up his bag of Asian food, and it looks like he’s bought half the restaurant with how big the bag is. “No. I left and got dinner.”

Not for the both of us. That’s what his eyes tell me. He’s an open book right now, when for most of the day, he’s been hard to read, all rigid shoulders and stony expressions. Something’s telling me that he chooses what he wants me to know and what he doesn’t. He can close the book on me if he wants to. Jasper King is weird like that.

The food bag looks more appetizing than what the tiny diner next to this motel has, which looks like salads and what the sign in the window proclaims are ‘healthy and vegan friendly burgers.’ I hold out a hand toward Jasper. “Share with me.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Why?”

“Because I paid for your motel room,” I say, annoyed. “I’m starving, and you look like you have enough food to last a week.”

“Hell no.” He scowls. “I bought this with my money.”

“And I paid for your room.”

“That doesn’t mean you can steal my food, Pierce. I only have enough for one.”

I raise both my eyebrows. I don’t know why, but the fact that he can raise only one and I can’t, irritates me. “Pierce doesn’t work as well as using King.”

“You call me King; I’ll call you Pierce.”

He’s so annoying. “Whatever. You’re seriously not going to share?”

“Why would I?”

“Maybe because I was a decent person and paid for your hotel room,” I repeat.

“You glared my way like you wanted to strangle me while you were handing over your credit card,” he retorts. “I don’t count that as a favor.”

“I paid for it because you said you didn’t have enough money. I was being the better person. Now you’ve got food, and I literally have no idea where anything good in this town is. I’ve had a horrible day, and my mother hasn’t sent me any more money yet, so I don’t even know if I should even spend what little I have left on food. You owe me, King.”

He glares at me in response. He’s not a good person, I think.

“What’s wrong with you?” I ask. “You act like I’m a horrible person.”

He scoffs. “Says the person who spread the rumor that I don’t wash my clothes and wear the same shirt every day of the week. People believed it.”

“It’s not true?” I ask, looking pointedly at the black shirt he’s wearing. It’s a variation of the same dark shirts he always wears. They all look the same. “Because it looks like it is.”

If possible, his eyes get even darker. “And you wonder why I painted you ugly.”

“I’m not ugly,” I say. “Not on the outside and not on the inside. You don’t know me.”

“I know enough.”

He pushes off the wall and turns to open the door to his motel room. He makes to open the door, but before he gets inside, I break. I’m so frustrated. The entire day has done nothing but go downhill ever since we left Boston.

I’m starting to wonder if I really prefer Jasper with me, in the same car, over just driving down to Jacksonville myself. Because I’m not even sure anymore if it makes me feel better having him in the car over having no one. And the longer we’re together, the more I’m wondering if he feels the same about choosing to get in the same car with me over getting on an airplane.

Couple that with the anxiety that’s been pooling and colliding inside of me the entire day, I take it out on him. I know it’s wrong, but I let it out on Jasper King. I burst. “Why are you so scared of planes, anyway? If you didn’t want to drive with me to Florida and had just gotten on a plane, we wouldn’t be here, together, right now.”

Jasper freezes midway into his room. He turns to face me. “I’m scared of flying in airplanes.”

I cross my arms. “Airplanes are safer than cars.”

“Even if I had to be in a car with you for the next week, I still wouldn’t get on an airplane.” His tone is cool, unamused. He’s done with this conversation before it even started.

I match my tone to his. “An airplane wouldn’t have broken down like my car did today. You could’ve gotten on an airplane and taken a pill. You would’ve slept the whole way to Florida, and then we wouldn’t have to be here.”

“Right, together with you,” he says. “I don’t fly, June.”

“Yeah, because you’re a coward.”

The hard look he gives me right then is frigid and passionless. It’s ice that stays frozen even in the warmest of summers. His tone matches the look as he spits out, “My parents died in a plane crash. I’m not the coward, June. You are.”

Then he finally slips into his room and slams the door so hard I feel the vibration through my shoes.

I’m left standing outside, speechless. Slowly, I raise my hands to my head, drawing my fingers through my hair and pulling it back. I turn to the railing, but when I look out at the view again, the sun has dipped behind the mountains, and the painted hues in the sky are gone. There’s only the darkening blue of the night sky. It’s almost colorless.

My parents died in a plane crash.

For the first time since Jasper King revealed his painting of me, I feel like the horrible and ugly person he portrayed me to be.