“Your church picnic?” Jessica asked.
“Yes, Kyle goes to my church,” Teri said, joining Jessica at the table. “He works with the teenagers. A sort of volunteer youth pastor.”
Kyle goes to church and works with teens. I suppose I should have guessed. Everyone in this town goes to church. Jessica was about to question Teri as to what Kyle had said, but Teri spoke first.
“Do you mind if I say grace?”
Jessica shrugged her shoulders. “Go ahead.”
Teri prayed, and Jessica half lowered her eyes and looked at the cucumber slice in her salad. It was more out of respect for Teri than for God. How could Teri talk aloud to God so naturally? It was peculiar, but nice, in a small-town sort of way.
They started to eat, and Jessica hoped the subject would change, but Teri brought it back to Kyle. “He’s taking a group of kids from church down to Mexico next month. Didn’t any of them try to sell you a candy bar this week? They’ve been working to raise the money ever since their trip last year.”
“As a matter of fact, Dawn Laughlin asked me if I wanted to buy a candy bar. Is she actually going to Mexico?”
“Yes, she is,” Teri said, cutting her spaghetti before eating it. “I think it will be the best thing in the world for her. She knows all about wealth and fancy hotels in Paris; it’s time she learned how others live. Besides, I’m the one who talked her into going.”
“You must be a good persuader,” Jessica said. “Mexico is not for everyone.”
Teri’s brown eyes grew wide, she put down her fork and looked at Jessica. “Why don’t you go too?” she asked enthusiastically. “It’s such a great trip. You’ll love it!”
“Me? Go to Mexico? I don’t think so, Teri. I’m not very interested in that sort of thing.”
“Oh, come on! I’m going. I went last year, too. I’m their official interpreter. Do you speak any Spanish?”
“Tacos,” Jessica said, her mouth full of salad. “And huevos rancheros.” She swallowed her bite. “That’s about it. Not quite enough to qualify as an interpreter.”
“What we need,” Teri said with a rather determined gleam in her eye, “is another adult chaperone. It’s only Kyle and me at this point, and we have at least twelve and maybe fourteen kids going.”
Jessica shook her head. She would never go to a place like Mexico to chaperone a bunch of kids, especially for a church outing. Especially when Kyle was going. “No, Teri, really. You’d be better off finding someone else.”
“Like who? Martin the Masher? Ms. Mendelson?”
Jessica kept on eating. She would not be persuaded.
“Take a week to think about it. I’ll ask you again,” Teri said, the determined lines on her forehead easing away. “We don’t leave for three weeks.”
Chapter Nine
True to her word, Teri showed up in Jessica’s classroom a week later on Friday afternoon and said, “Well?”
“Well, what?”
“I’ve given you a week to think about it. Have you changed your mind about Mexico?”
“Mexico?” Jessica had thought of many things that week, but Mexico was not on the list. “If you mean will I go with your church group, I don’t think so, Teri. You can tell me all about it when you come back. I’ll even watch up to three hours of slides.”
Teri laughed. “With free popcorn, right?”
Jessica smiled back. The thought of popcorn made her mouth water. Her food situation had gone from bad to worse. Each day she had made trips to the teachers’ lounge where a box of donuts, some muffins, or banana bread usually sat out on the table. If another teacher was in the room, she would take only a small portion. If the room was empty, she would eagerly reach for the free food and eat each morsel.
With her final eighty-four cents she had bought another loaf of day-old bread and two packages of Ramen noodles on Wednesday. She really disliked Ramen noodles, but they were the cheapest item in the store. Her purchase that day had actually come to eighty-nine cents, and she had sheepishly apologized to the clerk that she didn’t have the additional nickel. A little boy behind her handed Jessica a nickel and said, “I got fifteen nickels for all my pop cans. You want one?” Jessica thanked the boy, wrote down his name, and promised to pay him back.
Today was payday. She was saved. She could go to the bank, open an account with her check, keep some of the money, and begin to live a normal life.
But each of the four times she had checked her box today, it had been empty. She could see the white paycheck envelopes in all the other teachers’ boxes, but none was in hers.
“Would you like a ride home?” Teri asked.
“I need to check on something in the office,” Jessica said. “Maybe you better go on. I don’t want to hold you up since I know you have to be at the game early tonight with your cheerleader squad.”
“I have time. I can wait.”
“No, really,” Jessica said. “You go on. I don’t know how long I’ll be here.”
“Okay. Call me if you want a ride to the game tonight.”
“I will. Thanks.”
Jessica felt relieved to be on her own. Teri had given her a ride nearly every night, and on Wednesday, Ida had picked her up so she could go to the chiropractor and visit Mr. McGregor. When Ida left the room to find a vase for the flowers she had brought, Jessica had asked him again about her file. All he said was, “It’s not complete.”
“I know,” Jessica replied. “Charlotte has already talked with me about it. I’m sure it will be fine. Don’t worry.”
Hugh had shaken his head slowly. “I don’t feel good about this.”
“About what?”
“About you coming to Glenbrooke to hide. None of us can ever really hide, Jessica. The truth has a way of surfacing when we least expect it.”
Jessica had patted Mr. McGregor’s hand and said, “Don’t worry about me. I’m fine.” And she had really believed she was.
After all, she had a home, she was enjoying teaching, and today she would get paid.
After Teri left, Jessica closed up her classroom and headed for the office, practicing how she would ask for her check. She had never asked for money before in her life. If Mrs. Blair wasn’t in the office, she would have to discuss the matter with Charlotte.
As long as she had kept her distance from Charlotte these past two weeks, everything had been fine. But then, Kyle hadn’t been around, and that made it hard to define everything as “fine.” Jessica hadn’t seen him since that afternoon at the cemetery. It was horrible waiting to bump into him. She watched each white truck that went by on her walk to school, and every time she heard the faint whine of a fire-truck siren in the middle of class, she involuntarily wondered if Kyle might be the driver. Was he going to rescue someone else? Had he already?
Jessica stepped into the school office and shook away her haphazard thoughts. Mrs. Blair sat at her desk, nearly in tears.
“Are you okay?” Jessica asked.
Mrs. Blair looked up, startled. “Yes, yes, of course. What can I do for you, Jessica?”
“I didn’t find my paycheck in my box, and I wondered if you knew anything about it.”
The intercom buzzed on Mrs. Blair’s disheveled desk. Both she and Jessica jumped.
“Tell Ms. Fenton I’ll see her in my office.”
Jessica and Mrs. Blair exchanged glances. Jessica drew up her shoulders, sucked in a deep breath, and said, “You have a good weekend, Mrs. Blair.” She walked into Charlotte’s office like a woman who was afraid of nothing and no one.
“Were you wondering about your check, Ms. Fenton?”
“Today is payday, right?” Jessica answered with a question, refusing to let Charlotte have the upper hand.
“You failed to provide the information I requested.” Charlotte held in front of Jessica a form with Jessica’s name at the top and pointed with a red acrylic nail at the blank line under “nearest relative.”
Jessica remembered that she had said she would bring i
n a number on the first day of school, but she had completely forgotten. She felt like a student being reprimanded for forgetting her homework; she vowed never to make one of her students feel the way she felt right now.
“I can bring in that number on Monday. It’s not a problem.”
“Oh, yes, it is a problem. You see, I’ve called the district office, and they don’t seem to have a copy of your file anywhere. They don’t seem to think that you exist. Teachers who don’t exist don’t receive paychecks.”
“Then let’s call Hugh and have him talk to the district office,” Jessica said, trying to keep the tone of her voice on an even keel and not reveal any of the frantic emotions that had just broken forth inside of her. She had a horrible realization that Mr. McGregor must have registered her as Jessica Morgan, since the fake last name of Fenton came after she arrived in Glenbrooke. She also realized that she didn’t have any ID. How would she ever cash her check or open a bank account? After all the things she had worried about and lain awake at night thinking about, why hadn’t these obvious facts occurred to her?
“I’ve already called Hugh,” Charlotte said crisply. “I asked him when he sent in the file for Jessica Fenton, and do you know what he told me?”
Jessica could feel her temperature rising and her cheeks beginning to burn. She forced herself to show no emotion.
“He said he didn’t know anyone named Jessica Fenton, and did I mean Jessica Morgan.”
A fiery arrow of fear shot through Jessica. Why, oh, why hadn’t she warned Mr. McGregor, or at least told him she was going by the name Fenton? Jessica tried to think quickly. “It’s really not that complicated. Morgan was my step-father’s name,” Jessica lied, “and I chose to go back to my birth name when my mother died. Slight mix-up, that’s all. I’d like my file at the district office changed to Fenton.”
“I’ve asked for your file to be sent directly to me,” Charlotte said, her expression not revealing if she believed Jessica’s lie or not. “We’ll see about changing it once it arrives.”
“In the meantime,” Jessica said, directing some of her pent up emotions into anger, “what am I supposed to do for a paycheck?”
“Wait,” Charlotte said, leaning back in her chair.
“You can’t do that,” Jessica spouted.
“Oh?”
Jessica turned and exited as calmly as she could. Charlotte would not control her. “Mrs. Blair,” Jessica said, forcing herself to sound unemotional, “could you please give me the number for the district office? And do you know whom I would talk to about my file?”
The secretary scribbled down the information and handed the paper to Jessica. “I hope everything works out for you,” Mrs. Blair whispered.
“Oh, it will,” Jessica replied confidently. “It will.”
Retreating to the teachers’ lounge to use the phone, Jessica dialed the number and asked for the person listed on the paper.
“I’m sorry, she’s gone for the day. Can someone else help you?”
“I hope so. I’m a new teacher at Glenbrooke High, and there seems to be a mix-up with my file. I didn’t receive my paycheck today, and I need to know who can help me with that.”
“One moment, please.” The woman put Jessica on hold.
She waited a full three minutes before another voice came on the line. “Are you Jessica Morgan?”
“Yes, but I go by Jessica Fenton. There’s been a bit of a mix-up, you see, and—”
“Right. We received a call yesterday from the principal at Glenbrooke. Can I ask you to give me your social security number?”
Jessica repeated her number, and the voice asked, “Have you changed the records with Social Security? Do they have you listed as Fenton or Morgan?”
Jessica could see this was going to be much more complicated than she ever imagined. Several people in this town already knew her as Jessica Morgan; maybe she should come out of hiding. “Let me ask you something. Would my paycheck still be held up if it was written in the name of Jessica Morgan?”
“No, since that’s how you’re registered with us. If you want it in Fenton, we need a written notice from you and a signed authorization from the principal to release the hold she has placed on your file. Plus it wouldn’t hurt if you could provide us with your Oregon driver’s license number.”
“I don’t have it yet.” Jessica began to feel overwhelmed and weary of the whole mess. “Can you just go ahead and issue a check to me in the name of Jessica Morgan, and we’ll leave it at that?”
“I think we can. The person in charge has already gone for the day, but we can cut the check on Monday and you’ll receive it by Tuesday.”
“Fine. Please do that.” She hung up and left school as quickly as she could, taking long strides toward her house. Only instead of turning on her street, she kept walking. Her encounter with Charlotte had fueled her with so much anger that she hadn’t walked it all off by the time she had reached her street. As she turned down the next street, she found herself headed for the cemetery. Then it occurred to her that, for two weeks, she had wanted to see the name on the gravestone where Kyle had placed the daisies. Now was a good time to take a look.
The cemetery gate was open. Jessica stepped inside its boundaries and felt as if she had walked across an invisible line into quiet and calm. The cemetery was like a lush park with towering trees filled with bird choirs. A stone bench stood a few yards to her left, and Jessica decided it would be a lovely place to come and sit one day and do some soul searching. But not today. Her interest took her to the right, not to the bench on the left.
The gravestone was easy to find. The daisies were all wilted, but around the headstone grew wild cornflowers and Queen Anne’s lace. Jessica knelt and read the inscription, “Lindsey Sue Atkins. March 3, 1971-September 3, 1991. Loved by all. Safe in the arms of Jesus.”
Atkins. Kyle’s last name was Buchanan. Was she related to him? A former lover? Someone he rescued? How had she died?
Jessica was about to leave when she noticed the gravestone next to Lindsey’s. It read, “Thelma Jean Atkins, beloved wife of Clyde Jacob Atkins. Born: January 7, 1909. Died: November 14, 1991. Safe in the arms of Jesus.”
She died only a few months after Lindsey. Did they die of the same thing? Were they related?
Jessica slowly walked away from the grave, finding that her curiosity had been heightened rather than satisfied. She went over to the stone bench and sat down. It was cold. She felt cold.
Some of the trees around her were just beginning to shake out their summer greens. Some of them were already adorning themselves with gold lace around the edges. The clouds covered the sun, and a few drops of rain found their way through the leafy maze overhead and plopped down next to Jessica, as if they had been invited. She didn’t mind the company. She was thinking of her mom again.
Jessica realized that this was what she had missed all the years of growing up. A cemetery. A tombstone. A place to mourn her loss. She couldn’t visit the cremated ashes that had been sprinkled into the Pacific Ocean. No marker existed in the ocean to read again and again and to remember.
Strangely, Jessica felt clearer about her mom’s death than she ever had before. The gut wrenching cry of a few weeks ago must have done her good. This quiet bench was doing her good, too. She could come here and sit and remember whenever she needed to process the feelings she had kept inside for the past seventeen years.
Jessica closed her eyes and listened to the birds. The fresh smell of rain rising from the thick grass filled her nostrils and comforted her.
“Miss Fenton?” A gentle voice seemed to speak from out of nowhere.
Jessica snapped her eyes open and saw Dawn Laughlin standing in front of her. “Dawn, you startled me! I didn’t hear you walk up.”
“I saw you here and, well, if you don’t mind, could I talk to you for a minute?” Dawn had on her purple and gold cheerleader’s outfit, and her long bare legs were covered with goose bumps.
“Sure, but it??
?s kind of chilly here.”
“That’s okay,” Dawn said, sitting down on the cold stone bench next to Jessica. Dawn crossed her legs and folded her arms, tucking her hands under her upper arms and slouching so that her long, straight hair fell over her shoulders. Dawn looked younger than sixteen. Perhaps it was her round features. Her nose was round, so was her chin, her eyes, her face, and even her cheeks when she smiled. It made her look like a little girl.
“It’s about something you said in class this week,” Dawn began.
“Yes?” Jessica heard a truck engine and glanced over Dawn’s shoulder toward the street. Dawn’s bright yellow sports car was parked next to the cemetery’s entrance, and right in front of it, Kyle’s truck had pulled up and stopped. The engine was still running.
Jessica looked away, wondering if Kyle had seen her. She focused on Dawn. “What did you want to ask me?”
“You know that book you were reading from yesterday?”
Jessica thought back. “Oh, yes, The Pardoners’ Tale, by Chaucer. I won’t use any of it on the test, if that’s what you’re wondering. I was only reading it in the old English style to give the class an idea of how it sounded.”
“Actually, what I was wondering was where you got the book. You said you bought your copy for fifty pence in a secondhand bookstore.”
“That’s right.” Jessica couldn’t imagine why Dawn was asking her about this. It had only been a fleeting comment. “It’s my hobby; I collect antique books.”
“Did you buy it in England?”
“Yes, in London. Why?”
Dawn’s face lit up and her round brown eyes looked relieved. “So you’ve been to England.”
“Yes.”
“Have you been to Paris?” Dawn ventured.
“Yes.”
“So have I,” Dawn said. “My mom lives there.”
“Yes, I heard that,” Jessica said. She chanced a glance over Dawn’s shoulder again and saw that Kyle’s truck was still there but Kyle didn’t seem to be in sight.
“This probably sounds totally stupid, but could I talk to you about Paris sometime?” Dawn asked. “See, nobody in this town has ever been anywhere. Well, except the ones who go on the Mexico trip with the church. That’s different, though. It’s like I have this whole other life because I spend summers with my mom, and I can’t talk about it to anyone. Do you understand?”