“We could just go over there,” Polly said.
“That's what I was thinking,” Ama said.
Jo went to sleep knowing -what day she'd wake up into. She woke early and walked to the cemetery. She had avoided it for the last two years, but she was ready to be there now. She sat on the ground, feeling the damp soaking into her pants. She watched the sun rise and point its rays through the trees.
She thought of all the things under the ground, and it didn't scare her as it used to. She was grateful to her dream.
She let a lot of feelings settle over her. Missing Finn. Her parents living separately. The damage she had done to her friendships with Polly and Ama. She was worried these thoughts would crush her if she let them come, but they didn't. You didn't know how heavy they were until you tried to lift them. You didn't know how strong you were.
She would miss Finn forever. That was just the truth, and it was good to know. She decided she would say his name at least once every day and she wouldn't push away thinking of him. Admitting how much she missed him would be a relief. It took a strange kind of energy to keep him away, and she didn't want to try anymore. Maybe she could work on her mom a little.
And as for her parents, it wasn't all bad. She and her dad -were finding each other after a long time of being lost. She was hopeful about that. The world had possibilities. Maybe her parents could even figure out how to talk to each other again. You never knew.
The thing that nagged and troubled her -was her friends. Polly had been through so much, and Jo had let her down. And Ama. Jo hadn't been awful to Ama, but she had let her drift away.
Sitting together in the emergency room, Jo felt their old promise and it made her hopeful. But so much had happened. Was it too late for them, or could Jo convince them how much their friendship still mattered? Even –without special pants or a lame scarf. It was the most important thing she had learned this summer, and she wished she knew how to explain it. What if they had drifted so far that they'd lost the feeling? Could she show them the way to find it again?
Jo felt a light breeze over her shoulders and it lessened her load. She lay on the ground, curled on her side, and put her ear to the grass. She imagined she could hear the roots of the trees growing and reaching.
She must have fallen asleep, because when she opened her eyes, she wasn't alone anymore. She was momentarily so startled, she lost track of where she was and what was happening. She sat up. Ama and Polly -were there as though she had summoned them right out of the air.
But it wasn't the air, it was really them. They were both holding pictures that they'd brought. Ama showed her the photograph of the three of them -with Finn the year he'd dressed them up as Ewoks for Halloween and gone as Han Solo. Jo was amazed by Polly's drawing of a tree with roots and branches as delicate and elaborate as a spider's web. They laid their offerings carefully against Finn's headstone.
They sat down next to her, one on either side. Polly touched her hand.
Jo put her head down on her arms and cried. They'd remembered. She hadn't needed to tell them or ask.
Ama put her arm around Jo's shoulder. Polly patted her hair. Jo felt safe to cry -with them.
Jo hadn't needed to show them the way. Once again, they had shown it to her.
They traced the familiar steps across East- West Highway toward the 7-Eleven. They didn't need to talk about -where they were going. They strode arm in arm, -which gave Ama a dorky kind of pleasure.
They strutted into the 7-Eleven so much bigger than they'd been before, -with their adventures and their disappointments and their big ideas. But they still bought blue Slurpees and candy bars.
They followed their younger, smaller footsteps to Pony Hill and ran down it, losing their footing at the bottom and stumbling forward in their old -way.
They stepped into the -woods slowly. Ama felt like she -was holding her breath. She felt like they all -were.
It had been more than two years. She -was scared of-what they might see. Had the trees -withered? Had they died, -with no one to talk to them or -water them or pour plant food on them or play violin to them? It felt unbearable to Ama, the fear and suspense as they stepped deeper into the shade.
There -were no small trees. They looked in the place they thought their trees should be and saw nothing they recognized. Where were the trees?
“Look at these,” Polly said.
“Those couldn't be ours,” Jo breathed. “They're so big.”
“But look,” Polly said.
They looked and saw how the trunks lined up unmistakably, three in a row.
Ama approached them carefully, in awe. She touched a finger to the familiar bark she'd known in miniature. “It's true. These are them. They're willows. Look at the leaves. I'm sure of it.” Ama had always done her homework more carefully than the others.
Ama stepped back, a sense of wonder overtaking her. Jo and Polly stepped back too. For a long time they looked up at the canopy of feathery gray- green leaves making a roof over their heads.
It was remarkable to Ama, how the three trees had grown together, intertwining their branches and leaves above. She imagined the roots in mirror image below, mingling under the ground. They were three together, but they were also part of the larger forest now.
The trees were strong. They wanted to grow. They just grew and grew, even -when no one was paying attention.
As the three of them -walked home from the trees, nobody needed to say it, but Ama knew. They had questioned their friendship. They had searched and wondered, looking for a sign. And all along they'd had their trees.
You couldn't wear them. You couldn't pass them around. They offered no fashion advantage. But they had roots. They lived.
Ann Brashares lives in New York City with her husband and their three children. She is the author of the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants novels, a series that reached #1 on the New York Times bestseller list and inspired two major motion pictures. Visit her at www.annbrashares.net.
Copyright © 2009 by Ann Brashares
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Brashares, Ann.
3 willows : the sisterhood grows / Ann Brashares.—1st ed.
p. cm.
Summary: Ama, Jo, and Polly, three close friends from Bethesda, Maryland, spend the summer before ninth grade learning about themselves, their families, and the changing nature of their friendship.
eISBN: 978-0-385-73813-2
[1. Best friends—Fiction. 2. Friendship—Fiction. 3. Interpersonal relations—Fiction.
4. Conduct of life—Fiction. 5. Bethesda (Md.)—Fiction.] I. Title.
II. Title: Three willows.
PZ7.B73759Aag 2009
[Fic]—dc22
2008034873
v3.0
Ann Brashares, 3 Willows: The Sisterhood Grows
(Series: # )
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