I jumped as the bell rang and everyone started packing up their lunch things and heading inside.
“Let’s go!” Derrick shouted, throwing up his arms. “It’s time to learn, people!”
Jackson lingered by the door. “You coming?” he asked. “Yeah,” I said. “Sure. Just a second. I’ll catch up.” The doors slammed behind them and the yard was quiet and empty.
Just me and Jenny.
Jackson’s story hung with me. Now more than ever I had to be careful. If Jenny was going to be a threat to me, I needed to deal with it. I looked around, making sure I was alone before stalking up the hill. Jenny didn’t notice me as I drew near, too busy sketching the landscape in front of her. The trees looked almost alive on her paper, caught in mid-sway against the gray clouds, the horizon ominous in the distance.
“You’re different,” she said without turning. “Your clothes and hair and stuff.”
I froze. Jenny looked me up and down over her shoulder. Her dark eyes made me feel like I was a fish wriggling on the end of a spear.
“It was, uh… Violet. She gave me some clothes.”
“Figures,” Jenny smirked. “You look like one of them now. You come up here for a reason?”
I cleared my throat and tried to force myself back to business. “The note.”
“Which note?” she asked innocently. “A? B? C major?”
“Your note.”
“Oh, my note!”
“Jenny, whatever you think you saw—”
“Oh please,” Jenny said with a flirtatious lilt. “Let’s not play games that aren’t any fun.”
I felt my legs go weak. My mind was wiped clear like Tuttle’s blackboard. Jenny chuckled.
“I need to know what you want,” I said, trying to find the steel in my voice that was always in Grandpa’s, but only managed what sounded like a strained squeak. For a second I thought Jenny would laugh, but she didn’t. She dropped her pencil and shifted around, looking up at me like she was awaiting a lecture.
“Have you always been a scavenger?” she asked.
“I’m not—”
“Salvager. Whatever. You go north to south, right? To those trade gatherings?”
“Jenny, the note. I—”
“Do you take the same route every time or do you mix it up?”
One time Dad told me about how when they were building the railroads way back when, there would sometimes be a mountain in their way and they’d have to decide whether to load it up with dynamite and blow it up or just go around. I had the feeling that this was one of those times and I was pretty sure I didn’t have anywhere near enough dynamite for the first option. If I wanted the information, it looked like I was going to have to play along.
“It changes.”
“Why?”
“If you keep to one path, people can predict it. Set ambushes.”
“Smart. How close do you get to the coast?”
“Not close.”
“Why? Is it dangerous?”
“Some. Mostly it’s just rubble.”
“What about the West Coast? What have you heard about it?”
“Nobody goes there anymore,” I said.
“Why?”
I gave her a look like it was obvious.
“What? Because that’s where my scary Chinese brothers and sisters are?”
I crossed my arms over my chest. “Jenny—”
“You ever seen them?”
“No.”
“So what are they doing out there?”
Jenny chewed on the end of her pencil, squinting a little in the sun.
“You like your life, Quinn?” she asked, throwing me off base with the sudden change in tack. “Wandering about this war-torn land of ours?”
No one had ever asked me anything like that before. Did I like my life? What kind of question was that? “It’s just… it’s my life.”
“Well, it’s not a rock. You can have an opinion about it.”
“You like yours?”
“I like parts of it.”
“Which ones?”
“The parts where I get to break things.”
“Why? Because that makes you feel like you’re in control of something?”
For the very first time, I stopped her cold. It took everything in me not to throw my arms into the air in celebration. Jenny looked up at me blank-eyed, wriggling on a spear of her own. Slowly a smile grew at the corners of her lips.
“Oh Stephen,” she said. “You are a pistol.”
“What do you want, Jenny?”
Jenny’s eyes glinted in the sunlight.
“I want a lot of things, Quinn. I’m just trying to decide which of them you can provide.” She flicked her eyes to our left. “Uh-oh. Feel like a tussle?”
“Huh?” I turned and there was Will Henry, the redheaded giant, and one of the slug twins barreling our way.
“Come on,” I said, backing away down the hill. “Let’s get out of here.”
“What? Are you kidding?”
“No, seriously, Jenny. They’re trying to get me thrown —” But Jenny wasn’t listening. She jumped up and ran right at them. Will stormed on ahead.
“This isn’t about you, Jenny,” he said.
“Is it about the uses of symbolism in Melville’s Moby-Dick?”
“What?”
As Will stopped to figure that one out, Jenny punched him in the face. A hard right, slamming into his jaw. It rocked him, but he came right back at her. Jenny laughed and danced away.
I edged back down the hill toward school. If Jenny wanted to fight, that was her business. I needed to play it safe, for me and Dad. For the Greens.
“This is my town,” Will spat. “People like you and the spy aren’t welcome, Chink.”
Will planted both hands on Jenny’s chest and shoved her to the ground. She landed with a dull thump.
I didn’t even think. I just launched myself at him, slipping a fist past him and landing it in his stomach. He made a satisfying oof sound but recovered fast, throwing a punch that connected squarely with my jaw and spun me around. The next thing I knew, I was on the ground with a mouth full of grass. My head was ringing. I rolled over and all I could see was a wide expanse of cloudy sky cut in half by the dark shadow of Will Henry towering over me.
“You. Don’t. Belong. Here,” he growled.
Something behind me roared and Jenny flew past me, throwing herself at Will, her fingers stretched out like claws. He tried to shrink out of the way, but she got her arms around his neck and forced him to the ground. My vision was still a little hazy, but I could make out the two guys who were behind Will stepping forward and reaching for Jenny. I forced myself up, taking a fistful of dirt and grass with me. I threw the clump in Big Red’s face and threw myself at the other one, using my body like a battering ram. I hit the slug twin full in the chest with my shoulder and he went down. Once we were on the ground, I brought my knee up between his legs. He howled, then curled up on his side, moaning.
I pulled myself on top of him, cocked my fist, and gave him a good one right on the nose. There was a sick crunch and blood spurted out between us. I reared back again, but someone’s hands were on my shoulders, pulling me up and away from him.
It was the big redhead. He was strong but slow. I wriggled out of his grasp and got to my feet, backing away and getting my hands up in front of my face. I could hear another fight going on to my left. I wanted to look and see how Jenny was doing, to see if she needed help, but I had troubles of my own. Big Red was sizing me up, deciding on his next move. It was probably the dumbest thing he could have done. While he was thinking, I was moving.
I threw myself at him headfirst, right into his stomach. Even though I was pretty sure I knocked the wind out of him, he didn’t go down. I kept pushing forward, hoping to get him off balance, but he grabbed my shoulders and used my momentum to toss me down instead. I hit with a thud, my head slamming into the dirt. I reeled again and a wave of nausea hit me. I reached for my knife, realizing too late that it was sitting on Jenny’s floor guarding a pile of old clothes.