Jupiter Rising by Gary D. Schmidt

Author:Gary D. Schmidt
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2024-06-12T00:00:00+00:00

Eight

THAT afternoon, as soon as I got home, I changed into my running stuff, stretched in front of the house while Jupiter watched—“Funny Jackie goonie-pie!”—sprinted down our road to Sumner Hill, ran to Barlow Road, and turned. Barlow Road dips down to Barlow Pond, which maybe used to be a pond but is now more like a marsh, and in the springtime it’s filled with early mosquitoes, so no one should run there. But I did, and I got mosquitoes in my ears, in my eyes, in my mouth, until finally I circled back up and onto some granite ledges above the pond.

I know. I was being a jerk. But I just didn’t want to run with Jay Perkins today. Not if he was friends with Mr. Joyce.

I kept up through the ledges, and then along Lower Gore Road, and when I turned on Sumner Hill Road again—and just so you know, even though this circle was shorter than the three loops I usually did, I’d lost a lot of blood—I looked ahead to see if Jay Perkins was around, but he wasn’t.

I finished Sumner and took our turnoff in a sprint.

That’s what I ran the next day, too.

And the next day.

But the day after that, Jay Perkins was waiting at the end of our road when I finished.

He was standing like he was mad, hands clasped up behind his head, not moving at all.

I ran to him and I leaned down with my hands on my knees.

“Where have you been?” he said.

“Running.”

“Where?”

“Down to Barlow Pond.”

“Then you’re an idiot,” he said. “This time of year, the mosquitoes—”

“I know,” I said.

He turned around, then turned back.

“So what’s going on?”

“What do you mean?”

“Cut it out, Hurd. Where have you been?”

“I told you. I ran down to—”

“Okay,” he said, and he turned away again and started down Sumner Hill.

“How do you know the Joyces?” I called.

He stopped.

“Mr. Joyce said I should ask, so I’m asking. How do you know them?”

He didn’t move.

“They’re trying to take Jupiter away. Do you get it? They’re trying to take— How do you know them?”

Jay Perkins turned around. He lifted the bottom of his Mickey Mouse shirt and wiped the sweat off his face. “They’re my uncle and aunt,” he said.

“What do you mean?”

“Do I need to explain it to you?”

“How come you never told me before?”

“Why should I?”

“You cut it out. You know why.”

Jay Perkins walked back toward me.

“I don’t need your drama, Hurd. I really don’t. And if you don’t want to run together, I don’t care. You understand that? I don’t care. You tell Coach that—”

“So that day in the med center, when you said you were Jupiter’s cousin, you weren’t lying?”

“Madeleine was my cousin.”

“What?”

“Madeleine was my cousin.”

“Again, why didn’t you tell me?”

Jay Perkins looked like he was about to lay me out.

“What the hell, Hurd, why do you think?”

I really didn’t know.

Jay Perkins stepped even closer, and remember, he was a lot taller than me, and maybe I’d slammed him into gym lockers once, but it was true that that happened when his back was turned to me—and it wasn’t now.

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