CHAPTER SEVENTY-NINE
The next day was undeniably a little weird. Jane and Sarah didn't really know what to say or do around each other. After all, they were two completely different people now. They hardly knew each other. The only thing still linking them together was the emotional bond that they had formed so long ago which, while faded and bent, had not yet been broken.
After Sarah's mum and step-dad had gone off to work, the two of them just sat in the den, watching the telly. A kind of tension filled the room as they sat there in awkward silence. And Jane kept remembering the last time they'd spoken to each other. Finally, she blurted out:
"I'm sorry for punching you in the face."
Jane wasn't sure what made her say it, and for a second, Sarah just stared at her, either shocked at what Jane had said or just shocked that Jane said anything in general. And then Sarah did something that Jane hadn't been expecting. She laughed.
Jane stared at her in confusion, and in amusement as well.
"Why are you laughing?" Jane asked.
"That was just so random," Sarah said. "What made you think of that?"
Jane shrugged.
"I don't know. I just guess—I guess I thought I'd apologise," she said.
"Well, it's two years late, but apology accepted. Besides, I kind of deserved it. Sorry for calling you a bitch," Sarah said, still laughing a bit.
The tension around them seemed to disperse all at once as Sarah's laughter filled the room. And Jane felt this huge weight lift off of her chest that she had not known had been there. Sarah's laughter infected her, and for the first time since her mother's death, Jane laughed. And it felt so great that once she started, she couldn't stop.
Jane wasn't even sure what they were laughing at, but it felt liberating. For so long, she had been filled with despair and grief, and finally being able to feel something positive was so relieving that it almost made her burst into tears of joy.
After their laughing fit, they lay in their armchairs, panting and trying to catch their breath. Sarah caught Jane's eye and they both grinned.
"Let's go to the river," Sarah said, jumping up.
As Jane waited for Sarah to grab something from her room, she felt a pang of guilt. How was she having a good time? Her mother was dead. Why did she get to feel happy? She didn't deserve it.
However, as Sarah came bounding down the stairs, Jane repressed the feeling of guilt, and by default repressed any feelings at all, and replaced them with a false sense of happiness. And the girls headed off to the River Test.
They walked along the river, finding stones to throw in it. Jane listened to Sarah talk about how she still really couldn't stand John. She talked about the new friends that she had made and about the trouble they all seemed to get into together. And she talked about her latest boyfriend, some bloke named Paul, whose older sister had a new car that she drove them around in.
Jane guessed that Sarah had become pretty popular at Test Valley, which was confirmed when Sarah told her about all the parties she'd been to. Jane was rather popular at Hogwarts, but not in the way Sarah was at Test Valley. People knew Jane because she was on the Quidditch team or because she was friends with James and Sirius. Sarah was popular because people really liked being around her and because she was outgoing. Jane wished she was like that.
After a while, Sarah pulled a out a small white box with two blue stripes on it. From it, she took out a cigarette and lit it with a lighter. Jane watched as she took a long drag on it and blew out a thin stream of smoke.
"I didn't know you smoked," Jane said.
Sarah looked down at the cigarette in her hand and shrugged.
"My friends smoke 'em. Guess I just gave in to peer pressure," Sarah teased before taking another drag.
"You wanna try one?" she asked, eyeing Jane.
Jane shook her head.
"No, I'm fine," she said.
"Ah, come on. One fag isn't gonna kill you," Sarah said. "Here, catch."
Sarah threw her box of cigarettes to Jane who caught them with ease. Jane looked down at the gold lettering on the box which read:
Player's No. 6 Filter Virginia
She flipped the box on its side and read:
WARNING by H.M. Government SMOKING CAN DAMAGE YOUR HEALTH
Jane looked over to Sarah. She didn't seem to be dying or sickly. In fact, she looked kind of devil-may-care. She looked kind of tough and cool with her red lipstick and her cigarette. Jane looked back down at the box. What harm could one cigarette do?
She took out a cigarette and put it to her lips as Sarah lit it with her lighter. Jane took one suck on it and immediately started to cough and gag in a way that was most definitely not tough or cool.
Sarah laughed a little as Jane threw the cigarette on the ground, still coughing.
"Well, that was amusing," she said. "First one's always rough."
"Sorry for wasting it like that," Jane said, looking down at the cigarette on the ground.
Sarah shrugged.
"No big deal. I did the same thing. Besides, they're only like thirty-five pence," she said.
"I thought you had to be sixteen to buy them," Jane said.
"You do, but there's this store right before you get into Andover, and the guy that owns the place is pretty creepy, but he doesn't ask how old you are," Sarah said.
Jane gave the box of cigarettes back to Sarah, deciding that that was enough smoking to last her for a while.
Later that night, when everyone else had gone to bed, the two girls climbed out onto Sarah's roof and looked at the stars, talking about old memories as Sarah smoked another cigarette.
They had been talking about the time that they were eight and their neighbour's dog had chased them down the street when they had gotten too close to the house. They laughed at the memory and then sat in silence as Sarah lit up yet another cigarette.
"Do you ever wish you could go back?" Jane asked out of the blue.
"Go back?" Sarah asked, not quite sure what she meant.
"To that summer when we were seven. When you had just moved here? And your parents were still in love and my mum hadn't gotten that bad yet," Jane elaborated.
Sarah got kind of quiet, sucking on her cigarette.
"We were all happy back then, weren't we?" Sarah finally said, nostalgia creeping into her voice.
"And look at us now," Jane said bitterly, "at what the world did to us. Your dad left, your mum married a guy that you can't stand. My mum's dead, and my dad doesn't say anything anymore. And you and I both grew up wishing things were different, wishing that they'd get better."
Sarah flicked away the ashes from her cigarette.
"Remember we used to come up here or up on your roof, and we'd talk about how we wished we could fly so we could fly far away," Sarah said, smiling a bittersweet smile. "The roof seems a lot smaller now, doesn't it?"
"It does," Jane noted.
Jane looked down at her hands, and another pang of guilt washed over her.
"No matter how hard I try, I can't seem to get over it," Jane said, and Sarah instantly knew that she was talking about her mother.
"How did you get over it when your dad left?" Jane asked, desperate for some advice.
"Jane, that—my dad left, he didn't—that's different," Sarah said.
Jane shook her head.
"No, it's not. Not really. Your dad left you. My mum left me too; she just did it in a different way," she said quietly.
They remained silent for a while before Sarah finally said:
"I talked to you."
Jane furrowed her brow and looked up at Sarah, confused.
"You asked me how I got over it," Sarah explained. "It was by talking to you."
Jane let out a little laugh, wiping at her eyes before any tears could fall. She looked at Sarah and smiled a bit.
"You're a good friend. Always have been," Jane said.
Sarah smiled and went back to smoking. Jane watched her as she blew the smoke out in little rings.
"Mind if I have another go?" Jane asked, pointing to the cigarette box beside Sarah.
Sarah smiled and tossed Jane the lighter.