A/N: So, I know it's been almost a year since I wrote the first chapter, but in my defense, I did finish writing the last three chapters (which I loved writing! Jack and Sandy are so funny. I can only imagine Jack as one of those naughty kids who will do anything to stay awake so as not to miss out on all the fun).
Basically, what happened is that I wrote the end so I wouldn't have to write the middle (isn't procrastination great?). Then I lost my steam…but I'm back now and have all but three chapters left to write and edit. So, hopefully all will go as planned. Anyway, thanks for the reviews and sorry for the long wait! We should just call this the Long Winter's Update.
Lol.
Have a nice day!
Two
No less than an hour later, Jamie sneaks out of the house through the bathroom window. He should be showering, like Mom said, but grown-ups can't see spirits. If Mrs. Bennett could see Jack and believed that he was more than just an "expression," Jamie's sure she would have excused him from the dinner table much sooner. (She also told Jamie to feed the dog before his shower, which he did. Kind of. Hopefully, Abby doesn't mind baby cabbages and polka dot casserole).
Silently thanking the Man in the Moon for his advice, Jamie clambers out of the bathroom. On his way out, he scratches his tummy on the sill by accident, and then lands with a soft plop in the snow. "Owie," he mutters. He pulls up his jacket, wincing at the scrap on his belly, and rubs it sorely before shivering at the winter cold on his bare skin.
Pulling on his coat again, Jamie reaches into his pocket to check his cell phone— a Nokia flip phone, of course. Jamie's dad flat out refuses to buy a ten year old a smart phone, so for now, it's the Stone Age for Jamie. Maybe Santa can help with that this year, if he's super good. Flipping open the phone, Jaime sighs when he sees the screen.
Great, no replies.
He'll just have to hope that Pippa got his text message and meets him at the lake. All of his other friends are busy. Except for Cupcake, but her mom is super protective and never lets her play outside after dark. Not even on the first snowfall of the year. Claude and Clyde, on the other hand, are having dinner and a movie with their grandparents. Monty's out of town for the holidays. This leaves Pippa as his last hope.
Jamie tugs on his coat nervously, flashlight in one hand, cellphone in the other while his fingers crisscross together. He had knocked on Pippa's door right before coming to dinner, but according to her dad, she took her bike down downtown to return some library books. He fidgets some more because, well, on top of Jack's situation, Jamie's just a little more edgy than usual because he kindofsortofmaybe…likes Pippa.
Like, likes her, likes her.
Pippa's smart and pretty, and in the same reading level at school (two grades ahead of their class). Even though Pippa denies it within an inch of her life, Jamie once caught her snooping through his books on ghost hunting. And it just thrills him to no end that the girl he's liked since kindergarten believes—or at least wants to believe—in things like ghosts, ectoplasm, and orbs. So no matter how much they bicker, no matter much she nags him to stop reading The Enquirer and start working on their science fair project…Jamie can't help but like Pippa.
He waits by the trail for ten, then fifteen minutes. His heart skips a beat when the light of another flashlight slashes through the darkness like a long rapier.
"This had better be a big emergency, Jamie Bennett," Pippa tells him, climbing carefully over a fallen log buried in snow. Jamie offers her a gloved hand as she slides down. "My dad thinks I'm at the library."
"I told you," Jamie says, "It's Jack. There's something wrong with him."
Pippa gives him a flat look. "The only thing that's wrong with Jack Frost is that he always gets you into trouble."
Jamie rolls his eyes. "That's not true."
"It is so! Like that time you got hit by a couch or that other time Jack hit Principal Hatchet with a snowball." She points to the space between her eyes and cries, "In the face!"
"So?"
"So, Jack's magic doesn't work on everyone. Not even he can make our principal smile, and he's the Guardian of Fun!" She folds her arms, wearing that same don't-argue-with-me look that Mrs. Bennett sometimes gives Mr. Bennett. "You got detention for a week."
"Jack's our friend," Jamie says firmly. "He's in trouble. He needs our help."
The conversation lapses into a brief silence. "I'm not saying that we shouldn't be worried about him," Pippa says after a moment. "I'm just saying that whenever you two get together, it's always trouble. Do you know how long I was grounded for sneaking out the last time?"
Weeks, Jamie remembers with a cringe. Last Easter, they had helped the Guardians battle an unmentionable evil. After the Guardians left, that the police found Jamie and his friends walking home in the dead of night, telling wild stories about a showdown between the forces of good and evil. They'd all stuck to the truth about their adventures with the Guardians—Santa must be very proud of them—but their parents were less than pleased about the 2 AM trip to the police station.
"I got grounded, too," Jamie says. "But Jack is way more important than watching TV and playing video games."
"I know, I know. It's just…" She looks around nervously, biting her lower lip. She glances around at the surrounding darkness. "It's dark and kind of creepy out here. What were you two doing, anyway?"
They make their way over snow-covered rocks, twigs and roots. Darkness gathers all around, thick as syrup Jamie tells Pippa everything about the ice sculpture, about Jack's ambitions to create an assistant to help spread the frosts. "I think he used too much of his magic or something," Jamie explained, gravely. "There was this flash of blue light, and then he just…fell."
Pippa's frown deepens. "Really?"
"He just laid there and wouldn't wake up. I didn't want to leave, but I had to take Sophie home and mom made me clear my plate before leaving the dinner table." He scowled, the stench of bitter baby cabbages still lingering in his nose. "Jack might be okay now," Jamie adds. "I hope, but if he's not then I really need your help."
"Wait a minute," Pippa says, stopping dead in her tracks, and props a hand on her hip. "You just left him?"
"I told you, I didn't want to, but I had Sophie with me and once Mom saw me walk through the door, she didn't stop telling me what to do!"
Pippa shakes her head and says, directing her disgust to a new target, "Parents. They just don't know when to quit."
To this Jamie adds a sigh of his own, relieved that he's not the only kid on the block with bossy parent problems. "Yeah, you said it."
At last, they arrive at the lake. Luckily, it's stopped snowing—for now at least—allowing them to see clearly. Just as Jamie feared, Jack is right where he left him. Jamie can see him lying in the dark, besides the ice sculpture, which although unmoving and lifeless, seems to glow with a soft blue light. Pippa's mouth drops open.
"Wow, that's amazing! I mean, it's…it's perfect!"
"I know, right?" Jamie says, beaming with pride. "It looks like it's going to play a prank on somebody. C'mon, you have to see."
Up close, Pippa is instantly mesmerized by the amount of tenuous detail Jack put into the sculpture, from the hair on its beard to the hundreds of smooth, teeny-tiny scales. Jamie's favorite parts are the dragon's tall twisty horns, its white mane and sneaky expression; it's icicle fangs are bared in a sly, playful smirk. It's eyes squint with mirth.
"It kind of looks like Jack, " Pippa says in awe. "But in more of a…I don't know, a dragon sort of way," Pippa says, tilting her head to the side. She glances at Jack, who hasn't moved an inch at all since he collapsed, then kneels and gently shakes his shoulder. "You did a really good job. Wake up."
Kneeling, Pippa gently shakes Jack's shoulder, frowning, and decides that she likes Jack best when he's awake. Always moving, fidgeting, laughing. Pippa has always thought of Jack as a teasing big brother who, if human, would probably never be able to pick you up after school on time because of too many detentions. Jamie thinks of their friend in the same way, as do the other kids, which is why they have to take very good care of him.
Jack doesn't have his own family.
He's never outright admitted this and when they ask, he usually fibs and says that Guardians are his family (which more or less is true). Sometimes his tone gets dry and sarcastic and he starts tall tales telling about how he's the great, great, great grandson of Old Man Winter. The children of Burgess are young, yes, but they aren't stupid.
"What's wrong with him?" Pippa asks. "He's so still. Do you think he'll wake up soon?"
Jamie picks up the staff, looking sorry as his fingers trace over the frozen wood. "I don't know," he admits. "I didn't even know spirits could sleep without the Sandman's help."
After talking for a few minutes, the children decide that right now the best thing to do is to get Jack off the lake. It's way too dangerous to leave him there with that big hole in the middle of the lake—they just can't keep walking out there in the dark. Plus, there's something strange about Jack's ice sculpture. He feels as although the statue is watching their every move, listening to their every word. It doesn't move. Its glowing eyes stare, unblinking. Nor does it breathe. But somehow, the sculpture feels…sentient.
"I'll take the arm on the left; you take the arm on the right?" Jamie suggests.
Pippa shrugs. "Okay."
Together, they carefully—and slowly, ever so slowly—drag Jack across the ice. His head hangs forward on his shoulders, rolling limply from side to side, chin pressed against his chest. It's a long, arduous journey mostly because the ice is so slick and (to be honest) for a guy as skinny as Jack, who soars with the wind with such an impressive ease, he sure weighs a million some miracle, they manage to get to the banks without falling down. They lay Jack down in a bed of snow and then collapse themselves.
"Somebody needs to quit snitching Santa's cookies," Jamie mumbles to the sky. Hearing Pippa snicker, Jamie smiles. Once Jack wakes up, Jamie is so going to make sure that he never lives this down. Which is why Jaime can't ever tell Jack how he feels towards Pippa; the teasing banter passed between the two of them is a big-bro-little-bro sort of thing. Almost like a game. It never ends and leverage is everything.
While they rest, Jamie stares across the lake. The more he watches the sculpture, with its eerie blue glow, the deeper his disappointment descends. Jack put everything he had into that thing. Why hadn't it come to life like it was supposed to? If it had, Jamie could have asked it for help carrying Jack home.
Pulling her knees to her chest, Pippa asks, "So where do we take him now?"
"The shed," Jamie replies automatically.
"The clubhouse?"
"Duh, it's close and I won't have to worry about my parents stepping on him when they walks across the bedroom floor."
The shade—or clubhouse, as Jamie's friends call it—is as good a for Jack to rest place as any. Jaime's dad bought the shed at Costco as a temporary storage place for his tools until he finished remodeling the garage. Now that the garage is finished, the Bennett family has managed to turn the empty shed into the coolest play are ever. For Jamie's last birthday, his parents even had an electrician come out and wire the little building with some overhead lighting and a couple electrical outlets, as well a small furnace to keep the kids warm in the winter.
Once they make it to Jamie's house, the children work together to clear out the back corner.
The clubhouse itself is actually a lot bigger than it looks on the outside. Its walls are solid cedar, evident in their woody scent. A wrap-around workbench where Jamie keeps his TV, Xbox, and favorite Lego creations (the ones that he's too proud of to take apart). An ordinary ceiling light supplies most of the lighting, as well as the tranquil red glow of Grandpa's favorite lava lamp from the 70's (a family heirloom to match Sophie's mood ring from Grandma, but that's a story for another day). Underneath the bench, sits a box of Sophie's favorite toys as well as a huge pile of pillows, sleeping bags, and fleecy blankets.
Jamie has spent many, many Saturday nights camping out in the clubhouse with just a flashlight, a book, or maybe his favorite video game. His friends used to sleep over all the time, but lately their parents say that Jamie's…well, Jamie doesn't like to think about what their parents say about him.
Anyway, most of the time, Jamie just likes camping by himself. He likes making forts out of blankets and sheets, eating popcorn for dinner in front of his favorite Godzilla film and falling asleep pondering the universe's biggest questions. Imperative questions concerning the existence of alien life forms on distant planets, and just how many chocolate eggs could a six-foot tall Easter bunny eat without getting sick?
They leave Jack, slouched and silent, in one of the beanbag chairs while they make up a bed. Jamie smoothens out the blankies, patting them down into a comfy, thick layer while Pippa fluffs up the pillows. By the time they have a bed ready, Jack's beanbag is nearly half frozen and the rug beneath his bare feet has crystalized under a light layer of frost.
A good sign, Jamie decides.
And so they tuck Jack in, carefully covering him with a thin bed sheet so as to keep him cool, yet comfortable. Jamie makes sure to cover up his slightly bluish toes while Pippa pushes the corners in around his thin, boney shoulders.
Any adult might have quirked a smile or cooed endearingly at such a sight, but Jamie and Pippa are kids. For them, bedtime is still a very serious matter. This is how their parents put them to sleep when they're sick or tired, with a pile of favorite stuffed animals gathered nearby to stand vigil against things that go bump in the night. As children, they still believe that this is how everybody goes to bed.
"Good night, Jack," Pippa says, giving the spirit a gentle pat on the shoulder. "Don't let the carpenter ants bite."
Jamie rolls his eyes and laughs humorlessly at the memory of last summer when Monty accidentally kicked his soccer ball under the shed. Of course, Jamie, fearless explorer and future cryptozoologist, was the one who had to crawl down there and get it, only to end up with half a colony of carpenter ants down his underwear.
"Ha, ha," he says, blushing, "very funny."
Pippa gives him a smile. "I'll call the others and tell them what's going on. Maybe they'll have some ideas on how to help."
"Thanks."
Pippa doesn't stay much longer after that, afraid that her dad will find out that she's been running around town after dark with a boy. In fact, after the incident last Easter involving the police, she's not really supposed to be hanging out with Jamie too much. The ring leader, the other parents call him, that odd little boy with an obsession for the unexplained. This hurts Jamie, on the inside where nobody can see. Already, Jamie knows that he's going to have a very hard time fitting in when he gets to middle school. But at least his friends are loyal. They love him, for now, and even if they do outgrow him, as friends sometimes do in books and movies, he'll always have Jack.
7
