5. Jess
Jess was back in the car a few days later, adjusting mirrors that didn’t really need adjusting and waiting for Glory to join her for their road trip down the east coast.
She was still kind of in disbelief that they were really doing this. But after talking to Liberty, and then to Glory, she had run out of reasons not to.
So, they had spent the last few days packing up everything they would need for a summer in the Keys. For Jess, that meant a big suitcase and a small backpack. And for Glory, it meant filling the rest of the car plus running back in for whatever she was grabbing now.
Nikki and Marta had agreed to take turns checking on the house, and Jess had called her long-suffering real estate agent to let her know they wouldn’t be taking the apartment after all, but that she could go ahead with the touch-ups she had scheduled for the house since it was going to be going on the market, as planned, as soon as it was ready.
To her credit, the agent had assured her they would find her something when the time came, and that she ought to enjoy herself, because life was too short. It was good advice. And it was true. So what if her husband had left her? It’s not like anyone was dying. Maybe it was time to start actually living a little.
For the first time in a long time, Jess found herself excited about something.
“Hey,” Glory yelled, coming out of the house in a straw cowgirl hat that she had convinced Jess was great for the beach one day at the King of Prussia Mall. “I brought yours, too.”
She waved the smaller pale straw hat with the white ribbon around the brim and Jess couldn’t repress her smile in return.
Glory had insisted she looked retro chic in it.
Jess imagined maybe it reminded Glory of what a mom on one of the ‘80s throwback shows Glory loved would wear.
But for once, Jess had to agree that it suited her.
“Thanks for remembering,” she said, as Glory slid into the passenger seat.
“Are you grateful enough to give me my phone back?” Glory asked hopefully.
“It’s not a punishment,” Jess told her for the tenth time. “And no. We’re both taking a break. I’m in it to win it with you.”
“You were on the phone with literally everyone last night,” Glory sighed dramatically.
“I called everyone—no text messages,” Jess told her. “Because I needed to make plans. And when I was done, the phone went back on the charger—no scrolling, no checking.”
Glory made a noise that might have been reluctant agreement. She was still sounding a little grumpy, but not rolling her eyes or talking back.
“I’m just not sure how you expect me to get through an entire day on the road without my phone. And please don’t say road trip bingo.”
Jess wondered what Glory would think when she realized she was going to have to go three days on the road without her phone. Last time they visited the Keys, they had flown. But driving was cheaper, and it meant they wouldn’t have to rent a car when they got there.
“Well,” Jess said. “I brought you a little surprise. It’s in the glove compartment.”
She pulled out of the driveway while Glory stared at her.
“Seriously?” Glory asked.
Jess hadn’t been too keen on buying anything but necessities lately.
“It’s not new,” Jess told her, turning left into the neighborhood to head toward the highway. “Just new to you. And it used to be my most prized possession, so don’t hurt my feelings.”
“Whoa,” Glory said, pulling the bag out of the glove compartment and looking at the contents. “It’s a… really old phone?”
“Not even,” Jess told her. “It’s an iPod, the very first one they made.”
“It’s got a screen,” Glory said hopefully, pulling it out.
“Don’t get excited,” Jess laughed. “It won’t go online. It’s just for listening to music.”
“And games,” Glory said.
“Uh, no,” Jess told her. “Just music.”
“How do you even get music on it if it doesn’t go online?” Glory asked.
“You use a cord to plug it into your computer and a folder pops up,” Jess remembered. “I think you just drag your music onto it. It holds like a thousand songs.”
“What songs?” Glory asked shrewdly.
“I guess you’ll have to find out,” Jess told her. “There’s a pair of headphones in there, too. Those are new.”
“I’ll just use mine,” Glory said, reaching for her pocket.
“Nope,” Jess told her. “You need wired ones.”
“Is it also a time machine?” Glory joked.
But when Jess glanced over, she saw Glory was smiling down at the little device as she scrolled through song titles.
“You got this when you were my age?” she asked after a minute.
“I was Liberty’s age by the time I got the iPod,” Jess said, laughing. “I don’t think you’d be interested in the Walkman I had at your age. And besides, mine was a knock-off and it ate tapes and batteries like crazy.”
“Being poor sucks,” Glory said, nodding wisely.
Jess decided not to point out that she’d had good food to eat and a roof over her head, or that plenty of things were a lot worse than not being upper middle class, or even that all teenagers were poor personally, and the kids from families of means only got cool stuff when their parents decided to buy it for them.
She would learn all that on her own.
Glory turned back to the music, unpacking the cheap earbuds Jess had picked up, and sticking them in her ears.
The rainy weather from earlier in the week had mostly stopped, but the clouds were still hanging around. The sun was playing hide and seek, and the breeze was cool enough to keep the windows rolled down.
Before long, they reached the highway. There was no traffic to speak of—just smooth sailing. Jess let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding, pressed down on the gas, and let the road carry them closer to her childhood home.
* * *
A few hours later,they stopped outside of Baltimore for gas and drinks. Jess figured they’d better have a pit stop before they hit the DC traffic.
While Glory grabbed an impressive armload of snacks, Jess gazed at the racks of impulse purchases by the counter. This was the kind of stuff the girls had always begged for when they were little—coins for the bubble gum machine, shrink-wrapped plastic baby dolls, sets of jacks.
On instinct, Jess gave the cable display a whirl.
“Help you with something?” the grandfatherly man behind the counter asked.
“I was just wondering if there’s a wire that would hook an ancient iPod to a slightly less ancient car stereo,” she said, with a smile. “It’s probably hopeless.”
“Does your stereo have a CD player?” the man asked.
“Sure does,” she told him.
“Then it’s probably got an auxiliary jack,” he said, grabbing a cable in a plastic packet from the display. “Plug this into the headphone jack of the iPod, and the other end into the one marked aux on the stereo.”
“We can plug that thing in?” Glory asked, depositing an alarming amount of junk food on the counter. “Righteous.”
Jess smiled and decided not to argue about the snacks.
It was nice to see Glory interested in eating. She had always been the one of her girls who most loved a treat, but in middle school, she’d gotten a little obsessed with fighting off the soft tummy she had inherited from her dad. Even now that she was wildly popular, Jess could sense her insecurity at times, though she was a perfectly healthy young woman.
On Driftwood Key, we let it all hang out, she remembered her mom saying.
Jess’s mom had always been slender, as far as Jess could remember. But letting it all hang out referred to much more than just throwing on a bathing suit and a battered pair of flip-flops without worrying what you looked like. The people in the Keys were a healthy mix of longtime residents, eclectic newcomers drawn by the quirky, casual vibe, and for part of the year, tourists eager to try new things and soak in the unique atmosphere. Even a sleepy little spot like Driftwood Key had its share of artists and musicians, and carried that same air of freedom and possibility.
Maybe Glory would let it all hang out too, and get back to the happy-go-lucky core of the confident childhood self that Jess remembered so fondly.
We’ll definitely have fun trying,Jess told herself, handing over a princely sum for their overpriced snacks and a tank of gas.
“There’s a song on here that I actually know,” Glory told her excitedly, as they headed back to the car.
“Oh yeah?” Jess asked.
“I’ll play it for you,” Glory told her. “If this thing actually works.”
Jess smiled and they piled into the car. Glory was opening the plastic on the cable with her teeth before they got out of the parking lot. A few minutes later, they were back on the highway and Glory was scrolling through songs.
“How did you ever find anything back then?” she muttered darkly. “Ah, there it is.”
A moment later the familiar opening to “I’m Just a Girl” by No Doubt was blasting from the speakers.
“Oh, this one’s a classic,” Jess said, smiling and singing along.
“Those lyrics are kind of subversive, Mom,” Glory said, smiling in disbelief.
“Of course they are,” Jess laughed. “But they’re mostly just sarcastic. We weren’t quite ready to topple the patriarchy back in the 90s.”
“Yeah, you guys left that to us,” Glory said, rolling her eyes.
“We were latchkey kids,” Jess told her, solemnly. “Our moms all worked, so we were just focused on survival.”
“Did your grandparents really disown your mom for having you?” Glory asked suddenly.
“They were very old-fashioned, and they didn’t like the idea of having a single mother in the family,” Jess said carefully, wondering why Glory was suddenly interested in the subject. “My mom never gave up hope that they would change their minds.”
“But they never did,” Glory guessed.
“Not even when she was dying,” Jess said, shaking her head. “Uncle Brian didn’t keep in touch with them after that. I think he was surprised to inherit the house. But they had no one else to leave it to.”
“We’ve got to get their snobby mojo out of there,” Glory said firmly.
“How?” Jess asked her, frankly stunned.
“I follow this girl on BeeBop who says you’re supposed to use sage,” Glory replied, shrugging.
“Wow,” Jess said.
“I could look into it more,” Glory suggested. “If I had my phone.”
“Sorry,” Jess told her. “Not yet.”
“So, you don’t know who your dad is,” Glory continued.
“Nope,” Jess replied. “But Uncle Brian was the best dad-type-person I could have ever wished for.”
He had raised her like a nun in that little apartment of his, watching over her as if his sister were looking over his shoulder every minute to make sure he was doing a good job.
And the theater he ran always made her feel like she was part of a big family, even though it had really just been the two of them. Jess had been fussed over and adored by all the actors, who snuck her treats and delighted in trying to teach her the songs and dances in the shows. The costume designer had even made her a bespoke prom dress with gorgeous leftover fabric from a production of The Pirates of Penzance, and the lighting technician ended up teaching her how to drive when Uncle Brian almost had a panic attack after her first lesson.
Though there had been tragedy in her childhood, Uncle Brian had ensured that it wrapped up safely and happily. Losing him two years ago had been quite a blow. Jess had never wished for his advice more than she had in the past few months.
“He was super cool,” Glory agreed with a genuine smile. She had always been tickled that Great-uncle Brian knew all the Broadway musicals and TV shows she followed online.
“And I had my mom before that, of course,” Jess said. “And this amazing foster family in between. I’ve told you about them.”
She hadn’t really dared to let herself wonder if she might see any of her former foster family, or if they were even still in Driftwood Key all these years later.
“It’s sad that you were a foster kid,” Glory said, as if the thought had never occurred to her before.
“I don’t think so,” Jess told her. “It was nice to stay in Driftwood Key for a while after mom passed. And they were really wonderful. I kind of wish I’d stayed in touch.”
Glory nodded and scrolled through the iPod again, apparently satisfied that things had turned out all right for her mom.
“Oh, I know this one too,” she said, tapping.
“That’s ‘Linger,’” Jess said. “By The Cranberries. That was another big one. I saw them in person at The Troc in Philly.”
“That place is closed,” Glory sniffed.
“It wasn’t back then,” Jess told her.
“Well, this song is trending, Mom,” Glory told her. “So, you know, be happy. You were cool once.”
“I am happy,” Jess decided. “I love road trips. Hey, remember when your Dad and I took you guys down to Baltimore to stay at the Inner Harbor?”
“I don’t want to talk about Dad,” Glory said, her voice going cold.
“I’m sorry,” Jess said automatically, glancing over.
But Glory was staring out the window with her arms crossed.
Jess was used to a little whiplash when dealing with Glory. She was the quintessential moody teen. But they had been having a real conversation just now, and Jess had been feeling hopeful that they would be deepening their relationship on their new adventure this summer.
Maybe this bullying had to do with her father…
A thousand questions rose to her mind at once. But Jess buttoned her lips and drove on, willing herself to stay quiet.
Maybe with the car moving, the music playing softly, and Jess’s eyes on the road, Glory would feel less vulnerable, and decide to share what was making her heart ache so much that she lashed out at her friends at school.
But Glory stayed silent for a long time.
“I do remember that trip,” she said at last, unlinking her arms and turning to her mom. “Liberty told me knock-knock jokes the whole way. And Anthem got a harmonica at the rest stop.”
“That harmonica,” Jess laughed.
Silas was almost always patient with the girls, but she remembered him losing his cool when Anthem woke them all at dawn the next day, playing the harmonica on the balcony of the hotel suite.
“I loved taking you guys to the aquarium,” she told Glory. “You were so interested in the rainforest exhibit.”
“The birds were just flying free, all around us,” Glory remembered.
“You thought you could talk one into landing on your head,” Jess said. “You didn’t want to leave.”
“Hey, if we’d stayed a little longer, maybe I could have,” Glory said. But she was smiling.
They drove on, and Jess found herself relaxing more and feeling better and better about this adventure.