Bridge to Terabithia

Cremated. Something clicked inside Jess’s head. That meant Leslie was gone. Turned to ashes. He would never see her again. Not even dead. Never. How could they dare? Leslie belonged to him. More to him than anyone in the world. No one had even asked him. No one had even told him. And now he was never going to see her again, and all they could do was cry. Not for Leslie. They weren’t crying for Leslie. They were crying for themselves. Just themselves. If they’d cared at all for Leslie, they would have never brought her to this rotten place. He had to hold tightly to his hands for fear he might sock Bill in the face.

He, Jess, was the only one who really cared for Leslie. But Leslie had failed him. She went and died just when he needed her the most. She went and left him. She went swinging on that rope just to show him that she was no coward. So there, Jess Aarons. She was probably somewhere right now laughing at him. Making fun of him like he was Mrs. Myers. She had tricked him. She had made him leave his old self behind and come into her world, and then before he was really at home in it but too late to go back, she had left him stranded there—like an astronaut wandering about on the moon. Alone.

He was never sure later just when he left the old Perkins place, but he remembered running up the hill toward his own house with angry tears streaming down his face. He banged through the door. May Belle was standing there, her brown eyes wide. “Did you see her?” she asked excitedly. “Did you see her laid out?”

He hit her. In the face. As hard as he had ever hit anything in his life. She stumbled backward from him with a little yelp. He went into the bedroom and felt under the mattress until he retrieved all his paper and the paints that Leslie had given him at Christmastime.

Ellie was standing in the bedroom door fussing at him. He pushed past her. From the couch Brenda, too, was complaining, but the only sound that really entered his head was that of May Belle whimpering.

He ran out the kitchen door and down the field all the way to the stream without looking back. The stream was a little lower than it had been when he had seen it last. Above from the crab apple tree the frayed end of the rope swung gently. I am now the fastest runner in the fifth grade.

He screamed something without words and flung the papers and paints into the dirty brown water. The paints floated on top, riding the current like a boat, but the papers swirled about, soaking in the muddy water, being sucked down, around, and down. He watched them all disappear. Gradually his breath quieted, and his heart slowed from its wild pace. The ground was still muddy from the rains, but he sat down anyway. There was nowhere to go. Nowhere. Ever again. He put his head down on his knee.

“That was a damn fool thing to do.” His father sat down on the dirt beside him.

“I don’t care. I don’t care.” He was crying now, crying so hard he could barely breathe.

His father pulled Jess over on his lap as though he were Joyce Ann. “There. There,” he said, patting his head. “Shhh. Shhh.”

“I hate her,” Jess said through his sobs. “I hate her. I wish I’d never seen her in my whole life.”

His father stroked his hair without speaking. Jess grew quiet. They both watched the water.

Finally his father said, “Hell, ain’t it?” It was the kind of thing Jess could hear his father saying to another man. He found it strangely comforting, and it made him bold.

“Do you believe people go to hell, really go to hell, I mean?”

“You ain’t worrying about Leslie Burke?”

It did seem peculiar, but still—“Well, May Belle said…”

“May Belle? May Belle ain’t God.”

“Yeah, but how do you know what God does?”

“Lord, boy, don’t be a fool. God ain’t gonna send any little girls to hell.”

He had never in his life thought of Leslie Burke as a little girl, but still God was sure to. She wouldn’t have been eleven until November. They got up and began to walk up the hill. “I didn’t mean that about hating her,” he said. “I don’t know what made me say that.” His father nodded to show he understood.

Everyone, even Brenda, was gentle to him. Everyone except May Belle, who hung back as though afraid to have anything to do with him. He wanted to tell her he was sorry, but he couldn’t. He was too tired. He couldn’t just say the words. He had to make it up to her, and he was too tired to figure out how.

That afternoon Bill came up to the house. They were about to leave for Pennsylvania, and he wondered if Jess would take care of the dog until they got back.

“Sure.” He was glad Bill wanted him to help. He was afraid he had hurt Bill by running away this morning. He wanted, too, to know that Bill didn’t blame him for anything. But it was not the kind of question he could put into words.

He held P.T. and waved as the dusty little Italian car turned into the main road. He thought he saw them wave back, but it was too far away to be sure.