The Lemonade War (4 page)

That didn't seem right.

Jessie would know. She'd do that math in a second.

Evan capped the pen and jammed it into his pocket. "But I bet it's a lot," said Evan. "I bet on a hot day like this, we could actually make some real money in the lemonade business."

"Yeah," said Scott. "Then we'd be rich. And I'd get an Xbox. The new one. With the dual controls."

"I'd get an iPod," said Evan. He'd been saving for one for over a year. But every time he had some money put away, well, it just disappeared. Like the ten dollars from Grandma. She'd even written in her card, "Here's a little something to help you get that music thing you want." But the money was gone. He'd treated Paul and Ryan to slices of pizza at Town House. It had been fun.

"That would be so great, to listen to music
whenever I want," said Evan.
I could tune you out,
he added in his own head.

They sat in silence, feeling the heat suck away every bit of their energy. Evan was hatching a plan. The heat wave was supposed to last at least five days. If he and a friend (
not Scott
) set up a lemonade stand every day for five days, he'd definitely have enough to buy an iPod. He imagined himself wearing it as he walked to school. Wearing it on the playground.
Hey, Megan. Yeah, it's my iPod. Sweet, huh?
Wearing it in class when the teacher droned on about fractions and percents.
Nah.
But it would be so cool. At least there would be one thing,
one thing,
that didn't totally stink about going back to school.

After two hours they decided to call it quits. Sales had dropped off—fast—and then stopped altogether.

"Hey, did you notice something?" asked Evan, stacking the chairs.

"What?" said Scott.

"When we started the stand, most of our business came from that direction." He pointed down the street toward the curve in the road. "But after an hour, not one person who walked past us from that
direction bought a cup. Not one. They all said, 'No, thanks,' and kept on walking. Why do you think?"

"Dunno," said Scott.

"Boy, you're a real go-getter," said Evan. "You know that?"

Scott socked him in the chest, but Evan defended and knocked Scott's cap off. While Scott was scrambling for his hat, Evan said, "Just hang here for a minute, okay?" and set off down the street. As soon as he rounded the curve, he knew why business had fallen off so badly.

There was Jessie. And
Megan Moriarty
from his class. They were standing inside a wooden booth, and their sign said it all.

By the looks of it, their business was booming.

Evan watched as Jessie accepted a fistful of dollar bills from a mother surrounded by kids. At that moment, Jessie looked up and saw him. Evan had a weird feeling, like he'd been caught cheating on a test. He wanted to run and hide somewhere. Instead, he froze. What would Jessie do?

Evan couldn't believe it: She sneered at him. She cocked her head to the side and gave him this little I'm-so-much-better-than-you smile. And then—and
then
—she waved the money in her hand at him. She
waved
it! As if to say, "Look how much
we've
made selling lemonade! Bet you can't beat that!"

Evan turned on his heel and walked away. Behind him, he could hear Megan Moriarty laughing at him, clear as a bell.

partnership
(
) n. Two or more people pooling their money, skills, and resources to run a business, agreeing to share the profits and losses of that business.

Jessie had been waiting for this moment—the moment when Evan would see their lemonade stand, see the wonderful decorations they had made, see the crowds of people waiting in line, see
Megan Moriarty
standing by her side. He would see it all and be so impressed. He would think to himself,
Wow, Jessie is one cool kid. She sure knows how to run a lemonade stand right!
And then he'd jog over and say, "Hey, can I help out?" And Jessie would say, "Sure!
We were hoping you'd come over."

And it would be like old times.

Why hadn't it worked out like that?

With one part of her brain, Jessie continued to take money from customers and make change. That was the part of her brain that worked just fine. With the other part of her brain, Jessie went over what had happened with Evan. That was the part of her brain that tended to run in circles.

She and Megan were selling lemonade. Business had been good. Then Mrs. Pawley, a neighborhood mom, walked up. She had had a bunch of kids in her backyard running through the sprinkler, and now they wanted twelve cups of lemonade. Twelve! It was the biggest sale of the day. Megan got cracking pouring the lemonade and Jessie took the six singles that Mrs. Pawley handed her. All the kids from Mrs. Pawley's backyard were chanting, "Lemon-ADE! Lemon-ADE! Lemon-ADE!"

A fly buzzed by Jessie's ear—they'd been having a problem with flies because of the sticky lemonade spills on their stand—and she cocked her head to
one side to shoo it since her hands were busy with the money. And that's when Jessie looked up and saw Evan standing there, staring.

So she smiled.

But he didn't smile back.

So she waved, even though she had all that money in both hands. She waved so he'd know that she was happy to see him.

And then he stalked off, all stiff-legged and bristly. And she never got to say, "Sure! We were hoping you'd come over," like she'd rehearsed in her head.

And just then, Tommy Pawley, who was two years old, pulled down his bathing suit and peed right on the lawn. And Megan laughed so loud, Jessie was sure you could hear it all over the neighborhood.

That's what had happened. That's exactly what had happened. But Jessie knew that something else entirely had happened. And she didn't get it. The way she didn't get a lot of things about people.

All she knew was that the sight of Evan walking
away—walking away from her for the second time that day—made her feel so sad and alone that she just wanted to run home to her room and curl up on her bed with
Charlotte's Web.

"Hey, Madam Cash Register," said Megan, nudging her. "You're falling behind. Ring three for this lady and one for this kid here."

Jessie turned away from the retreating figure of Evan. "That's a dollar fifty," she said to the woman standing in front of her. She took the five-dollar bill the woman was holding out and made change from her lock box, focusing all her energy on the part of her brain that worked just fine.

It's true that when Evan had first walked out of the garage, Jessie had banged up to her room and tried to think of every way possible that she could make his life a living misery.

She'd thought of telling Mom that Evan was the one who broke the toaster (by playing hockey in the house, which is not allowed). She'd thought of taking back every one of her CDs from his room
(even though she knew that would mean she'd have to give back all of
his
CDs). She'd even thought of putting peanut butter in his shoes. (This was something she'd read in a book, and she loved to imagine that moment of horror when he'd think he'd somehow gotten dog doo
inside
his shoes.)

But when these ideas had finished bouncing around her brain, and when her breathing had returned to normal and her fists weren't clenched at her sides anymore, she knew that what she really wanted was to get the old Evan back. The one who was so much fun to be around. The one who helped her out of every jam.

Like when she ate all the Lorna Doones that Mom had set aside for the Girl Scout meeting. And Evan had ridden his bike to the 7-Eleven and bought a new package before Mom even noticed. Or when she accidentally—well, not accidentally, but how was she supposed to know?—picked the red flowers in Grandma's garden that were a hybrid experiment. Evan had said they'd both done it so that Grandma's disappointment was spread around.
Or the time that Jessie had smashed the ceramic heart that Daddy had given her because she was so mad that he had left them. And then, when she had cried about her broken heart, Evan had glued every single last piece back together again.

She wanted back the Evan who was her best friend.

But Evan didn't want
her,
because he thought she was a baby and she was going to embarrass him in Mrs. Overton's class. So she had to prove to him that she was a big kid. That she could keep up with the crowd. That she could fit in—even with his fourth-grade class.

I'll show him I can sell lemonade, too. Just as good as him and Scott. I
won't
embarrass him.
So Jessie got down to business.

She knew she needed a partner. From past experience, she'd learned that having a lemonade stand alone wasn't considered cool—it was considered pathetic. And her partner would have to be a fourth-grade girl, because that's what this was all about—showing she could fit in with the fourth-
graders. So the question was
who?

It had to be a girl who lived in the neighborhood, or at least close enough to bike to her house. And it had to be someone that Jessie had talked to at least once. No way could she call up a girl she'd never even talked to. And it had to be someone who seemed nice.

This last part was a problem, because Jessie knew that she often thought people were nice and then they turned out to be not nice. Case in point: those second-grade girls. So Jessie decided it had to be someone who
Evan
thought was nice. Evan knew about these things. He was the one who had explained, with his big arm around her shoulder, "Jessie, those girls are making fun of you. They are
not
nice."

When Jessie thought about all these different requirements, there was only one obvious answer: Megan Moriarty. She lived less than three blocks down the street. Jessie had said hi to her a few times while biking in the neighborhood. And Evan must have thought she was nice because Jessie had found
a piece of paper in his trash can with Megan's name written all over it. Why would he cover a page with her name if he didn't think she was a nice person?

Jessie went to the kitchen and climbed onto a stool so that she could reach the cabinet over the stove. She took down the school phone book and looked through the listings for both of last year's third-grade classes. No Megan Moriarty.
Duh,
Jessie remembered—she'd moved in halfway through the school year. With a sinking heart, Jessie checked the town phone book. No Moriarty family listed on Damon Road.

"Okay," said Jessie, slapping the phone book shut and putting it back in the cabinet over the stove. "Time for Plan B."

Jessie went to the hall closet and got out her backpack, which had been hanging there, empty, since the last day of school. Inside she put three cans of frozen lemonade from the freezer and her lock box full of change. (She put the ten-dollar bill, still paper-clipped to last year's birthday card from her grandmother, in her top desk drawer.) Then she
went to the garage, strapped on her helmet, and rode off on her bike. As she left the driveway, she could see Evan and Scott's lemonade stand on the corner, but she was careful not to make eye contact. She didn't want to talk to Evan until she was ready to
(ta-da!)
impress him. Her heart leaped when she imagined him ditching Scott to be with her.

Megan's house was so close that Jessie got there in less than thirty seconds. And less than thirty seconds wasn't
nearly
long enough for her to plan what she was going to say. So she rode back and forth in front of the house about fifteen times, trying to pick the right words.

"What're you doing?" a voice shouted from the upstairs window.

Jessie slammed on her foot brakes and looked up. Megan was staring down at her. She looked huge. Her voice did not sound nice.

"Riding my bike," said Jessie.

"But why are you riding back and forth?" asked Megan impatiently. "In front of my house?"

"I dunno," said Jessie. "Ya wanna play?"

"Who are you?" asked Megan.

"Jessie," said Jessie, pointing down the street toward her house.