STORY: The Beast of the Suburban Jungle

Becky is here at the grocery store. She still wears bangs, but they are even. She’s carrying a bright red purse. She doesn’t see me; she has two boxes of pasta to her ears and is staring intently at another on the shelf. She’s wearing jeans with at least three differently patterned patches sewn on (one was plaid, one was striped, and one had neon flowers), and a bright purple sweatshirt with flowers painted on. I wonder about her. Twenty-five years later, I still don’t know what to say. So I turn down the cereal aisle and continue to shop, my cheeks feeling suddenly warm.

When I was eleven, my family moved to a new house in the suburbs. Behind our house, past our backyard, was an untamed tract of land called “the Jungle.” At least, that’s what Becky called it when she wandered into our backyard the day we moved in.

Rainbow-colored backpack over her shoulders, Becky led me between the two giant oaks, left at the prickly bushes, and down the barely-noticeable dirt path to the giant rock. We sat on the rock as she told me how she and “the gang” had wandered through my house while it was still being built. When she told me that she and Joey had shared their first kiss in my bedroom, I didn’t know what to think.

We wandered on to a tiny creek. There she pointed out her house, a mirror image of my own, and further down the creek, Joey’s house. She sighed and leaned her head to one side, her amber hair brushing her shoulder, whenever she talked about him; I struggled not to laugh at this girl I had just met.

“Hey, let’s go back to your house,” said Becky, jumping up suddenly.

“Well…” I said.

“Oh c’mon. It’s not like I haven’t been there before,” she said, grabbing my hand. “Besides, I can help you unpack.”

And she did. In about an hour, Becky and I had unpacked all the boxes in my room. She shrieked when she saw my binoculars.

“Oh my god, this is so cool,” said Becky, looking through the binoculars. “I have a pair too. Hey, look.” She grabbed my hand and pulled me to my window. “That’s my bedroom there. Look, you can see my canopy.”

I looked through the binoculars and saw a rainbow painted on the far wall. The canopy over her bed also looked like a rainbow.

“You sure like rainbows, don’t you?” I asked.

“My mother always told me I was the gold at the end of the rainbow.”

I giggled. For about thirty seconds, it was silent; all I heard was a soft patting sound. Although I hadn’t known her long, I had realized this silence was unusual with Becky around – so I turned around. Becky was frowning and looking at her hands. She made a fist with one hand and hit the palm of her other hand. Then she switched hands. Over and over again she did this. I watched for a while before speaking.

“That’s sweet,” I said. “My mother calls me her little sunshine.”

Becky looked up and smiled, her hands falling to her sides. “So we’re both in the sky.”

Every morning, I would look out my bedroom window and see Becky sitting at her window facing me. When she saw me, she would hold up a pink pad of paper. I would pull out my binoculars and read her message.

“Jungle After Breakfast?” she would write.

Still feeling the sting on the scratches on my legs from the day before, I would respond, “Maybe later.”

She would suggest the playground, or hanging out with her friends, and just then my mom would come in telling me of some shopping trip we would have to take after breakfast, and I’d have to tell Becky “Sorry. Gotta hang with Mom.”

“That’s ok. Joey just called. Gonna hang with him,” was her usual reply.

In that way, Becky and I would sometimes go several days without seeing one another. But then she would appear in my backyard and sit on the grass and wait until I happened to look out our bay window. One afternoon, after my four-year-old twin cousins had left after visiting for the day, I found her sitting cross-legged in the middle of the lawn, backpack in her lap. She was doing that fist thing with her hands while looking up at the giant oak at the edge of our lawn.

“Hey, Beck,” I said.

“Hey, Shell,” said Becky, looking up at me but not dropping her hands.

“How long you been out here today?”

“Three birds and two squirrels,” said Becky absently. She refused to wear her watch during vacation. She had shown it to me once in her room; it was gold and had a rainbow wristband. She said she loved the watch and actually missed it during vacation, but didn’t wear it because then it made her look forward to the school year.

“My cousins were here,” I said.

“Mm hmm,” she said.

I was tired from chasing the boys around all day, and just wanted to be alone for a while. She kept punching her palms.

“What’s up?” I asked.

“I thought we could hang out,” said Becky.

“I’m really tired.”

She stood up. “Then I should go.”

“All right,” I said, turning toward the house.

“School starts soon,” said Becky.

I turned back around. “Yeah.”

“We could go together,” she said.

“Okay,” I said.

Silence. Then she picked up her backpack and held it out. “Here. I thought you might still need one.”

“Actually, I already got one.”

“Oh, okay,” she said, dropping her arms. “Well, I told Joey I’d meet him at the rock. See you.”

Then she turned and ran into the woods. I went inside and watched television.

Every day after dinner, I would wander through the Jungle on my own, creating a map in my mind. I would sometimes retrace routes Becky and I had taken earlier, but inevitably I would stray from the known to explore the unknown. It was thus that I discovered the oasis. I knew there had to be something, since the creek didn’t continue to the next street, but I hadn’t expected to find this gorgeous little waterfall – more like rapids – leading to a shimmering pond. I nicknamed it the oasis because after scratching up my legs and arms on all the prickers along the path, it was really quite a welcome sight that I couldn’t believe existed.

It seemed to me that nobody knew about the oasis, because otherwise, it would be crowded and a more obvious path would exist. The day I found it, I stayed for an hour before wandering aimlessly and coming out two streets over and walking back home. The next day, I got up early and followed the creek until the path was too overgrown and I had to turn back and find another way back to the pond. Finally, during the course of a week, through trial and error – and ultimately by leaving markers along the way – I mapped out the route.

The day before school started, I wandered to the rock and stood on it to find Becky to show her my discovery. I didn’t see her. I decided I would walk around the pond and map a course to her house (along the other side of the creek) on my way back. I was surprised to hear voices as I approached the rapids. When I got to the pond, there were Becky, Joey, and a few of the other neighbor kids from their street. Becky and some girl were talking, while Joey and a couple of boys were skipping stones across the water.

“Hey, Beck,” I called.

Becky turned her head and her smile disappeared. She turned back to the girl. “So do you like this pond that Joey and I found?” She sat punching alternating fist to palm, again and again.

“You discovered this? When?” I asked, walking toward them.

“Oh, a while ago,” she said. “I like the markers you added.”

“So why didn’t you show it to me?”

Becky’s face turned red. “We don’t let just anyone come here, you know. You have to be special.”

Something about the way she said special made me feel suddenly queasy. She stood up and started pacing, still punching her fists. I looked over at Joey, who didn’t seem to notice Becky, but instead kept skipping rocks with his friend. The girl was now staring into the water.

So she was upset that I hadn’t shown her this place. I felt bad that I hadn’t included her, but it wasn’t like we had known each other very long. Besides, she was spending more and more time with Joey. I didn’t think she would be interested. Apparently I had assumed incorrectly. Becky kept pacing, stamping her feet harder and harder with each step, her fists now starting to make a sound as they hit the other hand.

“Oh yeah, Joey and I have been coming here all summer,” she said.

Joey was bent over picking up more flat stones, and I watched as he looked up at Becky with a confused expression on his face, then turned to one of his friends and shrugged his shoulders. I looked back at Becky, who stood still now with her hands at her waist, elbows sticking out.

She continued. “To think, I actually thought of inviting you a couple of times. But, of course, you were too busy for me.”

She scrunched her lips together so her cheeks looked inflated. She stared at me, her eyes filling up with water. She turned her back to me as the first tear started to sneak out of the corner of her eye.

“Look, Becky, I’m sorry. I meant to show this to you. But I kept getting lost. I finally set up markers and came looking for you before I came here today,” I said. I really did feel badly. I just didn’t think she would be this upset.
Becky stepped toward me. She turned to the girl, who remained seated and turned her head away when Becky looked back. Becky looked back at me.

“The jungle was mine long before you came here. You don’t get to go off discovering new places without me. You owe me. I welcomed you to the neighborhood, showed you the coolest places in the jungle, and this is how you repay me? You find this awesome place and hide it from me? I thought you could be my friend. I guess I was wrong. You’re just a selfish beast!” Becky turned and ran back into the jungle, but not before I had seen the tears that had started to stream.

I stood there, four pairs of eyes staring at me, not really sure what to do. I looked at Joey, who shrugged his shoulders and went back to skipping stones in the water with his friend. I looked at the girl, who stared blankly back at me. In that moment, an incredible wave of sadness and pity swept over me. Becky had considered me her best friend. But I failed her. These other people, they didn’t care. They spent time with her, but they didn’t think of her as a friend. None of them would run after her. It didn’t matter to them if Becky, with her jagged bangs that she cut herself and rainbow-colored backpack that she carried everywhere but had inadvertently left lying near the pond, was upset.

I picked up the backpack and ran after her. Before long, however, I was lost and wandered for about half an hour before making it onto a side street. I walked to Becky’s house and, unsure of what to say, left the backpack on her front porch. I walked home and acted as if nothing had happened, but suddenly I dreaded the morning, the first day of school.

My parents still live in that house. The jungle has been mowed, and a walking trail loops around the creek and the pond, with a quaint wooden bridge passing over the rapids. Benches line the trail, and a playground sits where the large rock used to be. My kids like to run back there, play on the slide and swings, and I am happy that they can enjoy it. Usually I am fine, but if I climb on the jungle gym and look toward Becky’s house - or as I walk around the trail, if I find myself standing by the pond in the exact spot where Becky had lost her backpack and her best friend - my throat feels crowded, my face feels hot, and my cheeks feel suddenly wet. And I smile.

Standing in the grocery store, I see Becky get into the checkout lane by the cookie aisle where I stand. I see that I am holding a pack of rainbow cookies. I know what I must do. I quickly get into line behind her.

“Do you think there might be gold at the end of these rainbow cookies?” I say.

She turns her head.