Read Online Carrying Mason by Joyce Magnin - Free Book Online Page A

more questions. But I had to start somewhere. Aunt Sapphire apparently had some kind of say in Ruby Day’s life, and I needed to get to the bottom of it.
    Sapphire seemed a powerful woman with powerful opinions. Still, I couldn’t figure how a person could blow into town, make demands, blow out again, and expect someone like Ruby Day to follow along.
    “Ruby Day, how come you never told me about Aunt Sapphire and Bryn Mawr and all?”
    “Didn’t need to, Luna. Long as I had Mason, didn’t need to.” She untwirled the string from her finger. “Sapphire said as long as Mason could help me it would be all right to stay.”
    “Then why does she want you to go back there? You’re doing fine right here. And I’m here.”
    Ruby Day swiped at her tears and ran her palm over the top of Mason’s picture. “Don’t know. Sapphire is just like that. She’s so rich and all.”
    “But rich doesn’t give her any special rights to tell you where to live. She might look like a queen in all herfancy getup and hat and pointy glasses, but she doesn’t have any right to tell you where to live. Ain’t no rule about it.”
    Ruby Day pulled her glasses off. She cleaned them with her dress. “Sapphire sent me here … with Mason.”
    “To Makeshift?”
    Ruby Day nodded her head so hard I thought it might fling right off her shoulders.
    “How come?” Other than right after Mason’s funeral, I’d never thought much about Ruby Day not living in Makeshift. I mean, she was always just there and Mason was always my friend. I never remembered them moving into town. Their arrival was a mystery, and now all of a sudden I needed to solve it. Especially if Sapphire was involved.
    “After my daddy died. She said I embarrassed her, so she sent us here. To this house.”
    Ruby Day went quiet, and I stared at Mason’s picture, wishing he could give me more answers.
    “Luna,” Ruby Day said. “I think I want to change into my garden clothes.”
    I nodded. “You go ahead. We’ll figure this out later.”
    Ruby Day started up the stairs, stopped, and said, “I ain’t going back with Aunt Sapphire.”
    “I know. I heard you say that. Don’t worry.”
    My stomach growled. I figured if I was hungry then so was Ruby Day, so I went into the kitchen. I openedtwo cans of tomato soup and plopped the contents into a pot with two cans of milk. I stirred and stirred and watched the mixture turn dusty rose. Next I made two grilled cheese sandwiches just like Mama taught me, with butter inside and out.
    I thought about calling Mama and telling her what happened, but I really didn’t know what
had
happened. It seemed simple enough to me that if Ruby Day wanted to stay in Makeshift, she should. How could even a force so seemingly powerful as Sapphire make that happen if she didn’t want it?
    Ruby Day walked into the kitchen carrying a shoebox closed tight with gobs of masking tape. She was wearing her garden clothes—blue jeans with rolled-up cuffs and a flannel shirt.
    “Whatcha got there?” I asked.
    “Papers. Stuff Sapphire told me to keep.”
    “Certainly has a lot of tape.”
    “Mason did it when he was little. I kept dropping it and things poured out on the floor.”
    I turned the sandwiches over and pressed them down as flat as I could with my spatula. They sizzled as the buttery and cheesy aroma rose to the ceiling. “Sit down. I made lunch.”
    “Not hungry,” Ruby Day said.
    “Doesn’t matter. You have to eat, especially if we’re going to fight Aunt Sapphire.”
    Ruby Day plopped onto a kitchen chair. “Fight? I don’t want to fight her.”
    “I don’t mean with our fists. I mean we’re going to fight to keep you here. In Makeshift. She can’t force you to go. You’re an adult, Ruby Day.”
    She started to cry again. “No … I’m not, Luna. My brain is not. Sapphire said so. Everybody said so. Even Mason said so.”
    I used the spatula to cut her sandwich into four triangles and then arranged them on a large blue