It didn’t seem fair at all. But Jasper was waiting, and that mattered more than twenty dollars, or it felt like it did anyway. So I said, “Okay, I guess,” and the driver—still with his eyes on the road, plucked the bill neatly from my fingers.

The bus jerked to life as I made my way to the back of the bus, and when it picked up speed I found myself sort of stumbling and flying toward Jasper. I nearly landed in her lap.

“Hey!” I said, when I slid into the seat beside her. “Fancy meeting you here!”

“Crazy!” she said. “Where are you going?”

“Actually,” I said, “I was just walking into the village . . . but I’ve been wanting to see you. And I’m having kind of a strange day already. So when I spotted you there at the bus stop, I guess I just . . . hopped on too. Is that weird?”

She stared at me for a second. Then she burst out laughing. “Yes!” she said. “Yes, Leah, it is absolutely totally bizarre that you jumped on a bus behind me without thinking about it. But it makes me happy, so who cares if it’s weird? I’ve been wanting to see you too.”

She meant it, I could tell. I sighed and sank back into the seat.

“Well, if you’ve been wanting to see me, why didn’t you come visit?” I asked. “You can stop by anytime.”

Jasper shrugged and looked away from me, out the window beside her. “Oh, you know,” she said.

“I don’t, actually,” I said. Now that Jasper was staring out the window, I found myself gazing straight ahead of me, into the back of an old lady’s hat. The hat was purple. “I thought we had fun the other day,” I said, to the hat.

“We did!” said Jasper. “Of course we did, silly.”

“I even left you a note when I went out. I was hoping you’d come by and find it.”

Jasper sighed.

“Sorry!” I said. “I’m sorry. I sound pathetic right now. I don’t mean to. Don’t be mad. It’s fine.”

“Mad?” she said. “I’m not mad, Leah. I just felt like . . .”

“Like what?”

“Like I was the pathetic one. Eating all your food and washing my clothes and watching your TV in your fancy house. You were so nice, and I was the needy one, not you.”

“That’s not true,” I said. “Not at all!”

Jasper shook her head. “And then, after you were so generous, there I went, opening that door, and asking you all those questions. About . . . your brother. Like the clumsiest person in the world. I didn’t come back because I was embarrassed I’d been so rude. And because I didn’t want you to think I was some kind of leech. I didn’t want you to think I was using you.”