Chapter 23: Twelve Buttons

Junie walked down the courthouse steps one at a time, and Eli did not lower his hand.

She stopped in front of him and looked at the compass.

"You kept it," she said.

"You said till the court."

"The court's over."

He swallowed.

She took it from him, turned it over once in her palm, and pressed it back into his.

"You can hold it till the sleepover," she said. "It's on the fourteenth."

Eli's whole face changed.

Mona stood a few feet behind him with her hand over her mouth.

I looked at her across the salt on the steps, and I nodded.

It was all I had.

It was enough.

The Brightwater costume shop had a new front window by the first of April.

Across the glass, in gold letters Nolan had paid a sign painter to do, it said Lana Althouse, Alterations and Costumes.

I stood on the sidewalk the first morning and read my own name for a full minute.

Then I went in and opened the shop.

By May, I had a waiting list.

On a Saturday afternoon the back room was loud with scissors.

Junie and Eli sat across from each other at the cutting table.

Each of them had a pair of safety shears and a heap of red felt.

They were cutting a pirate coat for next Halloween.