Jilly-Bean (Jilly-Bean Series # 1) Read Online Free PDF Page A

breathing had suddenly grown shallow and quick. “Is everything all right?”
    At first he said nothing, but just stood rigid, staring at her, as if he were suddenly tongue-tied. “Oh— oh yeah, I'm fine. H-how did you find out about the job opening?”
    “The Canada Employment Centre” she answered, giving him a quizzical look. “Care to have a coffee with me?” He smiled and nodded. They fell into stride together along the sidewalk and decided to have a coffee at the Coffee Tree café, which was known far and wide for roasting its very own coffee beans daily and sending the aroma wafting throughout the neighbourhood. Not surprisingly, the place was crowded with young people and seating was limited. The young woman behind the counter smiled at Jillian and Andrew in a friendly but harassed way and handed them their drinks and pastries. Then they sat on high stools in front of a large open window, watching people stroll past.
    “This neighbourhood never changes,” he remarked after a while.
    She was looking at him sidelong and taking little sips of her tea. “Well, I've changed. I'm older, and so are you.”
    “Yeah, I know. It just seems like last year we were starting high school, and here we are— graduates. Scary.”
    “I still feel the same. It's still me in there,” she pointed to her head: “ Jillian at age nine, Jillian at age five. I'll probably feel the same when I'm fifty.”
    “You're going to Queen's, right?”
    “Yup.” She was smiling at him.
    Andrew took a swig of coffee and stared at his plate as if contemplating things. “I'm taking a year off to do volunteer work in India. I need to experience something more than just Western materialistic civilization.”
    “No way!” She was astonished. Andrew Waits' parents were rich, and she knew he had been accepted into an Ivy League school in the United States. “When did you decide this?”
    “I've been toying with the idea for a couple of months now. My parents fully approve.”
    “Really?” Jillian looked at him closely. He must be keeping something back, she thought. How could his father, a cardiologist at Mount Sinai Hospital, approve of this sudden change of plans? “When will you be going?”
    “September. I told my dad that I didn't want to wake up an old man like him one day and find out I hadn't lived. I'd like to have fun while I'm still young. When I think of the four years of my life I spent in high school, I'm amazed I didn't go out of my mind. I need to travel— get away from here, see the world! Just for a year. I promised my mom and dad that.”
    “Ah, these visions of freedom you have, Andy. You're such an idealist.”
    “I don't know if I'm an idealist; more like a realist,” he retorted, eating steadily.
    Jillian listened intently as he went on about his plans for the future and making a difference in people's lives. India sounded so exotic, so far away. She felt envious of his pure spirit. To give oneself for a cause and not care about base Western materialistic needs. “Ah, yes,” she exhaled loudly and found her eyes welling up. She had been going to tell him about her apartment-hunting in Kingston and starting at Queen's in the fall, but somehow that fell short by comparison. Andrew Waits, looking thin and probably getting only thinner in India, eating vegetarian food. He was glancing sidelong at her with his clear grey eyes and a half-smile on his face, as she ate a cherry turnover that was oozing and dripping jelly from its sides. She frowned as she discovered that it had dropped onto her new dress— the dress that she had specially purchased for the job interview in an hour's time. She paused to carefully wipe the spot clean with a paper napkin. They reminisced and laughed about friends and teachers in high school and growing up. Jillian was laughing so hard, tears were streaming down her face— a fact that did not escape Andrew, whose look promptly became concerned, perhaps embarrassed, by this display of