by Sandra Smith
“Good,” he said.
Dante ran ahead, pointing and calling out every green patch he encountered. The two teenagers, meanwhile, crawled along, deep in conversation that hadn’t anything to do with weeds.
“Come on you guys!”
“Wait, Dante.”
He pulled the Monitor out of Clare’s hand and began flipping through the photos. “Aha! Chickweed! Look at this.” He pointed to the photo and back at the plant with the tiny pointed leaves and white flowers.
Clare and Jason stopped talking and looked from the Monitor to the plant near where Dante squatted.
“Wow, good job,” Jason said. He turned to Clare, “And here I thought you were so smart. Maybe your brother’s been doing your homework for you.” He winked at Clare, but Dante missed it.
CHAPTER 15
Lily
If Meg had seen a ghost, I’m not sure her face would have registered more surprise and confusion than it did when she opened the door at 6:30 a.m. and saw me standing there, dumb apologetic smile on my face, flanked on both sides by the strong, swarthy, young men.
“Meg. I’m sorry. Let me explain—” I moved past her, followed by Arturo and Juan, introducing them as we entered. It was early enough that Aaron hadn’t gone out to work. He sat at the table eating an unidentifiable breakfast.
I explained how the questions the night before, followed by the reaction to the name Trinia Nelson, had spooked me into taking off. I told how my friend Arturo had followed me and about our meeting in the night. They listened quietly.
“But you came back?” Aaron asked, after his customary initial silence.
I nodded. “Arturo convinced me that Abner and Evelyn were trustworthy and that if I could trust them, then I could trust you.”
The couple smiled at Arturo and Juan. “Thank you,” Meg said to them.
“I’m sorry. I guess I’m not thinking clearly.”
“It’s understandable,” Aaron said, but I could tell he didn’t mean it, that he had no patience for panicked indiscretion.
“However, you need to start thinking clearly at all times. I’m not sure how you play into everything, but there can be no mistakes.” I knew it.
Meg mouthed, It’s okay.
Aaron looked at the three of us teenagers. “So,” he asked, “are you ready to talk?”
I looked at Arturo and Juan. Juan shrugged his shoulders. Arturo spoke, “Sir, I am not part of the Network. But I can help. You can trust me.” He put out his hand. Aaron took it and they shook, eye to eye.
“Thank you,” Aaron said.
All eyes turned to me. It’s what I had wanted. The dreams of grandeur, the secret plots I’d imagined and journaled about, the words I had pronounced to Clare and Dante in the apartment that day—Lily Gardener, you will help change the world—ringing in my ears. Here the moment was, and I felt like a chicken.
I started by telling Aaron that Trinia Nelson had visited Rose within the past two weeks. I explained everything I knew about the questions asked of Rose, the accusations and threats thrown at Ana.
“What’s so special about your town, your friends, that Trinia herself was there? Do you know for a fact it was her?”
I hesitated. I knew what was special about my town, but so far, I had told no one about my father.
Arturo, bless his heart, tried to answer for me. Maybe he saw me tiring, stressing out a little. What he told them held the key.
“A great leader of Seed Savers once begin there. Then, Trinia trick everyone,” he said.
No one said anything.
“Understand?” he checked, a bit embarrassed at the silence, wondering, maybe, if his English was to blame.
“It’s good,” I assured him.
I saw when it happened. Aaron put it together first, but Meg wasn’t far behind. The click when James Gardener, Lily Gardener fit together—the check on my age, my Amerasian features.
And then I felt guilty. Because Arturo didn’t know.
I glanced at him quickly. “I’m sorry.” And then to them, “Arturo doesn’t know.”
“What? What Arturo doesn’t know?” Arturo asked. He turned to Juan, speaking in Spanish, trying to figure out what he had missed.
“No sé, bro. I think this is what we call a secret.”
Without meeting his gaze, I answered. “Arturo, the leader of the Movement—the one who was tricked and went to jail—his name is James Gardener. He’s my father.”
He didn’t try to make me feel bad. In fact, quite the opposite. He laughed a little.
“Oh brother,” he said. “So big deal.”
But he couldn’t hide it. In the second before his facade of nonchalance, I saw the pain of my deception blow across his face like a gentle breeze. The way the corners of his mouth lowered slightly, the sadness in his eyes.
We all saw it.
Aaron saved me; he repeated his question as if my disclosure meant nothing.
“So you are absolutely sure it was Trinia?”
I admitted I didn’t know for certain but that from Ana’s past description and Rose’s recent encounter, I believed it was. Then he grilled me on when I left, who I told what, and my route and mode of transportation. He didn’t need to ask where I was headed; he had figured that out already.
“What does your mom know?”
“About what?”
“About all of this—your activities, the arrest and interrogations, the visits to Ana?”
“Nothing.” I said it slowly. By the end of the last syllable I realized how naive I’d been. “So you think GRIM keeps an eye on Ma?”
“I’m not sure if it’s their official policy anymore; it is true they’ve cut their staff in recent years … but many people in the Network believe Trinia’s “attachment” to James never completely ended … she has a special animosity toward your mother.
“Lily, look, kid,” Aaron continued, “your father was in Cuba. But he’s been out for seven months.” His eyes were focused on his hands, sprawled out on the table in front of us. He looked up, meeting my gaze. “He escaped.”
I was floored. My whole life, my dad had been dead. Then he was alive, yet imprisoned. Now I discovered he was out and had been for half a year. And he didn’t come home. Try to find me. I felt the air drain out of my lungs, and I had to remind myself to breathe. How much more of this could I take?
“Trinia has probably kept an eye out to see if your dad contacted your mom in any way.”
I got up and left the room, tears streaming down my face. Abandoned again. It didn’t matter why.
CHAPTER 16
Clare and Dante
“And then he told Clare that he had thought she was smart, but maybe it was me doing her homework!”
Dante had been so excited about identifying the chickweed and Jason’s compliment that Marissa got an earful before the car doors had hardly slammed shut.
“I think he was kidding, Dante,” Clare said graciously, “but even if he wasn’t, you are really smart.”
She had always been a good big sister to him, and she wasn’t about to stop when he needed her most. It couldn’t be easy for a third grader who barely remembered his father to now be apart from his mother, as well. Clare carried this weight with her, and it’s what she reminded herself of whenever she was tempted to be selfish or smart-mouthed. It was a strategy that worked most of the time.
Marissa looked at Clare in the rearview mirror and smiled. “You are both very smart children. But tell me again, what was the class about?”
Clare excitedly explained about edible weeds and learning to identify them. Marissa laughed. “Well, I’ll be darned. So now they’re teaching you to eat weeds. That must be something new they’ve added. We won’t be eating any weeds around here. I mean, you can if you want, but why would you bother?”
Clare’s heart sank. Sometimes Marissa’s skepticism troubled her. For being a host, she didn’t seem to understand what it had been like back where Clare and Dante were from.
; “Because what if you couldn’t plant a garden but you wanted some good healthy greens?” Dante said. Clare smiled. That’s my little brother.
“Oh, of course,” Marissa said, embarrassed.
Even before the Garden Guardian classes in January, the children’s education had begun. Not formally, but by way of lifestyle. Ever since they had arrived on Canadian soil they had experienced one new thing after another. It had started on that moonlit night, the moment they discovered the “apple forest,” as Dante had called it, and had not ended. Even if Marissa often said, “It’s not my job to teach you—I’m just here to love and feed you,” the very act of life on the farm was an education.
One of Clare and Dante’s favorite things was checking the chicken coop each day for eggs. Less exciting was cleaning the coop, but even the droppings, they learned, were valued as fertilizer for the vegetable garden.
“Dante, it’s your turn to clean.”
“Won’t you do it, Clare?”
“Why? You’re perfectly capable.”
“But I’m just a little kid.”
She rolled her eyes. He had been coddled so much in the Guardian class lately that he was starting to take advantage of the situation. Fortunately, Marissa stood nearby.
“What’s this? Aren’t you the same little boy who rode his bicycle 400 miles, through long dark nights, all the way to Canada? And you don’t think you can handle a little chicken poop?”
Dante cracked up hearing Marissa say the word “poop.” And he knew she was right. With no more complaints, he put on his boots and coat and left out the back door.
“Thanks,” Clare said to Marissa.
“No problem. He wouldn’t be the first little brother who tried to guilt-trip his sister into doing his chores for him.”
“I guess not. And I don’t actually mind cleaning the coop. I just feel like staying in right now. It’s so cozy and warm.”
She meant it, too. Cleaning the chicken coop wasn’t that bad. She used a pitchfork and tossed the soiled straw into a wheelbarrow. One trip to the compost pile was usually enough. She had learned about composting in class and looked forward to watching the pile of plant debris, leaves, chicken droppings, grass clippings, and table scraps change into rich, fertile compost to add to the garden. She remembered the class with Monroe Cassidy and smiled to herself.
And the chickens made her laugh. She truly enjoyed their company. Although Clare had seen chickens at the summer fair, she had never thought of them as pets or realized they could be so endearing. But John and Marissa had raised the dozen or so hens from chicks and named each of them. They believed white chickens and white eggs were boring, so had a mix of breeds such as Rhode Island Red, Plymouth Rock, Buff Orpington, and Australorp, producing eggs of several colors and hues. And now Clare and Dante shared in the watching, feeding, holding, and sometimes chasing of Ruby, Sparkles, Fluffy, Buffy, Clover, and Nugget—to name a few. The way their bell-shaped bottoms rocked from side to side or their necks bobbed out in front of them as they scurried across the yard never failed to amuse the children. John had taught them how to hold the chickens just right, close to their bodies with the wings pinned, to keep them from flapping. Clare often wondered what Lily would think if she could see them holding the docile and cooing chickens. Or Mama; she had a feeling Mama would love holding a chicken and running her long fingers over the soft, smooth feathers.
“Sweetie, your mini-Monitor is ringing.”
“Huh?”
“Someone is calling you.”
“Oh.” Before the Guardian class, Clare had never owned a mini-Monitor or carried a tele-com. She had seen them on the Monitor shows, but most people she knew back home couldn’t afford to pay the usage fees or to buy the more reliable units. She ran to the table where her homework lay.
“How do I answer it?”
“Just pick it up; open the case.”
She did as she was told. Jason’s smiling face greeted her.
“Hey there, Clare.”
“Hi.”
“You okay?”
“Sure. I—I—How’d you call me?”
“The directory.”
“Oh.” It wasn’t what she had meant.
He gave her a quizzical look. “Anyway, I was wondering whether or not you’ve done your homework.”
“Yes. I always do it as soon as I get home.”
“Man, I don’t see how you can stand that. I need a break. I don’t even think the Guardian classes should have homework. I mean, there’s still the regular schoolwork.”
Clare just looked at him.
“So, I wasn’t sure about number 12,” he said. “Is gypsum a good substitute for lime?”
“Just a minute.” She checked her answers. “No,” she said. “Gypsum does not affect the pH of the soil. That’s what the text said. But it was kind of confusing … the way it was written.”
“No doubt,” he agreed. “So what are you doing?”
“Reading. Enjoying keeping warm. I was talking with Marissa—my host mom—just now.” She knew Marissa could hear the conversation and thought she should clue Jason in on the fact that their exchange wasn’t private.
“Hi, Marissa!” he called.
“Hello,” she answered.
“This is Jason,” she held the mini-Mon up. “Jason, Marissa.” He waved. It was weird, making introductions this way.
Just then Dante returned from the chicken coop. “Hey, what’s tha—Jason?” He looked at Clare and back to the screen in her hands. “Cool! I didn’t know we could do that on those—it’s just like on Monitor shows!”
“Hey, Dante,” Jason’s face said.
“Goin’ down!” Dante replied, trying on the latest slang.
“Okay, Jason. My battery’s low. See you tomorrow.” Clare closed the cover, unsure of how to end the call. She heard the Monitor click off.
“Your battery wasn’t low,” Dante said.
CHAPTER 17
Lily
“Juan need to go back.”
Arturo and I were walking through the large air-controlled greenhouses, his thumbs in his pockets, my arms folded in front of me.
“Oh.” I felt too emotional, worn out from the revelations of the past twenty-four hours. “So soon? But we only just got to see each other.”
“You so friend with Juan?” he asked, perplexed.
“No, silly, I meant you.”
The initial confusion on his faced cleared. “Oh, no, I not go,” he said. “Are you kidding? Mm-mm.” He shook his head from side to side. “I keep you safe.”
“Really? You’re staying?”
“Sure. Papa and Abuelo say I need to stay with you.”
It felt good knowing I wouldn’t be alone on this crazy adventure, but at the same time I recognized the conflicting emotion of irritation at the idea of needing to be “kept safe” by someone. I decided to ponder it later. Right now I would be grateful.
“That’s good,” I said quietly.
His arm slipped around me.
“Sí,” he said. “Querida Lily.”
Aaron and Meg were extremely high up in the Seed Savers Network to also be GRIM-sanctioned growers. They told us that any other time of year we wouldn’t have been able to spend even one night with them, and that even now, we had better be on our way. We spent the rest of the day talking, exchanging information, and preparing to leave in search of my father. I wanted to write it all in my journal, for my own sanity mostly, and also as a record, but when I asked Meg, she said it was too dangerous. They had been appalled at the list Ana had given us but noted that it wasn’t current and probably wouldn’t do much harm if in the wrong hands.
Aaron explained that politically things were moving in the right direction. We would soon be entering an election year, and there were many Seed Savers running for office. However, the money would always be in favor of the opponents, so it was imperative to educate as many people as possible about whom to vote for in order to make changes in the food laws. He wa
s certain that, as a department, GRIM would be eliminated within the next couple of years. Yet this was only one thread in the fabric that needed unravelling.
When I asked if he knew where my dad was, he said he didn’t—that it was better if he and Meg did not know. He would help me get to him, though. I asked how my dad did it, how he had escaped.
“Lily, listen. I can’t tell you any more. You and Arturo need to get out of Florida. It’s not a good place to be. I have a motorcycle for you. It’s all-terrain but has no protection from the elements. I’m sorry. We tried for an ECV but weren’t able to get one on such short notice.”
“ECV?”
“Electric Capsule Vehicle. They’re really nice, haven’t you heard of them?”
“No.”
“Really?” Arturo chastised. “Wow, that will be so cool,” he said to Aaron.
“Anyway, the bike has a nav-map but I won’t program it, and I’m not going to write down where to find friends. I will give you verbal directions toward where a few are located, the ones that I think are safest at this time. You’ll need to look for the signs. The Savers who don’t work for GRIM can tell you more about finding and meeting your father … more about everything.” He leaned over and picked up a mini-Monitor, a high quality one, like I’d only ever seen in Stores but had never had the opportunity to touch. With a few flicks of his fingers, several images of Clare and Dante appeared—on their bicycles, or standing at crosswalks. “Your friends were tracked and didn’t even know it,” Aaron said. “I’m surprised they got away. They were lucky.”
“Who took those pictures?” I asked.
“Simple traffic-cams. Drones. They had the sense to travel at night, and fortunately they don’t seem to have gone into many cities. But still—they could have done better. You two need to do better.”
“We will,” I said.
“You can believe in us,” Arturo added.