by Holly Hook
"Mara," she said in a voice that told me my weird day wasn't over yet. The color drained from her face. Not that there was much.
I took a long, deep breath and stepped around the cluster of sunflowers. "What happened now?"
"The lettuce. It wasn't like this before."
Sara backed away to show the two rows of it.
She was right.
One row of the lettuce had turned purple. Not just dark, reddish purple but angry purple—the kind I had painted my nails with a few weeks ago. The heads of that entire row had grown larger and the leaves bigger.
And the other row of lettuce had gone from regular green to acid green. The plants had shrunk as if they were trying to hide.
I turned and walked right back out of the garden again. "I need to lie down."
"Mara, are you all right?" Sara was right behind me. "You're not yourself."
I whirled around on her. "I've just had a long day. Now's not the time to get into it. I'm just going to go stuff my head under my pillow, go to sleep, and wake up and pretend none of this ever happened." The lettuce had been normal when I left the garden. It should still be normal. Or maybe I just imagined all this crap.
But Sara had seen the change.
"You never get upset like this." Sara paled even more than usual, almost to where she looked dead.
"I've never gotten accused to choking a teacher before," I said. "And now our garden's changing."
"You didn't choke the teacher. They let you off."
"Still," I said. Behind her, the lettuce stayed as strange as ever. "Sara—did you see the lettuce turn color like that?"
She swallowed. "No. I was looking at the sunflowers and the when I turned around, it was like that." She shook her head. "We need to get our project done. I'm sure the lettuce is fine. The sun must have caused it to change color or something. Or the soil. I'm sure there's a rational explanation for it. Maybe Stephanie used some kind of spray on it that made that row turn purple."
"Maybe. Or we're losing our minds." At least I wasn't alone in this.
Sara gave me a funny look. She had never seen me lose anything before.
I was the one who was there when she was having a bad day. We were the closest thing to sisters we'd ever have. Sara was twenty days younger than me and I always joked that all authority belonged to me.
I couldn't afford to break down. Stephanie and Tom were great and all, but they had twenty-two kids to manage and some younger ones needed it. I'd take care of whatever was going on. I always did.
"We're not," Sara said. "It's just lettuce," Sara said. "I know it's weird, but I've seen purple lettuce before at the store. The sun must have made it ripen. These must be two different varieties."
"Stephanie just told me she only planted crisp head lettuce."
"She must have been wrong," Sara said.
"Just lettuce," I repeated. I could finish this salad. I would. Maybe we'd get bonus points for having more color in ours. Mrs. Landry from Foods always said more color meant more nutrients, or something.
I picked some purple lettuce. Sara grabbed the green kind. It might be luck we could use two different types. This wasn't a partner project.
Sara and I borrowed the Haven House kitchen, which Stephanie had painted in a warm yellow with flowers on the walls. I'd helped bake cookies here lots of times. Or had I? In one way, I felt like I never had, that I imagined the whole thing. But the memory felt real at the same time.
We went to work cutting up the carrots and adding the last of the croutons that Stephanie had stocked. The bus rolled up and let the elementary kids off, who flooded the kitchen looking for snacks. Tony stopped in the kitchen doorway and stared at me as if I had just grown horns. I flashed him my biggest smile and waved. What was with him? He'd seen me a million times.
The kid turned and walked up the steps to the second story, his orange Adventure Time backpack hanging low on his back. He stole one last glance at me and vanished up the steps. That was strange. Tony liked to stop and tell me about his day and about how good he was getting at his music lessons.
I wouldn't think about it.
I'd finish this project and then none of this would follow me into tomorrow.
Chapter Three
I held the reddest apple I had ever seen.
Cradling it in my hands, I looked around the forest to make sure no one was spying on me. The apple was heavy, heavier than it should be, but its color was so alluring that it seemed to glow in the sunlight. It was free of all spots and of all other color. My mouth watered just looking at it. I stood not too far from a castle that loomed dark and foreboding in the distance. Birds chirped and a lone rabbit ran away through the trees.
Something rustled in the underbrush.
I turned.
A dark form emerged from the vegetation, cloaked in a black robe and hood with trim the color of blood. It looked like a living shadow coming out of the ground. The air went as cold as a mountain peak and became as sharp as a dagger. The world turned dark around me and the sky went to an ashen gray, the gray of death.
"Hand it over," the figure said in a low voice that made me think of a deep, dark cave. "I need you out of the way."
And he reached out towards me.
I backed away, tripped over a root, and fell.
A strange buzzing woke me.
I sat up in bed. The sound repeated itself, along with the gentle white noise of a fan blowing. The sticky air wrapped around me as I sat up and got my bearings. Where was I? Plain white walls with hearts and skulls drawn all over them surrounded me like the scribbling of an inmate. Black curtains hung over an open window and only let in a bit of weak sunlight. Dawn. It was morning. I'd been dreaming.
Then the memory flooded back.
This was my room in Haven House. Duh.
And no shadow guy was lurking around.
Well, it had been an awesome dream, at least. I fished through my backpack and got out my dream journal. I flipped to a random empty page, one where I had scribbled roses and vipers bearing their fangs around the border. On it, I wrote about the dream, closed the book, and checked the time.
Crap. I had to leave for school in twenty minutes. So much for breakfast, like Stephanie loved to insist on. I couldn't wait until I could just grab a coffee and a donut like an adult. I'd stopped eating cereal at the table with the little kids a long time ago.
The buzzing sound came again.
The phone. I'd left it in my backpack. I fished it out and shoved the dream journal back in.
At first I marveled at the screen, at the perfect images that came up behind the glass. Something about it felt right and familiar. But then I blinked. The phone was always like this. There was nothing magical about it. What was wrong with me? I was just as stupid today as I was yesterday.
Sara sent me a message. Don't forget the salad.
Won't, I typed back. Don't think the little kids will want to devour it. I thanked Mrs. Laney that we hadn't had to make cookies. Those wouldn't have lasted long.
I dressed in my black dragon leggings and my skull hoodie today even though I could tell it would be hot. I rushed downstairs with my backpack, pushed through the kitchen and around the boys, and opened the fridge. Tony watched me from behind his glasses and went back to his cereal when I waved at him again. All seven of them ate in silence. It was morning. I couldn't blame them.
"Hey, Tony," I said. "Everything okay?"
He didn't answer me. Instead, he poked Chad who sat next to him. He was in the fifth grade and a year older than him. Tony clung to Chad like he was a brother. I could understand that. Tony whispered something to her and he made a confused face at him.
Maybe word about Mr. Rain had spread a lot farther than I feared.
The huge bowl of purple salad remained in the fridge, untouched by even Stephanie. The green one had vanished. I grabbed it, made sure the plastic wrap was tight, and ran out the door. Sara had already left. She was the good one, always getting to scho
ol early so she could get studying done without the kids.
I hopped on my bike and balanced the Dark Side salad on top of my handlebars all the way to school. I got two cheers from some basketball guys as I drew closer. When I waved to them, my project almost took a tumble. Sara had the other salad, the green one. She had the light side of the force.
Sara met me outside in the hall after I had stuffed my project into the fridge in Mrs. Laney's classroom. She held the green salad as she came in through the parking lot doors. "Morning," she said. Her smile told me that something was up.
"Morning," I said. We dropped the good off every time we said it. I was not a morning person.
"Let me stash this," she said. Sara had her hair in pigtails today, tied in red bows, and she was wearing her red lipstick. It was the same color as that apple from my dream. She put the Light Side salad next to mine and closed the fridge. "I have news. Mrs. Laney's having her second and fourth hours meet in here at the same time. We're all going to do the tasting after lunch today. Now think about what that means."
"That we'll get crowded?" I asked. "That we're all going to die horrible deaths in the excess body heat?"
She smiled. "No. It starts with E."
E.
Eric.
He had Mrs. Landry in second hour.
And he might try my salad. I might even get the chance to talk to him.
A shiver ran down my spine and my heart raced. "Good to know," I said. My mouth got dry. I could stomach whatever nightmares came every night, but talking to Eric—nope.
"Come on. Aren't you excited? You never get to talk to him in Algebra."
"Because of Mr. Rain," I said. Would Eric even want to look at me? I was just the mouthy goth girl who lived at Haven House. Eric was the guy with the class jacket who would get accepted at some Ivy League place. We weren't even in the same universe. People expected me to go out with guys like Skull Major, who spent his days cleaning his motorcycle even though he didn't have his license yet. Skull couldn't even pull his pants up high enough to hide his butt crack. People had tried to hook us up way too many times.
Just because I lived at Haven House didn't mean I didn't have standards. I wished people realized that.
Sara wasn't expected to date him. She might dress like me, but she wasn't bad like me.
"Come on," she said. "I'll make sure I steer him in your direction. Eric's a nice guy."
"I..." I choked up. "You don't have to, Sara."
"What? This is making you nervous? Nothing makes you nervous."
"This is Eric we're talking about."
Sara smiled. "I'll make sure the two of you talk," she said, winking. "Just watch. Foods will be amazing today."
* * * * *
I didn't eat lunch. Mrs. Landry had instructed everyone in Foods not to do so today. Because food. I didn't want to eat, anyway. Sara had something planned, and it was something I couldn't escape.
I loved her and hated her at the same time.
The bell rang, and I dragged myself to Foods. I stepped over the threshold and onto the red brick floor and found the fridge open. Mrs. Landry had our dishes all set out. My Dark Side salad sat in the middle of the long tables she had set around the room in a U shape. The tables almost sagged with sliced fruits, whole grain breads, tuna salads and deviled eggs. My stomach rumbled just staring at it all. We rarely got a good home cooked meal at the Haven House and this was way better than cafeteria food.
"Do you know what kind of lettuce this is?" Mrs. Landry asked me, standing over my salad. She pulled her sleeve down over her upper arm and smiled at me. "I've seen nothing like it."
"I'm not sure," I said. "It was growing in our garden at Hav...at home. There are all kinds of veggies in there and I'm not even sure what some of them are." Well, these. "We had a couple different lettuces."
She smiled. "It looks good, Mara. Almost magical. I can't wait to have the students try this."
I leaned closer to my salad. The lettuce leaves seemed even more purple now, almost black. They were the same color I imagined the velvet on the inside of a vampire's coffin might be.
I wondered if I should serve this.
"Hey, Mara."
My heart about stopped.
Eric.
He stood there, smiling and resting his hand on the table. He had on his class jacket today, the one with the big orange E. His long hair hung over his shoulders. His broad chest had gotten him asked to join the football team several times, but each time he refused. He didn't like to hang out with the jocks. He kind of floated around. It seemed like there were pieces of each group in Eric and he didn't belong to any one of them.
The smile faded off his face and the twin wrinkles in his cheeks vanished. He rubbed his hand through his hair. I wished I could do that. "Is something wrong?"
"No," I said. "It's just, we never cross paths, you know?"
Wow. I had to talk like an idiot. Now I needed to think about the Eric dreams I'd written about in my journal next and then I'd be a complete failure.
Heat rushed to my face. I was glad I'd put on plenty of pale makeup today. I prayed that Eric couldn't see it.
He didn't seem to. "What's that?" he asked, eyeing my salad. "It looks like it came from another planet or some garden in an underworld."
"I like the garden in an underworld idea," I said. Maybe we had something in common. Eric didn't look like the guy who would be into the same stuff I was. Even though his hair was long, he shared his clean appearance with the kids in the Honor Society, even though he never hung out with them, either. I couldn't figure him out.
Eric got a closer look at the salad. He leaned down and sniffed it. "Who brought it in?"
"I did." I searched around for Sara but she wasn't in here yet. She must have asked Eric to talk to me to make me feel better. The last thing I needed was the pity.
“It smells great,” he said, reaching for the plastic spoon I had thrown in there this morning.
“Not yet,” I said. “You don’t want Mrs. Landry to yell at you.”
“She won't yell at me.”
“I will yell at you,” Mrs. Landry said from behind us.
I whirled around, almost glad she was there. Mrs. Landry smiled and eyed all the food. “I think it was a great idea, having both classes do this together. It quickens the grading for me, too.”
Eric breathed out, hesitated, and spoke. “I had a hard time convincing Mr. Viele to let me out. We’re supposed to have a test today.”
Mrs. Landry screwed up her features like she was searching for an excuse. “It’s good to do these exercises this way,” she said. “No one is to touch the food yet. Not until I give the order.”
The teacher walked away and Eric shrugged at me. “She’s not this strict most of the time.”
“She has many people today,” I said. I was talking to Eric and having a real conversation with him, and I wasn’t dying from it. I spotted Sara on the other side of the room, hiding behind the cabinet. She smiled at me.
Mrs. Landry called for everyone so sit. There wasn’t enough room, so the second hour kids had to stand up against the wall. The room grew hot, even with the open window looking on the outside, and people fanned themselves with paper plates and whatever else they had in their hands. Eric took off his class jacket. He was wearing a black T-shirt with a coat of arms today. He fanned himself off with his shirt and muttered something to the guy next to him. It was the first time I'd seen him with the class jacket off.
“See?” Sara asked me.
I nodded. Mrs. Landry walked up and down the table of food today. My stomach rumbled now I had spoken with Eric like I promised. The stress had come off. The heat in the room increased, and I regretted putting on my leggings. At the next table, Devon pretended to faint.
“All of this food looks superb,” Mrs. Landry said. “I’ll be giving out a lot of good grades for this. I’m pleased with the healthy choices. However, I may have to mark down whoever brought the Thin Mints from the Girl S
couts.” She pointed to a plate with an assembled circle of brown cookies on it. It looked like a few people had already snuck away with some. In other words, someone had forgotten to do their project. “However, I think we should head outside to do the tasting. It’s much cooler out there and we won't have the heat from the ovens that I ran today. Everyone, grab your dish and we’ll go out to the picnic tables that are under the trees."
Cheers went up and everyone scrambled to grab their dishes. Sara seized her Light Side salad, and I wrapped my arms around mine. I couldn’t believe I had balanced this on my handlebars this morning. I checked to see what Eric had brought in. A loaf of bread he must have made in some bread maker. It looked really good. I'd have to try it and compliment him on it.
It was a long walk around the school to where the picnic tables waited. We all got under the shade and breathed sighs of relief as we set our food out everywhere. Blissful coolness washed over me as the breeze blew and the leaves rustled. A few flies hung around, anticipating the free food. One tried to land on Sara's salad and she tried to hit it with the wooden spoon. It flew away, hovering over each dish for a second while ignoring my salad as if it was swimming with the plague.
For a second, I wondered if something was wrong with the purple leaves.
They looked strange.
"Did someone dye this?" Devon asked, pointing to it. I shrunk back.
"Hey," Eric said to him. "Don't knock the salad because it's different. You might hurt its feelings."
More heat rushed to my face. He was defending me. Well, the salad, but he knew it was mine.
Mrs. Landry handed out the paper plates and opened a box of plastic forks and spoons. We all lined up and dug into each dish, piling food onto our plates. There was not enough sitting room with two classes out here, so most of us had to stand. Eric got a big heaping pile of the purple salad and Mrs. Landry grabbed some of Sara's bright green one. We had a whole spectrum of colors going on here.
