by Sandra Smith
“Aubrey’s Dad is the police chief,” he told me.
I couldn’t hide my shock quickly enough; Aubrey had been watching my face.
“It’s cool,” he said. “Cherokee police.”
I was beginning to wonder what we were doing here. Obviously we hadn’t found my father. We had seen the first two signs of a Seed Saver, but what about the third? What about the garden? And wasn’t it dangerous for us to be at the home of a policeman? This boy, Aubrey, wasn’t much older than me, but he acted so smug, like he was something special. It caused me to draw in, although I desperately wanted to ask Arturo questions. I also had to pee.
“Um. Excuse me, but can you tell me where the bathroom is?”
“We have five. Right in that door is the pool one,” he said, nodding the direction.
This time I managed to hide my surprise—I think. “Thanks,” I said, jumping up and darting toward the house.
I’m not going to describe the “pool bathroom,” though I want to. Somehow it seems like I’d be catering to the already overblown self-estimation of Aubrey if I expressed how impressive it was. I took my time, though, washing my face and checking myself in the mirror. Comforting myself by listening to my mother’s voice telling me how unhealthy the sun is for my pale skin though I yearned to be tanned and brown. I was also thinking that I needed to talk to Arturo alone.
“You okay?” The voice on the other side of the door startled me, but I relaxed at its familiar accent.
“Fine,” I said as I opened the door. “Just freshening up a bit. You didn’t expect me to jump into a pool in my underwear with four guys, did you?”
He smiled and laughed. “You okay,” he said. “Your funny Lily self is back.”
Dang but he was getting to know me too well. He used to take my sarcasm as anger, but now he recognized when I was just mouthing off.
I looked past him and saw Aubrey back in the pool with his brothers. “I need to talk to you.” I grabbed his arm, steering him back around the house to the porch. Just once I wished he would not do that ooh la la thing with his eyes every time I touched him. “Oh, stop it,” I said, letting go but steering him nonetheless.
He pulled himself up on the railing as I sat in a rocker, facing him. “What are we doing?” I asked.
“What you mean?”
“I mean, are we at the coordinates?”
A light flashed in his eyes. “I forget to check.”
“You forgot to check??”
“You forget, too. We both see the flowers and we are agree coming here.”
This was true, but I felt like blaming him anyway. “So why are we waiting for this kid’s dad if he’s a policeman? And what about Amber Jensen?”
“They are friends, Lily. Don’t worry.”
“You asked?” My voice rose slightly. He knew I had told him to let me handle the secret society stuff.
“No. He said to me.”
“He did?” Just when I was building up to a good blaming spot.
“Yes. And his dad is Indian police—not the same.”
“Nobody says Indian anymore.”
He shrugged.
“And?”
He got that frustrated “don’t make me explain—just trust me” look on his face.
“Really?” I asked. “You sure?”
“I’m sure.”
“One more thing, then. What dogs?”
He burst out laughing like it was some big joke.
“What dogs?” I asked again. “How did you know there were dogs?”
“Oh Lily-billy, there are always dogs.”
CHAPTER 34
Lily
We had been there for almost two hours when Aubrey asked the inevitable question.
“How’d you guys get here?”
By this time, Arturo had filled me in on everything that had happened between the two of them. Aubrey had asked Arturo right away if he was looking for Amber Jensen—apparently native lands were great places for Seed Savers to duck into while traveling from place to place. (Although he had also considered we might be runaways.) He had then suggested we stay and speak with his father. Besides being the police chief, he was also on the council. Aubrey said if we had any questions or needs there was no better place for us to be than right where we were. I felt a little nervous about it, but Arturo was one hundred percent sure so we stayed. Aubrey knew better than to ask a lot of questions. Up until now he had only asked if we had travelled a great distance and the nature of our relationship to each other.
“ATV,” Arturo said. “But they wanted to get us an EVC.”
“You came on an ATV?” Aubrey seemed quite excited. “What model?”
Arturo swelled with pride as he described Bronco’s features.
Aubrey looked around. “So where is it?”
“Down by the road; we walk up.”
“By the road?” Aubrey’s voice and face registered alarm. “The garage was locked, wasn’t it?”
“Yes. We left in the forest. Cannot see it from the road.”
“You better hope not, bro. Let’s go. That was not a bright idea.”
Aubrey dashed around the house and down the trail, Arturo at his heels with me right behind. Sure enough, when we got to the place we had parked the cycle, it was gone.
“Oh, no! Bronco!” I looked at Arturo. He said something in Spanish that didn’t need translating.
Aubrey shook his head from side to side. “Around here if you don’t want to go looking for your things, man, you need to lock them up. But don’t worry. We’ll find it.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I couldn’t believe it—I had finally spoken directly to this kid and I sounded impertinent.
He looked at me without speaking, then turned to Arturo and answered, as if Arturo had asked the question rather than me.
“Somebody out joyriding. They’ll leave it when they’re done. But my dad can find it before then.”
I wanted to say more, say how dumb that was. Ask if they just let thieves run around like that all the time here on native land. But I was too polite. Or maybe I was intimidated. Or maybe it was a mean and ugly thing to say. I’m not sure, but I kept my mouth shut.
Mr. Morningstar arrived home around seven, the sun taunting the mountains with its descent, its evening light soothing my anxious heart. He parked his tribal police truck in the garage at the bottom of the hill and trudged up the mountain, four large black dogs darting in front and behind, on and off the trail, all the way up the hill. Mrs. Morningstar had shown up around five. We had been offered food when it was discovered we were hungry, but dinner had waited for Mr. Morningstar.
The meal was tasty and filling. Arturo had advised that I should eat it without asking questions, and he would tell me more about the food later on if I wanted.
Here’s what I remember: steaks, cooked outside, like the time we had the meat at Arturo’s house; vegetables; and some bread—but not the kind of bread I’d had at Evelyn and Abner’s. For dessert we had something called “putting”—at least I think I got that right. A strange name for food, I know. And it was strange. Very soft, almost liquid. Tasty and soft. I tried to act natural, but I think they could tell I didn’t know much about real food. I felt them watching me, and Mrs. Morningstar kept talking to the twins in their other language, warning them, I suppose, to behave and not bug me. During the meal everyone was polite and talked only of the day’s events but not about why we were there or that the bike had been stolen or about police business. After dinner Aubrey’s dad invited us into his study, alone.
“Aubrey tells me you are friends of Amber Jensen.”
“Yes,” I said.
“And you came here because … ?”
“We saw the purple flowers.”
“Is near some coordinates,” Arturo interjected. He told Mr. Morningstar about Sara Jane and our brief stay with her.
His massive eyebrows raised. “I see.” He looked hard at me, then at Arturo. “You are looking for him?�
� he asked.
“Yes. James Gardener. He’s my father.”
“So I thought.”
Mr. Morningstar was a man of few words—unlike his son. And yet I found him a bit unnerving.
“How did you two get here?” he asked.
CHAPTER 35
Clare and Dante
“What are you doing here?” Her voice was pleasant and a comfortable smile lit her face.
“Nice to see you, too,” Jason joked. For some reason he enjoyed teasing Clare even though he had never had a younger sister. “Just checkin’ the place out. Making sure the Guardians know what they’re doing.”
She nodded her head slowly. “Oh, I get it. That’s why I’ve never seen you out here before. Your family had a greenhouse. You already know all this stuff.” After she had said it, she worried maybe she’d made him feel bad--reminding him of his family and everything. He didn’t seem to mind.
“Yeah, I pretty much know about growing veggies. I’m here to fill in around the edges.”
Clare stood over a flat of tomato seedlings. White plastic markers declared names like Anna Russian and Black Crimson. For the most part the different varieties looked similar at this early stage, but even now some stood out such as Silvery Fir Tree with its thin leaves. A few plants looked sickly and deformed.
“What happened to these,” Clare asked, flipping up the leaves of the struggling plants.
“Probably nothing.” Jason shrugged. “Just bad seeds. Sometimes you get a bad seed. It happens.”
“Hmm. A bad seed.”
“You just toss the bad ones,” he said.
She looked at the runt plant. Toss it? She wasn’t sure she could do that. The seed had sprouted, after all. It’s not like it was a totally failed seed. Maybe with enough tender care she could nurse it to good health.
“So where’s kid brother today?”
“He had a field trip with his class,” she said. “Lucky. It’s such nice weather.”
“Yeah, no kidding. Need any help here?”
“There’s really not that much to do any more. I think we are all just waiting for it to be warm and dry enough to move everything outside.”
“All right then, see ya around.”
“Bye.”
She turned back to the tray of seedlings and spoke quietly to the deformed plant. “It’s okay, little guy. I’ll take care of you.”
Clare didn’t know how she could stand to be indoors one minute more on a day like today—eighteen degrees Celsius, sunny and warm. And yet she couldn’t think of anything more to do outside.
After she had gotten home from school, she let the chickens wander while she pulled weeds from Marissa’s garden. Then she checked the place where a few of the first seeds had been planted when the weather allowed.
The lawn was long and green, and last season’s kale had survived the winter looking lush and appetizing. The overwintering herbs were ragged and scrawling, undoubtedly in need of trimming, but Marissa was busy inside and couldn’t be bothered. Dante played Monitor games.
Clare thought about home. Even then, living in an apartment, she had spent a fair amount of time outdoors. And it was nicer here—less humid and buggy, and of course the farm was quiet and peaceful. It felt healthy to be outside.
As she stood, thinking, it occurred to her that maybe she could get started on her school work out here. A swing hung on the front porch, and here in the back, the patio table lingered in the sunshine. She would work on her English assignment; they were doing a poetry unit. She had never been asked to write a poem before—or at least not a whole portfolio of poems! Her assignment was to produce a variety of poems culminating in a book, poster, or Monitor montage presentation. She hadn’t yet decided on her project’s final form, but she could definitely bring a notepad outside and get started.
Clare hurried inside and rummaged through her folders until she found the instruction packet for the project. Back in the sunny yard, she curled up on one of the white patio chairs she had dragged onto the grass. Let’s see, where are those examples, she thought, flipping through the packet. She perused the list of poems they were to construct: acrostic, diamond, haiku, free verse …
“Hmm. Free verse sounds easy,” she said aloud. The chickens, cooped up nearby, mistakenly thought she was speaking to them and called to be released. Clare sighed, stood, and dropped her notebook onto the chair. “You girls were just out,” she said, but she didn’t really mind. She opened the cage door, freeing the fat hens. She laughed as they ran and flapped and clucked as if they had been cooped up for months instead of just minutes. Back in the chair, Clare wrote:
The chickens run and cluck
fluffy bottoms swing from side to side
She couldn’t think of anything else to write and was tempted to scratch out what she had written. She tried again.
chickens
scratching in the dirt
as I scratch in my notebook
Just then a squirrel scuttled by—close—from the walnut tree, up a post, and into an apple tree. Clare had been so still it had not noticed her. She looked down at her paper and made changes.
chickens
scratch in the dirt
as I scratch in my notebook
A squirrel scampers past
unaware of our scratching—
Neither the chickens’
nor mine.
She wasn’t sure she liked it. Maybe I’ll come back to it later, she thought. Maybe I should try another kind. She took a stab at a sensory poem.
Five Senses Poem
Gnats hover just above the grass
Bumping my skin as they levetate (look up spelling)
their tiny bodies an unwelcome irritant
A crow calls in the distance
answered only by a fussing squirrel
The scent of freshly cut mowed grass
and newly turned soil teases
me into thinking I can taste
spring.
But I don’t know what spring tastes like
In my life, seasons had no flavor.
CHAPTER 36
Clare and Dante
The train screamed like a pig as it rumbled down the track. Oil me, oil me, it seemed to call. Dante and Clare stood astride their bikes, counting the cars of the slow-moving machine. The Woods had offered to buy them new bikes, but they had insisted on keeping these: the faithful two-wheelers that had brought them the great distance to Canada. So the bikes had gotten deluxe makeovers, with new tires and chains and whatever else the kids wanted. Though they would deny it if asked, the Woods definitely spoiled Clare and Dante.
As the weather grew warmer and the days longer, the kids spent more time exploring the rural area that was their temporary new home. When they had first arrived, late last summer, there had been too much going on. Before being placed with the Woods, they had stayed briefly at Firefly’s home. Next was the transitional orientation period when they had been housed in a special shelter where arrangements were made for them to have a brief and secure contact with their mother. They had been examined physically and psychologically and had filled out forms to best match them with their host family. And then they had landed smack dab in the middle of busy apple season with the Woods. Not to mention, Clare and Dante had just spent too much time riding bikes and seeing new places. They had been ready to settle in, and settle in they did.
But now the children shook off winter like a dog shakes off water. All Dante need do was stand at the open door and he could smell adventure in the fresh spring air.
“Fifty-seven, fifty-eight, fifty-nine.”
At last, the bright yellow caboose. The children pulled their bikes over the tracks, hopped on, and cruised down the lonely road. They turned at a small side road, Clare noting their turns so they wouldn’t get lost. Of course, Marissa had made sure they brought a tracker with them, but the kids did not plan to use it. They took no small amount of pride in the fact that they had made it all the way to Derby and
then into Canada, mostly on their own.
Soon the children found themselves enveloped by orchards of pink flowering trees, immersed in the sweet scent of the blossoms. They rode into the trees, stopped, and dropped their bikes.
“Oh, Dante,” Clare said, inhaling deeply, “it’s so lovely.”
He looked around. “I think these are fruit trees. What kind do you think they are? They can’t be apples, because they’re not like at home.”
It hurt Clare a little when he referred to the host place as home.
“Or maybe some trees are just a little ahead of other trees,” he added.
“Yeah,” she agreed. She was thinking she didn’t really care. It was so beautiful. The wave of pink petals up there, brushing against the blue, blue sky. The delectable scent of thousands of tiny blossoms.
“Hear that?” Dante asked. “Listen.”
She listened. There wasn’t anything—no traffic noise, no voices, or loud music. She was about to say this when she realized there was a sound, so uniform, so constant and unvarying, that she hadn’t noticed it at first. A low hum.
“Bees.” he said. “Like Gruff’s. These are some pretty happy bees.”
The little workers buzzed around them from blossom to blossom, oblivious to the children’s existence or to anything but the task at hand.
“Let’s run!” Dante took off into the orchard, arms flailing. Clare laughed and ran after him. After awhile both children stopped and lay flat on the moist ground. Petals had started to drop, and though not yet a carpet, the children felt wrapped in a sea of pink.
“I could never have imagined this,” Clare said.
