“Anyhow, I’m sure it’s fine.” I switch the topic back to safer ground, unwilling to probe the feelings he roused in me—good and bad. “He seemed to warm up to me by the end of our conversation.”
“I’m sure it went great. They’re pretty desperate for hires right now. I can put in a word for you.”
“Thanks.” I give Sid a genuine smile. I don’t like owing him, but this also matters so incredibly much. I need it to work out. “Was there anything else we needed to talk about?”
“No, I just wanted to check in,” he says.
“Then I better get back to April.” I hop off the bench, dusting my pants, though it doesn’t do much to get rid of the wet patches.
“You sure? I got the impression she wanted to be alone.”
“Why would she want that?”
“Well, everyone does sometimes.”
“No, they don’t. Nobody wants to be alone.”
Sid laughs outright. “That’s bullshit, and you know it. You avoid people all the time.”
“Not the people I trust,” I say. “Nobodylikesto be alone.”
His smile vanishes. “Kayla, you don’t have to live that way anymore. You’re safe here.”
“Sure.”
Easy for him to say. He’s the size of an ox and has seven people he can rely on. That’s probably the closest anyone comes to the villages and cities of earlier generations. Community building was wired into us by our ancestors, who lived during a time when it was still safe to reach out to other people. Evolution is a slow process, whichis why humans managed to outrun it, right into our own destruction. Now, we survivors have got all these left over inclinations that make us join cults.
Sid Charles might have started his life in Salt Spring as a sanctuary seeker, but he’s one ofthemnow. He’s bought into whatever dream it is they’re selling.
“Good night, Sid. It was nice chatting with you.”
And it was. It hurts more than usual to walk away, safe in the solitude that protects me.
A WEEK LATER,I spend the day pacing the farm as I await April’s return from her first day of school. By now, the sights are familiar. Most of the acreage is fields of oats. The stalks have been broken down and the men have moved on to later steps in the harvest. Today, they sit in a circle, talking while they swish the grain around in baskets. They toss the contents just high enough for the breeze to catch the chaff and carry it away. I give them a wide berth, not wanting to intrude, though Sid’s words from the other night echo in my ear.
You don’t have to live that way anymore. You’re safe here.
It’s so tempting to believe him. Most of the guys are comfortable ignoring me now, which is wonderful. Indifference is one of the safest emotions to inspire in a man. Aside from small talk at dinner each night, they expect nothing from me. I doubt they’ll even notice once we’re gone, aside from Silas who will be relieved to have his apartment back.
Well, Sid might notice too. Any time I pace near theirgroup, his eyes flick up. It only lasts a second and I wouldn’t know he’d done it at all if I wasn’t watching for the gesture. We’re both guilty of… what, exactly? Curiosity?
I turn away rather than dwell on the thought for too long and keep walking.
It rained last night, but the sun has broken through the clouds to illuminate the dew that clings to every surface. The cedars at the edge of the farm shimmer with heavy mist, their scent lifting into the air. These have always been my favourite mornings. Nothing feels better than rolling back a wet tarp to find the world filmy and bright.
My walk takes me to the far edge of the property, where Silas keeps a small clutch of chickens (they’re almost far enough away not to wake us up in the morning) and a beehive that everyone says is a huge pain in the ass to keep alive through the winter. I skirt by the duck pond, my boots sinking through the sodden grass into the muddy layer below. Closer to the farmstead, I pass a few rows of vegetable gardens. So long as Sid’s guys meet their assigned grain quotas, they’re free to use the remaining land how they wish. It’s late enough in the season that many of the plants have started to die back. Yesterday’s rain did the tomato vines no favours. They’re greying, though fruit still ripens along a tangled trellis and it takes all my self control not to run off with a handful of cherry tomatoes.
And that’s it. I can circle the whole acreage dozens of times in a day, going nowhere. Forget April’s medicine, I better get that border job just so I know what the hell to do with all my pent up energy.
Late in the afternoon, April comes home, a massive stack of papers in her arms. “They put me in Grade 10,” she says before I can even ask how it went. “Mostly because my English scores were high. I’m in a remedial math class for kids who’ve fallen behind, but I amnotstaying there.”
“And what are these?” I reach to take some of her load and realize the papers are math workbooks going all the way back to Grade 6. They aren’t bound with spines, like pre-Quake books, but crudely made with stapled printer paper.
“My ticket out of the stupid kid class.”
“April, we donotcall ourselves or other children stupid.” I should have taught her this a while ago, but it never came up in our old lives. She had no one to compare herself to other than me and I had a ten-year head start on everything. How was I to know she’s so competitive?
She grabs the workbooks roughly back from me. “I’ve got a lot of studying to do.”
