“Shut up!” I bump her again, this time hard enough that we both tip over, still wrapped in our blankets, and we end up half wrestling with each other on the floor as we laugh.
“Ahem.”
Rose and I look up from our tangle of blankets and limbs to see a tall, broad figure standing in the living room doorway. The firelight dances across a bearded face and sparks in frosty-blue eyes.
“Sol,” I say, sitting up and smiling at him. But the expression on his face is unreadable, still as a statue, and it makes my own smile fall away quickly. “I’m so sorry. Did we wake you up? Were we being too loud?”
“A little,” he says. “What are you two doing down here at this hour?”
Beside me, Rose sits up, too. “The wind. It kept us awake.”
“Ah. I see. Well, it seems to have calmed down a bit now,” he says. “You should probably go get some sleep. It’s only a few hours before you’ll need to get back up to get chores started.”
I nod and push myself to my feet. Despite the chill, I feel warmall over. “Right. Sorry again. We didn’t mean to wake you up.”
He smiles, and I instantly feel myself relax a little. “Don’t worry about it. No harm done.”
Rose is close behind me as we move past Sol and hurry up the stairs. “Still,” she says. “It was rude of us. I’m sorry, too.”
“You girls are sweet,” Sol says. “Your apologies are accepted. But next time you can’t sleep, try to remember the others. Caring for each other—being considerate of one another—is one of the things that helps our garden flourish.”
Behind me, I hear Rose stifling a giggle.
“Right!” I say, hoping I’m loud enough to cover for her. “It won’t happen again. Good night, Sol.”
We reach the top of the stairs, and Sol still hasn’t moved. I can feel his eyes on Rose and me, watching us go right up until we step through the door to the attic.
“Good night, girls.”
IRIS
It’sa few days later when Sol finally calls me to his room to discuss my upcoming trials.
Poppy and I are out in the shed behind the cabin, stacking firewood and listening to an audiobook on the old battery-powered cassette player Sol keeps out there. It’s a recording ofThe Fellowship of the Ringfrom the 1980s that Sol picked up from Goodwill after finding out that Poppy likes fantasy books. In the six months that Poppy has been here, she’s listened to that book more times than I can count.
We’ve just finished up and Poppy is turning off the tape player when I hear Lily’s voice calling my name from out in the yard.
“Iris?”
“I’m in the shed!” I call back.
A second later, Lily appears in the open doorway. She peers inside and grimaces, not crossing the threshold as she says, “Sol’slooking for you, hon. He wants to see you as soon as you got a minute.”
I know immediately what this is about, and my stomach twists with a strange mix of worry and excitement.
“We’re all done,” Poppy says, making her way over to Lily. She stretches her arms over her head and yawns. “And now I’m gonna sneak off for a nap.”
Lily gives her an apologetic smile. “I’m afraid you might not have time for that. Violet wants you and Rose to help her skin the deer she got this morning.”
Poppy wrinkles her nose. “Ughhh.”
“I know, I know. But y’all are the only two who ain’t learned to skin yet.”
Poppy turns and slumps back into the shed, brushing past me as she goes and sits down in a metal folding chair in a corner. “Might as well wait here for them, then,” she says.
I walk toward the shed door. “Is Sol in his room?” I ask.
Lily doesn’t answer. Her eyes are on Poppy. Or maybe on the chair Poppy has sat down on. Her brown skin has gone a bit pale. It’s not the first time I’ve seen that expression on her face out in this shed. I’ve always assumed it’s a claustrophobia response.
