“Something wrong?” he asked. He nodded at the jars. “Besides all this, that is.”
“No, no,” Leila said, shaking her head and grabbing a jar, studying the end of one of the sticks inside. “It’s fine, I’m fine. This one looks like it needs a little more trimming though.”
“Hey, fun fact—” Jon started.
“Oh God, not right now Jon, seriously,” Leila groaned. Jon wrote both locally, in the Philadelphia region, and abroad for news outlets such as Slate, Farm & Agriculture, The New York Times, and Grid. Back when she was in the group home, Leila regularly read those kinds of websites on her beat-up, donated tablet or on trips to the library. She dreamed of one day making a difference, quite literally, in the outside world. She was pretty sure she’d read an article or two of Jon’s in the past few years, but she wasn’t about to let him know that. He also taught part-time at St. Joseph’s University, in their small environmental studies department.
The result of all his constant research and once-a-week lectures though, was this.
The “fun fact” tidbits.
And while Leila certainly appreciated Jon’s wealth of knowledge about nature and all, he always brought them up at the worst time, his poor attempt to neutralize tense and awkward situations.
“Fun fact,” Jon said again, stressing the fun in the sentence, which should have told him no part of this was actually fun. He picked up one of the mason jars, clinking it with the ring on his finger. “They call this cloning. Technically, these sticks, if they bloom into new trees, are really just the same exact tree.”
Leila gave him a look.
“Yeah I should have figured you knew that one,” Jon said, shaking his head and placing the jar back down with a light plink. “Still, cloning. It’s like we’re mad scientists in here.”
“Sure, Jon,” Leila said, shaking her head with a smile. “Sure. Think Liz will be okay with me putting these up along the windowsill? I’d like to make sure they get some sun and have a chance to grow a few roots. They need to take root before—.”
“Yes, yes,” Jon said. “Before it gets too cold and the trees go to sleep.”
“It’s called dorman—” Leila started.
“Dormancy,” Jon said. “Yes, I know. It’s like hibernation, only for trees. Everything slows down. Abscisic acid in deciduous trees signals the leaves to fall, suspends the tree’s growth, stops cells from dividing…” He grinned as he faded off. Leila stared at him. “You do remember me being a journalist and professor of all this, yes?”
“I do,” Leila said with a smirk.
“Let’s wrap these up before Lizzie gets down here with her questions,” Jon said with a wink. Leila shook her head and focused on the jars, moving them from the sink to the window.
But with each small movement the voices came back, and they whispered.
She squinted as they spoke up, trying to focus on them while at the same time wishing they would just go away. The speech was soft and delicate, dancing around her ears like ghosts.
When it came to the voices, every now and again she could make out a word or two, sometimes the broken part of a sentence. The voices had been louder back at the group home, and sometimes they came back stronger when she took the local train into Philadelphia to visit Sarika at the cafe; but out here in the suburbs of the city, they were weak and muttering, pieces that made little sense. Even when they had roared as the tree was struck by lightning, the phrases still came out in hard-to-figure-out bits.
Thi… saf… whe… than…
Leila shut her eyes and shook her head, trying to push the voices away, push back the growing darkness brewing in her chest, the swirling mass of anxiety and panic. Not here. Not now, with Jon hovering over her like this, trying to do his way-too-perfect parent thing. Helicoptering, she’d heard Lisabeth call it. She didn’t need him to ask what was wrong so she’d have to make up lie after lie to cover it up. She didn’t need him figuring this out.
Sending her back.
Not after she’d gotten this far.
The voices called, whispering. It was the sound of a number of people talking all at once, quietly, like a crowd muttering in a movie theater before the previews.
She whispered softly to herself, so Jon wouldn’t hear.
“Kitchen. Jar. Floor. Sink—”
And then the voices spoke loudly, in one clear sentence, like the roar of the wind in the storm.
Thank you.
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