Rules of Escape

Chapter 34 - Ana

Grass grows in thick clumps around the garden fence posts because nobody wants to use the whipper snipper, or even a sturdy pair of scissors, to trim it back. Deciding who will do this unwanted job is not a priority for Ana or Evan. So the grass grows, well-watered and untended, and the gate is ever harder to open, so clogged by grass is its pathway. Ana would leave the gate permanently open if it weren't for the deer that munch on flowers, fruit, leaves, and stems. Even seedlings are ripped from the loose earth before having a chance to sink their roots in. Everything but the weeds and grass it seems, gets chomped.

Ana sets down the bowl and pitchfork she carries so she can use both hands to lift and heave the gate open. She walks past beans climbing corn stalks and tomatoes drooping over wire supports, kneels down and plunges her hands into warm, dark earth, feeling for young potatoes. Her mouth waters thinking about the scalloped potatoes and cherry pie Michael will have ready for dinner tonight. He is becoming a very good cook.

Michael likes working in the kitchen and every week, he masters a new dish. One day, Michael says, he will cook an entire meal by himself. It's the multitasking that is especially hard for Michael because everything is new to him. In the group homes, residents were not allowed in the kitchen. Ever. If he wanted a drink, a staff person had to get it for him. Peter told him that once he no longer needed recipes, cooking would become easier which is why he memorizes each recipe once he has perfected it.

Kazuki also helps Michael by researching recipes and methods of food preservation on the internet. The garden is such a success that they have more food than they can eat and some food they sell at a stand at the end of the driveway, but the rest Joe said they should freeze or preserve for winter. Kazuki likes using the computer because he has learned how to use social media. Ro set up a Facebook page for him and a twitter account. In the past, Kazuki wrote weekly letters to his mom and dad and he said it took a long time because he liked his writing to be perfect. Now he can post messages and pictures that all his family can see and lots of people in his family write back to him.

Usually Evan helps Ana with the garden, but today he has left with Peter and Kazuki to buy supplies to build a chicken coop. Kazuki has spent days researching chickens and coops and now has a detailed plan of exactly what they should build and which birds they should buy. Some chickens are better egg layers than others, Kazuki told Ana. Other chickens aren't very good egg layers, but are better for eating. And some chickens aren't very good for anything, they're just really pretty and make nice pets.

Most days, Eliza sings. She loves to sing and hang laundry. This is what Eliza is doing right now, while Ana searches for potatoes.

It is a beautiful day, Ana thinks, watching the sheets billow around Eliza. Every so often, she catches the sweet scent of a cherry pie Michael has left to cool on the kitchen window sill.

Her bowl almost full, Ana moves over to the tomatoes do some weeding. She pulls out weeds even though a man is standing on the other side of the fence, waving a piece of paper. Before she goes inside, Ana decides she will pick some cherry tomatoes for snacking on before dinner.

The man is shouting and Ana can't hear Eliza any more. She looks around for Eliza, sees only sheets blowing in the wind where Eliza had been singing. Eliza must have gone inside. The laundry basket is gone and when Ana looks around, she realizes she is alone with a yelling man who is flapping his arms.

"Hey, retard!" the man yells.

Ana looks in the direction of the man and is blinded by the sun. Who invited this man into the backyard? He shouldn't be in the back yard if he is not invited. Evan? What's retard? There's a man here saying retard. But of course, Evan cannot answer because he is out with Peter.