It felt as though all the air had been sucked out of the room.
“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that,” Jon said, shaking his head, his eyes gone wide.
“No, no, you’re probably right,” Leila snapped, standing up and grabbing her backpack. “I’m just some broken girl comparing herself to other things. Oh, this house is abandoned. I’m also abandoned. I’m just like this house. Let me make things difficult for Jon. People aren’t paying attention to these mice, I’m so ignored like a small woodland creature. Oh, this tree is going to get torn down because it’s a little broken. Maybe I’ll get thrown away too. Look at how emotionally damaged I am. I’m just like this fucking tree.”
“Leila, come on, I didn’t—”
“No, you said it, and you’re right.” Leila swung the backpack over her shoulder. “My reasons are my own, Jon.” Leila stormed for the front door.
“Yeah, well, your reasons aren’t going to be good enough,” Jon said, sounding a little more heated. Leila stopped and turned around.
“Listen.” Jon stood up and pushed the chair out, the wood squeaking angrily against the floor. “If you want to save your grove and this old house, come back with something other than ideas about the place being pretty and supposedly having these endangered mice, and, Leila, I will help you. I want to. I want your causes to be mine. The amphitheater isn’t, I don’t know, evil or nefarious here. It’s being built with good intentions. It’ll bring people to the park. It’ll help the whole park system make money, which can help fund other projects. Maintaining older sections of the park, repairing historic structures, things like that. And it’s been in the works for a long time. But maybe they can build it someplace else.
“But let me be clear on all this,” Jon said, walking towards her in the hallway. “This is going to happen. The permits are there, plans are being made. They’re going to lay the foundation in the next week or so, which means you’ve really only got days. And no one has been able to find proof those mice live there. Otherwise it wouldn’t be happening.”
Days.
Leila held her feet firmly to the ground, fighting the feeling that she might stumble over from the revelation. She put on a face, looked at Jon and shook her head, resisting the urge to burst into tears. Days. Days to ask questions. Days to hope that Karayea recovered from the chemical-filled spray paint. Days to get answers to her questions and save the grove, and possibly, save Philadelphia.
“What do I need to do?” Leila asked, pushing the anger down and away.
“You need to find something that’ll prevent them from building. If the fact that it’s a historic landmark didn’t help, then it needs to be something else. Something bigger than that.”
“Landon, this park ranger I met over there,” Leila said. “He’s the one who knows about the endangered mice. I can bring him in, he can talk to your board or however all that works. It’s illegal to take away the habitat of an endangered species, everyone knows that.”
“See, that’s your angle.” Jon nodded, his eyes widening. “But you need to get proof of these critters. They haven’t found those mice, Leila. If you did, somehow, that could stop, or least put off the building and construction. They will have to investigate it.”
“Got it,” Leila said, nodding.
“If I wasn’t on their board, I’d write about this myself, or tip someone off.” Jon sighed. “But I could lose my job with the papers, the magazines. It’s a big conflict of interest. I can at least point you in the right direction, though, and voice my concerns to the staff at the Center for Horticulture.”
A bit of silence hung in the air between the two of them as Leila looked at Jon and the front door, awkwardly wanting to leave while wanting to make up.
“Jon, look, I’m—” she started.
“Don’t,” Jon said, shaking his head and holding a hand up. “I shouldn’t have said what I said. I want to help. I’m just frustrated, is all. Walking on eggshells around these things is difficult.”
“Fair enough,” Leila smiled.
“Go save the world,” Jon said, waving Leila off. “Or at least part of it.”
Leila opened the front door. The trees that lined the street were a shade of deep red, and patches of the grass that had pushed its way up through the sidewalk cracks had already started to brown.
Save the world?
He had no idea.
LEILA: Hey, so, you know my father, Jon?
LEILA: He knows some of the people involved in the park situation.
LEILA: And your bird place!
LEILA: He can help but we need to get all this evidence.
LEILA: I’m basically talking to myself right now aren’t I?
LANDON: . . .
LEILA: I can see you debating on typing something.
LEILA: I see the dots!
LEILA: I know you want to say hi to me. I’m cute.
LEILA: Landon.
LEILA: Fine.
XIX
“Really? Nothing?” Sarika asked, as she polished one of the wooden tables in Adam’s. She looked up at Leila and tossed the rag. “Sorry, can’t help myself. I’m not even on the clock right now.”
“It’s fine. And yeah, I don’t get it,” Leila said. “After all we went through with the grove and the dryads. We had some real moments, you know? He’s skipping the protest and won’t return any of my texts.”
“You could always fall back on Shawn, if you know what I mean,” Sarika said with a grin. Leila snatched up the table rag and threw it at her. “Oh, gross!”
“That’s what you get,” Leila said, rolling her eyes. “I’ve got all the fliers hung up here and in the local shops, and I told the rest of the group about what Jon said. It’s just going to be hard to find these mice without Landon, you know? I mean, how do you find an endangered mouse? It couldn’t have been an endangered squirrel? A sparrow?”
“An endangered mole, perhaps?” Sarika continued, sitting down at the table “Maybe an ant? How about a salamander?”
“Psh, at least those we can maybe find under rocks and logs.” Leila sighed.
“Whatever,” Sarika said, standing up. “Let’s just go make him help us.”
“Come on, we can’t—”
“He’s not supposed to have that owl as, like, a pet, right?” Sarika asked, her hands on her hips. “I say we head over to where he’s interning, and tell him if he doesn’t help us dig around in the grove, we’ll report it.”
“What! No way. I’m fine with just talking to him, but I’m not gonna threaten his owl. Not Milford. That’s messed up.”
“Hey, ends justifying the means and all that stuff, right?” Sarika shrugged. “What’s more important? His feelings and a one-winged bird, or learning the history of your family, rescuing your apparent mother, and saving a patch of woods that supposedly helps sustain the entire city of millions of people?”
“It’s not that easy.”
“But it kinda is.”
“But it isn’t.”
“But it is.”
Leila sighed and shook her head, pulling her phone out. She turned the screen on, stared at the last few texts with Landon, and immediately put it back in her pocket.
“We go, but only to talk to him,” Leila said. “No threats like that unless . . . we have to, okay?”
“Deal,” Sarika said, nodding. She grabbed her satchel off the table and swung it around her shoulder. “Let’s go.”
THREAD: PROTESTING IN FAIRMOUNT PARK (UPDATE)
SUBFORUM: PHILADELPHIA
PROTESTING IN FAIRMOUNT PARK (UPDATE)
Posted by A Dash of Paprika
AUGUST 26th, 2017 | 10:02AM
Hey everyone! So far we’ve got an absolute legion of you on board for the big protest, and we couldn’t be happier.
But! We’re adjusting the message a little bit.
Turns out protesting the fact that they want to tear down something that’s gorgeous and beautiful isn’t quite enough, nor do they care about the history. But they are going to care about the endangered animals in the park.
Supposedly there’s a critically endangered field mouse living in that area. We’re going to head out to collect evidence and will circle back. If anyone wants to support or help out with that, give a shout, please!
RE: PROTESTING IN FAIRMOUNT PARK (UPDATE)
Posted by WithouttheY