“Sailor, wait,” Cal said. “What did the recruiter tell you?”
“Only what we wanted to hear.” He paused. “That we had a purpose.”
And with that, Sailor turned around and was gone.
August had packed Cal’s shorts and Frida’s favorite blue dress. Their quilt, sewn by Frida’s grandmother. A handful of Cal’s bandannas. A few pairs of underwear. Cal didn’t like to think of August going through their things, but thank goodness he had, because Cal had been craving another pair of socks and his second pair of boots and his pillow. They were all here.
August’s ability to pick the right possessions felt like a seduction. It implied that he and the others could anticipate their needs, could guess what would bring them comfort and happiness. This delivery of possessions said, We understand you.
Maybe they did.
Cal pulled out Frida’s blue cable-knit sweater and brought it to his face. The wool made his throat tickle. August had never seen Frida wear this, even Cal hadn’t; she only used it as a pillow when she couldn’t sleep. Somehow August had known she’d feel relieved, seeing it here.
It was the same as Micah knowing that Cal would feel flattered, honored, even, to be asked to join them each morning, to make important decisions. You’re really smart, he’d said. You’re my brother-in-law.
Micah wanted him to believe that their morning meetings were special but harmless. That they discussed who got what jobs and what repairs were needed right away and what members might be on the verge of dispute and need intervention. Village-elder-type work.
Their meetings probably did include such quotidian concerns, but there had to be more. Why else would he be asked to keep them a secret from Frida? How did the Land get all its coveted objects, for instance? Just yesterday, Frida had mentioned that she’d seen garlic powder in the kitchen, not due to expire for another year. And what was August looking for on his routes? The nature of his surveillance had to be central to their meetings.
If he joined them, he’d find out.
Cal swept his hand along the bottom of the bag and hit something hard. He didn’t recognize it. He felt along its strange surface and felt wire, too. He pulled it out.
Frida’s abacus. It was one of her artifacts, stored under the cots, where the turkey baster must have been hiding all along.
Why pack her abacus? If August had known of the child, Cal might have read its inclusion as a kind and hopeful gesture. Now it struck him as wrong, threatening even. It meant August had searched every corner of their house, that he’d left nothing unexamined. He must have been there for a few nights: like Goldilocks, he’d slept in their bed, eaten their food, tried everything on for size. He had seen the world as they did, or he’d tried to, though this wasn’t about empathy but scrutiny and territory. He wanted Cal and Frida to know that.
Sailor had blanched when Cal asked him about the Group. No way this was an idyllic ghost-town kibbutz.
A place that banned children had to have a streak of insidiousness at its center.
These men were up to something.
13
In the dark, Frida held the sweater to her cheek. It itched and made her eyes water, her throat tighten, but maybe that was the point. She’d been nineteen when her father had given it to her, explaining it had magical properties. He was wearing it the night he met Frida’s mother, and when the old Mercedes broke down for good on the 405. “This thing kept me from having a panic attack,” he said as he held out the ratty sweater for her to take. Now that she was old enough to appreciate it, he said, he wanted her to have it. “You’ve got a job, right?” He’d rolled his shoulders back and forth, and shook out his neck, like he was getting ready for a boxing match. “Adult problems are just around the bend.”
But tonight, the sweater wasn’t working. Her eyes were open, and even her blood felt awake.
Cal was snoring next to her. He’d fallen asleep soon after telling her what had happened earlier that day, as if confessing had exhausted him. No wonder Micah and the others—Peter, August, even Sailor—had acted strangely at dinner. They knew about the baby. She and Cal might not be able to stay.
There were rules, apparently.
“And if we have to leave,” Cal had whispered, before turning over in bed, “we’ll never be able to come back.” Frida tried not to hear the relief in his voice.
He told her he wasn’t angry at her for lying to him, but she knew he was. At dinner he hadn’t poured her a mug of tea as he usually did, and once it was just the two of them alone in their room he’d answered her questions curtly, hardly looking at her. He’d snuffed out the candle before she was even in bed.