CHAPTER TWO
Calder – Twelve-Years-Old
The dusty canyon trail was steep and narrow, but now that I'd almost made it to the valley floor where the harsh rays of the sun couldn't reach, I sighed in relief at the feel of the cooler air. It was January and the weather during the day was only in the seventies, but the shade still felt good while I was moving so quickly.
Even though it was a tough hike, I loved this bi-weekly ritual of collecting the purified water I brought and served at Temple. I made my way down the trail as quickly as possible, practically running in some spots, so I could spend extra time at the spring. Every so often, Hector would accompany me and say a blessing over the water himself, although it was actually the gods who provided the healing water for us so we would be pure and cleansed when the great flood came. It was this purification that would balance our systems and help ward off evil and temptation.
Whenever someone was injured or sick, I would fetch an extra dose of the water for them, as sickness was mostly a massive state of imbalance, or so Hector said. Hector also said that although the gods provided the water for us, and it would help with the situation, ultimately it was to be seen whether the gods' will was for healing or not. Sometimes they deemed healing to occur, and sometimes, Hector said, it was not their will, and we had to accept that and not question the reasons why. It was not for us to know, at least not yet.
That was the case with Maya. My parents had told me that when they saw the deformity of her leg and the fact her features were different, they had dripped the healing waters into her small, baby mouth, but apparently the gods had their reasons for keeping her the way she was, because that time, the water didn't work.
But, just last summer, when I had served the water to Franklin Massey who was doubled over in agonizing stomach pain, later that day, he suddenly straightened up and was healed, wouldn't you know.
I guessed it was true you never could know the reasons of the gods because from what I'd seen, Franklin Massey was a mean old crab who walked around with a puss on his face all the livelong day. And Maya, well she was like a little ray of sunshine. It wasn't how I'd run things when I got some authority up in Elysium, that was for sure. Although I guessed that was a moot point anyway, because there was no sickness in Elysium. Maya would run through the fields on two perfectly working legs and her mind would work just like everyone else's. I had to smile at the picture.
I knew for sure the water was magical though, because every time I drank it, a feeling of peace and happiness flowed through me, and I felt cleansed and strengthened.
I made a sharp turn and the spring came into view. The water was crystal blue and sparkling and it had green plants blooming around it. It always struck me as a small paradise and I stood simply admiring it for a few minutes.
I set down the canvas bag that held the water containers and dropped to the grass, laying back and lacing my fingers behind my head so I could gaze at the clear, blue sky, surrounded by the towering canyon walls. Everything around me was grand and beautiful and full of color and light. I wondered how Elysium could be any more beautiful than what the gods had already created right here on earth.
As I lay there, my eyes landed on some brush that seemed to have been pushed aside in a way I'd never noticed before. I frowned in curiosity and pulled myself up and walked over to the strange, little opening. There was a break between the rocks I'd never seen because of the vegetation that had been in front of it.
I peeked inside a little nervously, and then stepped in when I couldn't see anything much from where I stood. On the other side, it suddenly opened up and I stood upright and walked through the space, mostly consisting of dirt, rock, and a few sparse patches of desert grass. But as I walked farther, I heard running water and noticed more vegetation. Moving through another doorway-sized opening I found another spring! I laughed out loud, looking around in wonder at the hidden pool of water. How was it I didn't know about this? I spent more time than anyone down at the healing spring. This one was even larger than the other one—just as clear and just as blue—with plants growing everywhere. There was even a very small waterfall, mostly a trickle really, that ran between two of the larger rocks.
Something caught my attention to my right, in between two rocks. When I moved closer, I saw that someone had written in the dirt and there were several toys sitting neatly on a small blanket where both rocks met, creating a small alcove.
I tilted my head, taking it in. Two baby dolls, a plastic tea set, and a small, pink horse. Strange.
My eyes moved down to the dirt in front of the toys and I saw "Eden" had been spelled out in small pieces of broken sticks.
I scrunched up my face in confusion. Was this where she played? The items looked older. Had she been playing here since she arrived? I stared down at the toys for a minute, curious and wanting to touch them, but I didn't. The council member kids were given toys and the worker kids were not. Still, I kept my hands to myself. Something about those toys sitting there struck me as very, very sad and weakened my desire to pick them up and study them one by one. I thought about the many friends I had and how we played together every afternoon after our work was done—variations on sports our parents taught us, like hide and seek, tag . . . From my experience, there was never a lack of someone to spend time with inside Acadia. As a matter of fact, you had to put some effort into finding some quiet time if you got fed up with people chattering at you from sunup 'til sundown.
But Eden . . . didn't she play with the other kids who lived at the lodge with her? The council members' kids? Or was she forbidden for some reason? I had seen the way my friends looked at her as she walked to the front of the Temple month after month—still with some interest—but clearly she was different than the rest of us. Separate . . . and looked upon with a certain suspicion, probably even jealousy.
I guessed it might be the same with the council members' kids, too. She was separate from them as well—not just another ordinary kid, not yet a wife—sort of a strange mixture of both and not one of an “us.”
I stood up slowly and chewed on my lip for several minutes considering Eden, picturing her playing here in this place she'd found. All alone.
I was jolted out of my thoughts by the loud call of a hawk and made my way back to our spring to fill my water containers. My mom would be looking for me if I wasn't home soon.
I walked back through the brush between the two rocks and arranged it so it wasn't noticeable this time. Hopefully Eden would remember to do the same. For some reason, I didn't want anyone else finding out about that secret spring through the hidden passage.
**********
I watched for Eden more closely after that day, more curious about her now, what she did, how she lived. She was so close and yet seemed so far away from the rest of us.
I looked up at the main lodge, brilliant with its electricity in the midst of the darkness of our small cabins, where we only had candlelight in the evenings.
I saw her now and again, too, peeking through her window if we were playing in the large dirt area a little way from the main lodge, just beyond the first of the small worker homes.
One hot day at the end of that May, we were playing Kick the Can. Only in this case, our "can" was a small piece of driftwood I had retrieved from the river that ran behind our land—our source of clean, drinking water. I tried to keep referring to the game in my head as "kick the driftwood" because thinking about a can made me think about Coca-Cola, and man, that would have tasted good right then and there, sweaty and thirsty under a noontime sun.
All of a sudden, I noticed a blonde head peeking out from behind a tree just a little way away. I pretended not to see her and just kept on playing, every now and again glancing over where I could now see Eden standing among the small grove of Acacia trees, pretty much right out in the open.
Over the next fifteen minutes, she inched closer and closer to our game field, until she was standing right on the edge with some of the other players who had already gotten out.
As she got near, a small brunette girl named Hannah looked at her with wide eyes and blurted out nervously, "Should you be here?"
Eden pulled her shoulders back and glanced around, her eyes lingering on me as she whispered, "I was wondering if I could join your game."
Everyone backed away from her slightly, looking around at each other with disbelief. None of the other council members' kids had ever asked to play with us, ever, not once.
Finally Aaron Swift declared, "No. Uh uh. Go on back up to your palace, princess. You're not one of us." But then he softened his rejection by saying, "You're a flower, we're the weeds. You're either one or the other. You need to play with the other flowers." And he smiled a small, slightly nervous smile at her.
The rest of the kids standing around nodded as Eden's cheeks flamed. She looked down and breathed out shakily, resigned. I realized then she might have been working up the courage to ask us if she could play with us for weeks, maybe even months.
I thought of those toys hidden in the canyon by the spring and realized the council kids didn't play with her either. She was an outsider in both groups. I didn't know why exactly, because I didn't know what went on up in the main lodge, I just knew that she was. Just as she started to turn away, and before I even thought too much about it, I blurted out, "That's not true."
Eden halted and turned back around toward me as several other kids came off the field to see what was going on and what the game holdup was.
I walked over to Eden and made my way around her in a slow circle as she stood still, turning her head to watch me. "Do you know anything about morning glories?" I smiled as I looked into her deep, blue eyes. She was just a kid, but I couldn't help notice she sure was pretty.
She furrowed her brow and bit her lip, as she shook her head, no.
I stood in front of her and crossed my arms over my chest. "A morning glory is a beautiful flower, delicate-like. Blue, just like your eyes." I paused and smiled again. "But the thing about a morning glory?" I leaned in closer and so did she, her eyes filled with curiosity. "The thing about a morning glory is if you let it, it will totally take over your crops, because it's not just a flower. It's also a weed, totally invasive. Stronger than it looks."
I looked around at my friends standing around. "The point is, you don't have to be just a flower or a weed. You can be both." I shrugged my shoulders. "I figure some people are both." I looked around at my friends and grinned at them, raising my eyebrows.
"Aw, geez, Calder, I swear sometimes you make things up out of the clear blue sky," Xander scoffed. "Fine, flower, weed, whatever, let's just play. Eden can be on your team."
Everyone ran to get in their positions. I looked back at Eden as a slow grin spread over her face, and she laughed out loud as she looked at me.
Her grin was contagious, I guessed, because I realized I was grinning, too, as I ran to my own position.
What I had said, though, was true. Morning glories were flowers and weeds—at least here in Arizona. I should know. I'd helped to tug out whole batches of them trying to suck up all the water from our crops.
We played in that hot sun for at least an hour before Mother Miriam came stalking down from the main lodge looking annoyed. "Eden!" she shouted. Eden ran off the field past me, her long, blonde hair and long, heavy skirt flying up behind her. She had played with more gusto than anyone else on the field and within half an hour or so, everyone was treating her like one of the regular "weeds." I didn't think the smile left her face the whole time she was with us.
Eden, yeah, she was definitely a morning glory: as pretty as a flower, with the strength of a weed.
She looked back when she made it to Miriam and although I could tell Miriam was already giving her a tongue lashing, Eden flashed me a smile as if to say it was worth it, completely worth it. I smiled back.
Suddenly, Eden broke free of Mother Miriam and came running back to me as Mother Miriam screeched her name. She stopped in front of me, breathing hard and reached into a small pocket at the side of her skirt. She grabbed my hand hanging at my side and cupped her hand over my open palm, and then closed my fingers around something small and hard. We both looked up at the same time and our eyes met for several long seconds. Then she grinned at me and went running back to Miriam who grabbed her arm and started walking even quicker than before, practically dragging Eden behind her.
I looked down at my hand and slowly opened my fingers. Inside sat a butterscotch candy.
I laughed and raised my head, staring after Eden. It had been her that day, listening to Xander and me as we talked about butterscotch candies beneath her open window. Eden and Mother Miriam reached the main lodge and disappeared inside. I unwrapped that butterscotch candy and popped it in my mouth, trying not to grin around the mouthful of sweet deliciousness.