“Like what?” I knew I was prying, but I was curious. And North didn’t seem to mind.
“I hurt people,” he admitted. “Did a lot of hard living before I found Twelve Oaks. Drugs, drinking. Fights. Arrested a few times. Hit rock bottom when a girl and I partied too hard. I blacked out. She ended up in the hospital for alcohol poisoning. A doctor got me into a rehab program, and as soon as I was done I moved out here. Lived in Berkeley for a while before a friend told me about Twelve Oaks. Came here and never left.”
“How long have you been here?” I asked.
“Twelve years, I think. Thirteen?”
I could see why he’d stayed for so long. It was a nice place. The fragrant smell of simmering marinara sauce came from the kitchen, along with the low hum of people talking. A woman sat sewing in front of the fireplace, and a few kids ran around outside, kicking a ball. Everyone seemed content, at ease.
Even my mother.
“So, look.” North pushed the workbook toward me. “We’ll start with basic concepts and equations. Work your way up.”
I wasn’t all that crazy about doing the work, but I knew I was behind most other kids my age when it came to education. And because I wanted to catch up, I agreed to meet with North every morning.
Some of the other kids in the commune attended public schools, but my mother didn’t enroll me since the school year was almost over. The younger kids were homeschooled and worked in a cabin that had been set aside as a schoolroom.
The work wasn’t always easy—North pushed me hard, even with things like trigonometric functions. He was a good teacher, patient and insistent even when I tried to claim it was all beyond my comprehension.
“Nothing’s beyond your comprehension, Liv, not even the reaches of your own mind,” he said.
I had no idea what he meant, but he was prone to statements like that. We studied in the morning, and I helped in the kitchen and gardens in the afternoon.
I got to know others in the commune. Greta, the woman with long braids and piercing blue eyes adorning her weathered face. Susan and Tim, a young couple with a new baby named Penny. Sam, Parker, Emily—seven-year-olds who surfed the Internet after making soaps and macramé baskets. Roger and Clara, teenagers around my age who’d lived at Twelve Oaks for five years.
My mother spent her nonwork shifts in North’s shop. Whenever I went to find her, she was working on a new jewelry technique, or North was showing her how to use a special type of pliers or file. They sat next to each other at mealtime. She went with him to unload boxes for the farmer’s market. He worked in the garden alongside her.
Not once did I see them touch each other. Not once did my mother spend the night away from our bedroom.
Near the barn, there was a stone-rimmed campfire and benches set up, and every night a couple of the men would build a fire. We sat around it, listening to people play various instruments, sing songs, tell stories.
I always sat silently, watching the flames, feeling the warmth around me.
One night I watched my mother. She sat on the other side of the fire. She looked different, younger. Her hair had grown even longer, and she usually wore it in a high ponytail to keep it out of the way. She hadn’t worn much makeup since we’d come here.
North came to sit beside her, bending to say something close to her ear. She laughed. It was a genuine laugh, unforced, and I felt it spread over me from across the fire.
In that instant, I never wanted to leave Twelve Oaks.
For several months, it was good. Then my mother saw the necklace North had given me. I’d put it in the nightstand drawer and almost forgotten about it. She found it when she was looking for her glasses.
“North gave this to you?” she asked, holding the disk flat in her palm.
“Yeah. A while ago. I can’t remember what it means. The inscription. Something in Latin.”
She had an odd look on her face. I didn’t get it. I do now, but I didn’t then. I just shrugged and returned to my book.
The following morning North and I were working on lessons as usual. He was explaining ratios in right triangles when my mother came in and sat beside me.
“Just thought I’d see what you’re learning,” she said.
I felt her watching me for the next few days. Felt that something was wrong, but I didn’t know what. I hoped she wasn’t planning for us to hit the road again.
“Come on, then. Test time.” North thunked a book beside me as I sat drawing at the trestle table after dinner.
The kitchen had been cleaned and everyone was drifting outside toward the campfire. I made a face at the book.
“I hate tests.”
“Never say you hate learning. It puts up a block.” He rapped his knuckles against his head. “Makes it hard for the knowledge to get in.”
I sighed, but pushed my drawings aside and opened a paper on which he’d written a bunch of equations. He left the room while I worked, then returned a half hour later to check the test. I sat there fidgeting.