Outrun the Moon(53)

It strikes me that maybe I should stay with Ah-Suk and my countrymen. Where do I belong now? Maybe this is what it feels like to be a hungry ghost, caught in both worlds, trapped in ambivalence. There are only a few dozen Chinese here—most probably took shelter closer to Chinatown—but I recognize them all. Like the three o’clock funeral peddler and the Clay Street barber wearing his basin on his head.

A group of cigar rollers about Tom’s age are unfolding a large canvas sheet. I stare at their faces. If only he were here. He would understand the rift in my soul.

Biting my trembling lip, I head back to the girls. They do need me more, like Ah-Suk said.

In addition to the tents and pots—which, unless you’re a horse, are too large to be chamber pots—each crate also contains matches and candles, soap and rags, and a short-handled brush, either for brushing hair or washing dishes.

I wish they had thought to include toilet paper, as I am feeling the urge. My eyes catch on someone’s comportment book lying in the grass. Of all the things to grab in an emergency. I pick it up and rub one of the pages between my fingers. It’s not ideal, but it’s better than leaves.

When I return from my visit to the nearest bush, I find that the girls have successfully put up four tents, arranged due north, south, east, and west, with an open space in between for a campfire. Ironically, the number for death is also the number for survival. Something sour coats my tongue. What more can four do? It has taken the very best from me, and no longer do I fear it.

Only ten girls from St. Clare’s remain, plus Headmistress Crouch. The old woman claims the tent facing north, assigning Elodie, Minnie Mae, and Georgina to the one opening south. The one facing west goes to three sisters from Boston who are as frail as porcelain teapots. That leaves Harry, Francesca, Katie, and me in the one facing east.

Ma said an eastern-facing door harnesses the sun’s rising energy. My throat swells at the thought that I will never hear her words of wisdom again.

Georgina attempts to coax Minnie Mae into her new home, but she refuses to budge from the spot where she sits hugging herself. “I don’t want to stay in that nasty tent. I’m hungry, and cold, and I want to go home. I want to go home!”

Georgina pats her on the back. “Shh, now. It won’t be forever. Your parents will come soon.” I can’t help worrying how Minnie Mae, the weaker of the twins, will survive without Ruby by her side. “Have you ever gone camping? It’s like that.”

“Stop it,” Minnie Mae says, shrugging off Georgina. Her eyes are half-wild, and her hair hangs in greasy curtains around her shoulders. “You’re lying to me. Tell me the truth; we’re going to die!”

“Yes. The truth is, we are going to die.” Minnie Mae’s mouth unsticks, and Georgina adds, “But not today.”

She would make a good midwife with her sturdy arms and no-fuss ways.

“We need to build a fire,” I think aloud.

Headmistress Crouch looks up from testing the coarseness of a brush on her palm. “How? For God’s sake, every emergency kit should come with a stove. This isn’t the nineteenth century.”

Who knew it was possible for her to be even grouchier than normal?

“We can make one,” I say.

“How?” Francesca echoes.

Katie sits on a turned-over crate and rubs her nose, smearing black soot over it. “Put a bunch of sticks together and light it, like when you’re roasting apples on a stick.”

“And burn up Golden Gate Park while we’re at it? No, thanks. We have enough fires as it is.” Georgina stares off into the eastern sky, which is thick with smoke.

What would Tom do? He’d make a stove out of whatever he had on hand. We could build a fire in two of the pots, but then we wouldn’t have them for cooking or water.

I think back to the neighborhoods I passed on the way here. Many of the crumbled houses were brick. Bricks make excellent fireplaces. Back in Chinatown, we used a brick stove for cooking the community soup in the courtyard.

“I will make us a stove,” I hear myself say. Everyone looks at me.

In her chapter on productivity, Mrs. Lowry said that industry can get you through the hardest days. I must simply keep myself busy until Ba finds me. Anything is better than waiting in this clearing, where the sound of Minnie Mae’s crying sticks little needles into my skin.

The closer I am to someone’s grief, the closer I feel to my own. And that is a place with no doors and no windows. No escape at all.





25



‘‘WE NEED SOMETHING TO CARRY THE BRICKS.’’

Katie looks down at her perch. “We have the crates.”

I nod, considering, but carrying them full would be awkward. In Chinatown, men carried heavy loads on daam tiu. Maybe we can do the same. I eye our newly constructed sleeping quarters. “Let’s take down our tent.”

Katie gapes, showing the space between her teeth. “But we got it up not five min—”

“Do it,” says Francesca, a warning in her voice.

“All right,” says Katie.

After we pull down the tent, we disassemble the sticks and poke the two halves through either side of one crate, forming carry poles. Katie and Harry do the same with another crate. Using rags, I cushion the contact between the poles and crates, like we do with the daam tiu, to distribute weight so the poles don’t snap. Then I show the girls how to fold their shawls to cushion their shoulders, too. The Boston sisters watch us, their teapot faces awash with apprehension.