California(105)

Maybe Cal was right: he and Frida could help make the Land into the place they needed it to be. She wanted to ask Anika if such a dream was possible.

Betty came over and sat down next to Frida, who had scooted over to make room on the shower curtain.

Betty rubbed her hands together, her face to the sky.

“Cassiopeia,” she said, to no one in particular.

Frida looked up but saw only white clouds.

“In theory,” Betty said, and laughed.

Lupe and Sheryl came over and sat next to Anika. Frida liked Lupe, but Sheryl—what had Cal called her?

A stick-in-the-mud. That was a nice way of putting it.

But now, looking at their backs, Lupe’s slumped, Sheryl’s straight, Frida saw a closeness between the two women that she’d never caught on to before, and it made her happy. It was the casual intimacy of old friends; they had shared beds, swapped shoes, probably undressed in front of each other dozens of times, kept talking as one of them peed. If they had looked anything alike, they might be mistaken for sisters.

Frida watched as Anika, without speaking, passed first the cup and then the thermos to Lupe, their fingers briefly touching, and she realized all three women must have started the Land together. With Sandy Miller, too. They probably had known Jane. They remembered Ogden; maybe they had advised Anika on what to do. Or they had given away children, too. They probably still avoided red and certain stories. They had accepted Micah and his way of doing business. Maybe Anika didn’t trust Micah, but Lupe and Sheryl probably believed things were better with him around. Maybe Sheryl wasn’t that bad; maybe she was just prickly like Anika.

Peter had finally found the correct chords for the song he wanted to play, and the other side of the circle began singing along with him. Frida couldn’t place the song, though she thought it was a ballad from the last century, something her father might sing as he made dinner, humming everything but the chorus. As the voices rose, earnest and off-key, Betty leaned forward and whispered to the women in front of them, “I hear Rachel’s sleeping with Dave.”

Frida could tell the women had heard Betty by the way they looked at each other. Sheryl had the cup and thermos now, and she snapped them together so forcefully that Lupe laughed.

“Settle down, Miss Sensitive,” Lupe said. “It’s not as if he’s any good.”

If Frida had been drinking anything, she would’ve choked on it.

“Dave?” Frida said, without thinking.

This time, Sheryl turned around. “Anika said you were cool.”

“She is,” Anika said, still facing the fire.

Betty put a hand on Frida’s knee. “We’re warm-blooded creatures.”

“But Dave is so young,” Frida said. These women were old enough to be his mother, but she didn’t say that. She knew she sounded prudish already, and she didn’t want to be nudged out of this locker room too quickly. “I mean…good for Rachel.”

Lupe laughed, turning around. “Sheryl, give her some of the milk.”

Sheryl unscrewed the thermos slowly. “She doesn’t look thirsty to me.”

“Oh, but I am,” Frida said.

It was cow’s milk, heated to a foam. It smelled oddly sweet, like the postage stamps her grandfather had collected for nearly his whole life. He liked extinct things. He’d given Frida one for her eighth birthday, and she’d licked it as soon as she was alone in her room.

“So there aren’t rules against it?” Frida asked Betty.

“Not officially.” She smiled. “But you must have seen the whole drawer of Pills in the Bath.”

Frida was surprised, but she knew she shouldn’t be. Micah didn’t want children here, and he’d make sure no accidents happened. Likely, the women were grateful to have access to birth control, certainly procured from Pines.

“Otherwise, when it comes to love, we can do what we like,” Betty said. “As long as we’re discreet, that is.” She grinned. “And those who prefer to abstain pretend everyone prefers that.” She nodded at Anika.

“I never said that!” Anika said. “It’s just my own personal choice.”

“You’re our nun,” Betty said.

“Ha,” Sheryl said. “You and Micah.”

“My brother?” Frida said. “Really? He used to be such a dog.”

“He’s too serious for all that now, I suppose,” Anika said.

“The fact that he’s never been interested in sex made us like him,” Betty said. “He never touched us.”

The women fell silent.

“Who knows what happens on his treks off the Land,” Lupe said.

“Micah leaves?” Frida said. “With August?”

“Not often,” Betty answered. “Occasionally he needs to help August at Pines. They have to lug these big containers of soil. Sometimes cantaloupes or lettuce, whatever it is that we’re trading that month.”

“I bet he just wants to get away from us,” Lupe said. “It can be pretty boring around here. Maybe he has a secret wife living in the woods.”

The other women laughed.

“Micah? Can you imagine him having a wife?” Sheryl said as she reached her hand out behind her. She wanted the cup back.

Anika turned to grab the cup from Frida. “I hope you weren’t hoping for a top-secret meeting of the minds tonight. It’s just us ladies, gabbing.”