Counting by 7s (31 page)

F
or the next
17 days, Mai, Dell, and I become experts in the green garden trash cans.

In our town, trash is separated, with blue cans for recycling and green for anything from the yard. Black is for everything else.

My first observation: The green receptacles are not always filled with just cut grass and dead flowers.

I've found spaghetti in there. And all kinds of other objectionable things.

Some of them beyond creepy.

But for the most part, the people of Bakersfield, California, are following the rules of rubbish, meaning that they are tossing their garden waste in the right direction.

And this stuff is mostly alive.

Pattie doesn't want any more tubs or containers in the apartment. She put her foot down on that. And Dell only has his room down the hall, where Sadhu has strict rules.

Again, Quang-ha is the one who has the answer.

“Take everything up to the roof. No one goes up there.”

He hasn't been back since we put the broken glass on the skylight, but he obviously remembers what a wide-open space it is.

So now there are pots and containers all over the flat space.

With the rooting hormone and so much full sun and water, I've got a mini-nursery going.

And then we lose almost all of the plants.

There is a light rain and someone named S. Godchaux in unit #21 reports a small leak in the ceiling in his bathroom.

He calls the bank, and they don't notify the building rep. They notify their repairman.

Pattie and I are at the salon and of course I know nothing about this until it is all too late.

A roofer comes and can't make heads or tails out of the containers with the cuttings.

To him, it just looks like a big mess that is getting in the way of an area he needs to tar.

He gets back in touch with the bank, and apparently someone named Chad Dewey says that nothing should be up there.

So the workers gather all the plants that are growing (or at least trying to form roots), and carry them downstairs, where they are deposited in the Dumpster.

I come home to the crime scene.

Today the city picked up the trash.

I have to piece together the sequence of events, and when I get to the bottom of it, I believe that the plant loss is not just a defeat; it's a sign.

I'm not really going to live at the Gardens of Glenwood for much longer.

Very soon I'm going to be placed in a foster home.

I'm going to be sent back to school.

What's going on here will end.

For me at least.

When I go see Dell for counseling the next day, I tell him:

“I can't return to the past. Having a garden in the courtyard will not ever be the same as what was in my backyard at home.”

Dell only nods. And looks sweaty.

Later I see Dell hand Mai an envelope when he comes over for dinner. And then when I go to bed, I find the note on my pillow. It reads:

 

Willow—

When they find the place for you (and it will be a great place and it will be right for you, I know that) I want you to try to take Cheddar with you. I will call Lenore and say that the cat is a therapy dog.

Yours in friendship,

Dell Duke

 

He said that the cat was a therapy dog.

I appreciate his support, but I sincerely hope that he's not running this show.

Two days pass and instead of taking the bus home from the nail salon, I go to Southside nursery.

I find Henry and I explain about the sunflowers and losing my clippings and I ask for advice.

He has to go into the back because a truck is delivering something.

I wait.

There are cartons of ladybugs for sale on the counter and I decide to buy one.

They are usually burnt orange, but as I peer through the mesh that covers the container, the little bugs moving around in curls of wood look bright red.

I know what Pattie would say.

Lucky.

And she would be right because only a few minutes later Henry comes back in and says he's going to help me. He'll stop by after work and take a look at what I've got going on.

I feel relieved.

Which feels strange.

I walk back to the Gardens of Glenwood and I try to move in a very careful way because I don't want to jiggle the ladybugs.

When I come through the door Quang-ha, who is on the couch as usual, sees the container in my hands and says:

“Did you bring home food?”

I say:

“I brought home insects.”

But I smile and I don't even realize it until I catch sight of myself in the mirror.

I'm surprised.

I look different when I smile.

Maybe everyone does.

I don't go to the nail salon this morning.

I stay back to wait for the plant delivery.

Henry came yesterday and took a look. He said he'd bring me some things.

But it's not just the regular nursery van that arrives at 10:07
A.M
.

What pulls up is a large truck. And there is a forklift in the back. A van follows with four workers.

I go out to the street, and Henry and his cousin Phil are just lowering the lift-gate.

In the truck I see a big box of timber bamboo. It is being transported on its side. Standing upright, it would be over twenty feet tall.

There are other plants in the truck:

Pink stripe phormium.

A diverse selection of flowering vines (to climb up the metal poles to the second story).

Ground cover.

Even a three-year-old cherry tree.

I am overwhelmed.

But there isn't time to express it because there is a lot to be done.

The four workers cut down the sunflowers.

This would have been sad except that it isn't now.

We decide to hang the long stalks from the second-floor balcony. The large flowers are the size of human heads. The bright yellow petals are now dried and the centers are dark.

Henry has green twine and I'm in charge of that project while down below, the workers dig a huge hole because this bamboo they brought is serious business.

While I'm tying the sunflower stalks to the railing, Henry comes to tell me that this is all a gift.

I try to say thank you, but the words are stuck.

My mouth is open and I'm suddenly some kind of fish out of water. You can't see the hook, but it must be in my cheek.

Or maybe it's in my heart, because that's being pulled.

Henry puts his arm around my shoulder and whispers:

“You're welcome.”

It takes almost four hours to plant all of the stuff.

But the day is not over.

As another surprise, Lorenzo from Bakersfield Electric brings a set of solar-powered lights, which at night will send shafts up through the foliage into the starry sky.

It is all so much more than I hoped for.

Lorenzo says that the nursery guys called him. He explains about something called the “favor bank.”

I haven't heard about this before, but I'm thinking that I have a lot of accounts with people at this point.

I watch as Lorenzo puts the light fixtures in place, but I can't stop myself and end up moving them around so that they are just where I think they should be.

I explain that I like to see space in terms of triangles, and he listens for a while and then laughs.

When we finish, he gives me his card and says he wants to talk to me about a big lighting job he's bidding on at the new shopping complex.

I tell him I'd be glad to look at his design sketches.

It can be part of my favor bank.