Chapter 2

22-23 September, 2050

Sometimes she felt she had been running all her life.

It hadn't always been like that, but the persistence of a refugee life felt never-ending sometimes.

Today's run felt good, however. In her pocket, she held fifty dollars that she had promised Caleb she'd take back one day as they were hers.

After a long run away from the theater, she had at last found a bus stop but decided on a little culinary detour. While that digression - a little Polish joint hidden among the shabby buildings in view of the inundated beach - was much needed, it had delayed her.

She couldn't reach a stop in time for her bus and had to embark on a longer route with two bus changes and one lengthy stop at a recharging station for the vehicle's electric battery.

Now, she would be arriving at Vera's house by midnight.

She had to get off before the bridge into Corkscrew Colony. As she strode onto the main street of the half-deserted town, she slowed down. There was something very creepy about this place tonight. It felt quieter than usual, almost sinister. She could feel the down alert on her arms, pulling at her muscles.

It was the homeless row.

They were lying on cardboard strips, torn blankets, or plastic sheets, at the base of a small post office building. One had a sleeping bag wrapped around his legs, but his feet were peeking through a tear.

They were too fast asleep, dozed off in nanoseconds, their heads or necks awkwardly positioned. Their legs had the reclining postures of a wakeful rest magically paused in the moment, rather than oblivious sleep. Some even had their arms up, angled on elbows as if they forgot to put their limbs down lost in thought.

Had they all fainted? Had they all ... no, she could see the chest of the man nearest to her rise and fall, breathing. And why would they be all dead? That would make no sense.

A bad feeling made its way up from the pit of her stomach. But the only thing she could do at this late hour was take out her phone and take some pictures.

As she made her way into the town, she found a General Access Portal painted on the narrow wall of a strip mall and uploaded the pics to the Homeless Tracker website.

***

"Why in the world did you guys move to this God forsaken town?" she asked Vera, whispering in her backyard.

"Shush, I don't want any of them to wake up!" Vera pointed through the open window to the sleeping figures on her bedroom floor. Cousins a dime a dozen had decided to descend that very day on Vera's home for a sleepover. Meaning, Vera won't get her coveted, clandestine sleepover with her dear Chanbeli tonight, unlike the last two nights.

She smiled at Vera's use of that old nickname, about the only thing in the world that carried the flavor of home.

Vera hugged her again. "Are you sure you would be okay?"

"Vera. Your friend is very resourceful. Don't worry. Climb back in and go to sleep. I'll be back when they're gone." She hid her worries well to keep her voice reassuring for Vera.

"I'll text you," Vera nodded her head with a sad but warm smile. After another hug and a kiss to Chanbeli's cheek, Vera climbed back inside and shut the window pane. With a morose wave of hand at the sight of her childhood friend standing outside without a roof on her head, Vera let the curtain fall.

***

Chanbeli.

The echo of that name won't let her sleep tonight.

She snuggled closer to the dark, musky dirt under her slender body, the wavy strands of her hair mingling with the silky stems of the Jasmine bush. The tiny, pearl-white flowers with a pristine scent dotted her sight, playing tic-tac-toe with the stars behind.

These bushes, planted by the posterior wall of Vera's house, brought her the smell of her home.

And that term of endearment - the literal translation of Jasmine in her native language - had gripped her heart in painful clench.

'Chanbeli' was the last word, she had heard her mother speak.

***

11 March, 2043

Sonya always kept her little Chanbeli's photo inside the locket hanging around her neck.

Walking among the blossoms growing on the Bear Creek hill, Sonya was always reminded of her little girl. Tiny flowers had a special place in that doll's heart.

As she closed the locket with a happy sigh, Sonya noticed the steadily moving dot along the far road coming into Jarbidge. Soon the dot grew into a Jeep and trundled clear of the campgrounds. Sonya picked her binoculars from the picnic blanket beside the creek. The Jeep looked like an old Wrangler painted a fresh forest-green. Instantly, she stooped to gathered her equipment and rolled up the blanket.

Sonya ran downhill to the other side, away from the strip of habitable land around the river. Behind her, the river snaked through the canyon all the way from its mother lake snuggled in the armpit of the mountain range. It was a jagged landscape of pristine beauty as far away from the toxins of civilization as could be.

She found Akram near the mouth of the creek past their study shed.

"Why such a hurry?" replied Akram Agarwal with his ever-laughing mouth. An agricultural engineer extraordinaire, he was still madly and deeply in love with Sonya Motiwal, Ph.D. in Biophysics, the woman of his dreams, and the mother of his little girl. He was investigating farming opportunities up the high valleys of northeast Nevada. Sonya studied the link between the dwindling population of trout and the microbe diversity in the local river and lakes.

"I think they have tracked us here." Sonya's eyes were half-closed with strain even though the sun was well ensconced behind a rare cover of clouds. None of that beauty surrounding them could ease the lines of worry on the face of his woman.

Akram grabbed her arm instinctively and dragged her along down the road that curved down the hill.

They easily threaded their way through the dirtways and grassyards between the spotty architecture on either side of the narrow river valley. The RV park was just beyond the red barn-shaped motel; their trailer one of the few parked as summer had yet to arrive in this historical site of the country's last gold rush. Recently reopened mining operations had been closed down after environmental protestors had blocked the way to the mines beyond the northeast periphery of the range.

The jeep rolled into sight, emerging from a background of evergreen sentinels guarding the way south from Idaho. Akram ran to intercept the vehicle before it could rumble straight into the main street drawing everyone's attention in the tiny community.

Sonya had been right. It was the director of Idaho's Lands Department herself, the 'chiefest' of the various division bureau chiefs, come all the way from Boise, Idaho six hours up.

She was a formidable woman, Sheryl Crowne, a curt friendliness on the outside, hard determination on the inside, wearing her devil-may-care attitude on the sleeve of her fall-leaves jacket. She gave a nod to Akram as she followed him into their trailer, her thin-lipped smile unable to cower the steel out of her eyes or the chill rising from her crisp straw hair.

"What are you cooking up here, Agarwals?"

"How did you sniff us out?" Akram's face was politely hostile, while Sonya watched a few paces behind him.

"My intern discovered a copy of the European Journal of Mountain Farming from last year. The feasibility of European systems on our ranges, huh? Good work."

"Why do you bother?"

"Excuse me? I didn't climb my way to the top of a state department with my land management degree to be brought down by two hippies hopping from hill to hill saving every thistle, ferret and crossbill in sight."

"You know us well, Sheryl. You know what we do and what we believe in."

"Oh, I know of what you believe in, trust me. Wasn't expecting such a cheesy turnaround from enlightened souls like you ..."

"What happened to us being hippies?" Sonya, who had been silent till now, chirped.

"So this is about our change of faith?" Akram asked with a sigh. "That's ... disappointing. Though not surprising."

"This is only about one thing and you guys know that well," Sheryl's voice grew tense. "You committed a crime; you became an ugly stain on our foreheads. You went off the rails in so many ways."

Sonya nonchalantly pulled an unruly strand of curly hair behind her left ear. "I keep forgetting how many years did Robin Hood serve in the Sherwood Forest," she quipped again.

"So you admit to cruising into Big Bucket?" Sheryl asked, her milk-white countenance perked up with an aha moment.

"I'll only say, we never hung from any wires." Sonya's expression teased Sheryl as much as Sonya's hand teased the string of the tiny black beads on her neck. Sheryl turned to Akram with an arch in her brow.

"And what do you say to that, Professor Agarwal?"

Akram took a few steps behind and leaned against the screwed-on dining table in the middle of their trailer, linking his arm with the already leaning Sonya.

Feeling defeated, Sheryl shot her most piercing gaze at them, one after the other. They both looked the same in their stubbornness. Didn't all Indian faces look the same? Hard to believe, she had called them close friends but two years ago.

"As alien as you two became to the Fruitvale community ... for the sake of the old times, the good times ... and ...," Sheryl forced herself go meet Sonya's gaze again, "for what you did for my daughter ..." She tried her best not to let her voice waver too much but it did. "You better clear out of here fast."

The next second, she was out of their lives for good.

***

"Chanbeli." She jumped with joy at her mother's sudden appearance at the door. She detected a layer of eagerness behind those lovely almond-brown eyes perfectly matching the complexion on the grave, exquisite face, but her eleven-year-old mind was not equipped to handle carefully-hidden nuances.

After a prolonged hug, her mom forced her apart so they could look at each other as they spoke.

"Dishna and Prem are singing your praises, Chanbeli. You've been a very good girl to them and to the children. I'm happy." Her mother was kneeling before her, holding her by the arms, an earthy warmth tying the two hearts together.

"Vera makes it easy." She had twirled towards her friend Vera standing a foot behind her.

"What do you say to staying a little bit more?" Her father asked as he sat on his haunches beside her. While Vera erupted into giggles of glee and clapped in excitement, her own face fell.

"But I thought--"

"We already took their permission, darling. They agree." Her mother did not heed the unsaid which was unusual.

She raised her head above her mother's then and spotted the welcoming faces of Vera's parents, Mr. and Mrs. Chakarwati in the doorway of their kitchen.

That all may be good, but she had so wanted to see Jarbidge with her own eyes.

"Is the weather still not good in Nevada, mama?"

An iciness crept across her mother's face then, while her father pursed his lips and closed his eyes.

"It's only gonna get worse, Chanbeli. You be ready to batten down the hatches."

She didn't know what that meant, except that she'd have to wait longer to be back home again with her parents.

After a slew of instructions and advice, they made to leave.

Her father wrapped her one more time in his arms and kissed her forehead.

"You are a brave, brave girl, chanda. No longer my little baby doll. You're gonna be a big girl starting from tomorrow."

Why tomorrow, she had wanted to ask, but she figured she should wait until the next time she saw them.

At the threshold, her mother turned one last time towards her, sweeping a gentle hand across her cheek. When she looked up into those almond eyes again, she found the same love, the same depth, and a brooding gravity, she always saw in the mirror.

"Chanbeli ..." With that and the drop of a solitary tear, her mother left with her father.

It would be another twelve months before she'd stop waiting for them.

***

23 September, 2050

The last image in her mind as she fell asleep in the shade of the Jasmine bush was that of the matchstick girl and the delectable happy visions that girl saw in the flickering glow of the matches. By the time the tiny flame of the little girl's last match had extinguished, she had fallen into that long sleep after which there is no light left to return to ...

Her own mind began to drift into sleep. She felt as if she had lit her last match too and would extinguish into the damp night without a flicker in anyone's memory.

Except Vera. And her parents ... if they were still alive.