Free Outside In by Sarah Ellis Page A

keepsake. The best find of all time.” Tron ricocheted out of his chair. “Okay, that’s it. I’m out of here.”
    â€œHey! What about the feast?” Blossom banged her fist on the floor. Artdog jumped.
    â€œNot hungry.” Tron scooped his pack off the floor and was gone.
    â€œWait!” Fossick started to go after him, but the door slid shut before he had pushed himself out of his chair.
    â€œLarch says Tron is bad,” said Larch, an edge of panic in his voice.
    â€œNo,” said Fossick. “Tron isn’t bad. He’s just silly, because look at all this glorious boughten food. All the more for us. And the visitor.”
    The birthday feast didn’t make any sense as a meal, but it was delicious. Fresh bread, butter that Blossom sliced like cheese, chicken on skewers, bananas and more milk, consumed in no particular order.
    Larch went to one of the doors and swung it open. Inside were hundreds of cassette tapes, each with some combination of colored dots along the edge.
    â€œPurple and green is for finding days.” He chose one tape and put it into a big clunky machine. A fiddle and banjo joined the party.
    â€œWe got those all in one find,” said Blossom. “Enough music for a whole life.” She held a banana up to the light.
    â€œLook. Not one bit of brown.”
    â€œProbably under-ripe,” said Fossick.
    â€œI like under-ripe.”
    Lynn’s present, the only one in sight, was a big hit. It was passed around in its wrapped state for everyone to admire the paper and bow and the wrapping job.
    â€œThe visitor folds the edges under,” said Larch. “That’s good.”
    The bead bracelet was given the same intense enthusiastic scrutiny. Blossom modeled it on both wrists and both ankles. Fossick gave Shakespeare the final word. “What gold and jewels she is furnished with.”
    They ate every scrap of food. Larch fell asleep. Artdog went to stand with his head against the door.
    â€œI’ll take him,” said Blossom. “Then I’ll walk Lynn to the bus.”
    â‰ˆâ‰ˆâ‰ˆ
    They strolled through the Lingerlands, Artdog sniffing for news, Blossom softly whistling the bluegrass tunes they had been listening to.
    Every time they passed a garbage can, Lynn shivered, imagining that it cradled a baby. She wanted to ask about Blossom’s mother. She wanted to ask about Tron and didn’t Blossom realize that he was gorgeous. She wanted to ask why Larch went to sleep all the time and Fossick quoted Shakespeare.
    She didn’t want to break the friendly silence.
    â€œHe would have ruined my birthday. But you were there. You made it perfect. I love my bracelet. Did you like the boughten food?”
    â€œI did, but don’t you usually buy food?”
    â€œOnly on birthdays and other treat days because fresh milk is still a hard find, and unsquishy bananas and, of course, ice cream.”
    â€œBut where do you get food if you don’t buy it?”
    â€œWe just go where they’re throwing it away. It’s one of our jobs. Sometimes they throw it away from restaurants. Sometimes they throw it away from grocery stores. Sometimes people have a tree full of plums and they want someone to pick them and take them away. Sometimes people give away food on the Freecycle, mostly coffee. There is food everywhere. You just have to know and go.”
    â€œBut doesn’t all that take a lot of time?”
    â€œWe have a lot of time.”
    â€œOh.” Nobody ever said they had a lot of time. People always said they were too busy.
    â€œWhere does the money come from for the boughten food and other stuff?” Lynn suddenly heard herself. What was she doing? You didn’t go around asking people where they got their money. “I mean, if that’s not too nosy. You can just tell me to shut up, you know.”
    â€œWhy would I do that? We get some money from collecting and