Free Homeland and Other Stories by Barbara Kingsolver

people will not be considered.’”
    â€œI never thought of it that way,” I said.
    â€œWhat would be hard, though, is that it would take so much more effort than I’ve ever counted on, over the long term. A lot more than a regular baby. One of us would probably have to give up our career. I suppose me.”
    â€œWhy you?”
    â€œIs it something you’d be willing to do?”
    I thought about this. “Yes,” I said. “If we’d decided to commit ourselves to the project, then yes, I would.”
    Lena looked at me with such surprise I was overwhelmed by the wish that she knew me better. It isn’t as though I hold back information. Usually I don’t quite know how I feel about things until Lena asks, and often not even then. “It’s only logical, isn’t it?” I reasoned. “If it comes down to a choice between teaching Bryophyta and Lycophyta or saving the lives of our youth, there’s just no contest.”
    â€œAnd you would do that.” She put her hand into my hippocket and leaned on my shoulder as we walked. “No matter what ever happens, I’m so happy you told me that.”
    The Lapis Lazulis had packed up and moved on by the time we reached their spot, but we resolved anyway to buy something to commemorate the day. We would acquire the two-headed Yolo Wonder at any price, if it was for sale. Lena stopped at each table, weighing in her hands the acorn squash and noble ears of corn, and holding up small maroon apples for me to bite. She was wearing purple, a color that nearly glows when she puts it on. A purple sweater, and a turquoise and lavender scarf. As I looked at her there among the pumpkins I was overcome with color and the intensity of my life. In these moments we are driven to try and hoard happiness by taking photographs, but I know better. The important thing was what the colors stood for, the taste of hard apples and the existence of Lena and the exact quality of the sun on the last warm day in October. A photograph would have flattened the scene into a happy moment, whereas what I felt was gut rapture. The fleeting certainty that I deserved the space I’d been taking up on this earth, and all the air I had breathed.
    There are a few things that predictably give me joy. Watching Lena’s face while we make love is one. The appearance of the first new, marble-white tomatoes in my garden is another, and the break of comprehension across a student’s face when I’ve planted an understanding that never grew in that mind before. I’m told that seeing one’s own child born is an experience beyond description, but knowing these things, I can just begin to imagine.
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    That evening, little Melinda might have been enlisted in a conspiracy to make us parents. She ate her dinner without complaint, then rubbed her eyes in a dreamy and charming way, and went to bed.
    In the morning she awoke transmogrified. She sat in themiddle of the living-room floor and displayed her vocabulary in a dizzying, vengeful series of demands. Her dark hair was wild and her temper fierce. Most ferociously of all she demanded Mommy, and over and over again some mysterious item called Belinka. My will was soon crushed like a slave’s, but Lena held on bravely. She brought out the whole suitcase of Melinda’s animals and toys, which we had been instructed not to do (just bring the things out one by one, her mother had advised, so she won’t know this is all there is), and put on a puppet show as earnest as it was extemporaneous. Melinda was a cruel critic. She bit Lena on the hand, and crawled off toward the kitchen.
    By noon we were desperate. “Kids are always soothed by the outdoors,” Lena said, and I did not dare doubt the source of her knowledge. I packed cheese and fruit and cans of root beer into a picnic basket, and would have thrown in a bottle of Jim Beam if we’d had it, while she called Ursula.