My recounting what Tree had shown me about TLEU (ATA) was followed by an appropriately long silence from the Ents and the grown-up Ents. At least no one laughed at me or accused me of making it all up. I suddenly felt tired and light at the same time. It felt like I had been trekking with a rucksack that weighed a ton and had finally been able to put it down. It was a relief to tell everyone what I had been seeing, all those shady boardroom meetings, those conversations of people who thought they were entitled to destroy everything that came in their path, including Tree’s memories. Well, almost everything. Some memories were too private. I hadn’t realized that keeping this all to myself had taken a toll. This was, phew.
“I don’t get it. How is this happening?” Rushad was frantic. Samar got up and left but nobody noticed or cared.
“So you knew what TLEU (ATA) were hatching?” Gia asked. I did not appreciate her accusatory tone.
“Hey, hey, I thought I was imagining stuff, okay? How was I to know that all of this was real? Also, apart from the fact some of the uncles looked really familiar, everything was just a bit blurry, and I couldn’t make it out completely.”
“But . . . but . . . how can one group of uncles . . .” Rushad said, sounding confused and angry.
“And two aunties,” Sana added.
Rushad continued, “. . . cause so much destruction?”
“Arre, yaar, we’ve known they’ve been chopping trees,” Samar said. He was back with an armful of rolls and milkshakes. “Here, there’s paneer and aloo.”
“Ewww, I don’t want paneer—all veggie food is always paneer!” Sana pulled a face and took an aloo roll. “So wrong. What happened to, umm, you know, the other veggies?”
Samar held one out to me as well. I was starving, so I took it and bit into it. With some food inside me, I could get to other pressing questions. “I don’t understand either. How can this tree-chopping exercise make this much of a difference? Trees are cut down all the time.”
Tree shook and a swarm of wasps came buzzing out, and I immediately blurted out an apology.
“Now you have ticked Tree off too—well done!” Gia said, who was clearly no longer in the let-me-hold-your-hand-and-comfort-you phase. Her moods were like climate change—unpredictable.
“Gia,” Amba Ma’am said, shaking her head. “Who is going to explain? Sana?”
Sana sighed but before she could, Samar spoke up. “Let me,” he said. “Savi, here’s how it works. Trees are breathers of carbon, keepers of water, generators of food, givers of shade, homemakers to many beings, spinners of joy.” He was speaking slowly as if he was talking to a child. I narrowed my eyes, but it had zero impact. “Too much carbon is baaaad for humans. And what happens when you cut trees? Poof! There’s more carbon in the atmosphere. Less inhalation of carbon by trees, more carbon in atmosphere. That means that there is less water stored in the soil. Less food. Less places for birds and animals and insects to live in or chill in. Life is a maha bore—bad for the air, the water, the soil, the animals, and people.”
Tree rustled. “Nerdsplainer,” coughed Gia.
“Oh, and bad for trees,” Samar hastily added. “Capisce?”
What did he think I was? A five-year-old? I wanted to pull a face at him, but that would perhaps reinforce that age impression. I settled for sarcasm. “Thanks for the EVS lesson, Samar. #TIL, #SMH. But how can this happen so fast?”
“There’s this wise human,” Rushad said.
“Yes, yes, you!” Sana agreed. Everyone laughed.
“No, really! I am talking about Suzanne Simard. She’s a tree scientist! She’s so cool, she studied this underground network of forests and discovered something amazing. See, there’s the Internet, right? This worldwide web, the www, that connects everyone digitally. But the natural world already had that. It’s called the Wood Wide Web now, but trees have always been connected to each other. It’s kind of like holding hands. Don’t eeewww me. Trees don’t have sweaty, snot-filled fingers. What they have are roots—roots that connect to each other underground using fungi and bacteria. This means they talk to each other, share food, and even fight. Yes, they fight too. You should read Suzanne’s research—she’s the one who wrote about it and that’s how we know about it. She’s my hero.”
“Tree-cough-fan-cough-boy,” said Gia.
Rushad was in such a frenzy that he didn’t even hear her. “Oh and our Tree, they are the Mother Tree of Shajarpur, kind of like the central hub. Apart from helping seedlings, sharing nutrients, all of the awesome things they do, Tree also harnesses their power to regulate our city’s climate. Oh, close your jaw, Savi.”
I couldn’t believe what Rushad was saying. I had seen, heard, smelled, felt all that. Not just read it in a book or on the Internet or heard about it in some podcast or TED Talk.
“And the earthworms, they create wormholes in the soil, memory tunnels,” I whispered. “Raking up memories from one tree to another, sharing, listening, forever.”
“JUST LIKE THOSE SCI-FI MOVIES!” yelled Gia. “You know, you know, right! Those wormholes and time travel and all. It’s so cool! I talk to wasps. You travel through memory. These people . . . umm . . . they cheer us on.” She nodded at all of them and waved her hand regally. “Minions,” she whispered.
Maharukh Sir sighed loudly.
Sana shook her head and said, “Savi, you see, the trees are all connected. The Wood Wide Web, it connects everything and everyone, which is why when one tree falls, it rips a little hole in the universe.”
“Just like . . .” Rushad started to speak and stopped.
“Just like when someone dies, it rips a hole in our universe,” I said. It finally all made sense now. Well, almost.
“But then why are all the people suddenly droopy? They like all this, na? Shiny, new buildings in place of trees, industries where forests stood, and dams stilling all rivers.”
“Well, isn’t it obvious?” Gia said. “As the connection weakened, the climate slowly began to change. We are only feeling the impact now. The only way that rip . . . that hole, starts, well, not to heal but to feel less jagged is through nature. It’s all we have. And it’s a lot!”
“What rubbish!” I couldn’t help but say. “Is it really?”
As if on cue, it started raining and we all ran for shelter.