“Jomon. Jomon, wake up.”
Jomon is pulled from the sleep he finally fell into. Hi is shaking his leg and Angel is standing beside the bed.
“Get up,” whispers Angel. “You’re coming with us.”
“Where?”
“You’re going to say goodbye to your mother,” says Hi.
“It’s the one thing you want to do, and we’re going to help you do it,” says Angel.
“Leave me alone.” Jomon realizes that he is gripping the white paper flower Cora gave him. He drops it to the floor. Angel picks it up and puts it back in Jomon’s hand.
“Guard Boyton has a sick child at home,” Angel says. “She left the dorm door unlocked.”
“They’ll catch us in the yard and I’ll be back in solitary,” Jomon says.
“Maybe,” says Hi. “Maybe not. Maybe you’ll think of something once we get into the yard.”
“Leave me alone,” Jomon says again.
“Look,” says Hi, sitting down on the bed. “You’re planning on killing yourself anyway. Why not come with us? What, really, have you got to lose?”
Jomon looks from Hi to Angel. Then he swings his feet to the floor.
The three boys grab their sandals and head to the door. They open it and step out. They move soundlessly down the steps and into the yard.
The main gate is closed and locked. The boys are faced with a high fence topped with strands of barbed wire.
Not knowing how he knows to do this, Jomon picks up the Welcome mat and tosses it up to the top of the fence. It straddles the barbed wire. In seconds, he is up and over and on the other side.
“Go ahead, son,” Hi says to Angel. “I’ll watch out for you.”
Jomon sees Angel smile. Then Angel climbs and jumps and joins Jomon on the other side.
Hi is last. After he climbs over the barbed wire, he pulls the Welcome mat off the pointed barbs and tosses it back down to the office door. It lands on the stoop, silently and perfectly straight, not a speck of dirt on it.
The air smells sweeter on the free side of the fence.
Jomon and the great-grandfathers head to the cover of the cannonball trees. At the very last second, Jomon swerves, narrowly escaping stepping in the largest single pile of dung he has ever seen.
The young humans walk within feet of Gather, but they don’t notice her. She is very good at blending in with her surroundings.
She has eaten every cannonball flower she can reach in the grove. She has had a little nap, and she’s thinking of moving on. This is a nice spot that she’s in, but there’s a bit too much human noise and too few trees.
She watches the young humans head down the road. As humans go, they seem harmless.
She strolls off in the same direction, keeping a good distance, staying sheltered by the trees. She lets out a giant burp from all the cannonball flowers. It goes out into the night as just another forest sound.
When there are no trees to shelter her, she hurries across the open area, doing the rolling walk on the outside of her feet, protecting her long claws on the ends of her toes.
Gather’s belly is full, she is protected by the darkness and she is free to be curious.
Really, she is just free.