School Sucks

Adara woke and checked the time. Hissing out an expletive she rolled out of bed. She was late. Carline ALWAYS chastised her for being late. Adara hated that more than anything.

The teen dressed quickly and wrapped her long hair up messily on top of her head. Adara held her breath as she tiptoed past her mother’s room. It was too early for the woman to be up. She came home late last night. The house smelled of spilled vodka and anger. Her father left a month ago. Her mother had been spiraling ever since. She tucked her phone into her back pocket. Carefully palming her house keys so they didn’t jingle. She waited a moment just outside the door, listening for sounds within. Satisfied, she grinned and jangled her keys in victory, skipping out into the bright morning.

She made her way toward the outskirts of town. Slipping down quiet streets to avoid people as much as possible. It was still early. If skipping school was an art, Adara was a virtuoso.

Inside her favorite pastry shop, she tapped a payment using her phone.

“Nice morning out there,” said the shopkeeper.

“Sure is, Mr. Vas.”

“You make sure you get to school today, young lady, a good education leads to a good life,” he said as he wrapped up the purchase.

On her way out the door, Adara saluted smartly and deadpanned, “I live to learn, Mr. Vas. I live to learn.”

She headed off the way she came, heading down the road that led to the school. He was a kind man, but Mr. Vas didn’t know a thing about Adara’s life. It made her grit her teeth when the adults around her tried to parent her. She had too many parents in her life as it was.

A block away she turned down a side alley and angled again towards the outskirts. She ignored the change of scenery. Her focus on tapping short answers or taking pictures of her face or food into her phone. She did not notice the hum of insects and call of birds playing in the warm morning breeze.

Carline adjusted the sunhat that held down wiry white hair trying to escape from a long ponytail. On her knees, she began to work the garden. She sunk gnarled fingers into the soil and checked for moisture and closely observed the earthworms and crawling creatures that create a healthy ecosystem for her beloved plants. She hummed and sang under her breath as the morning sun warmed her. She worked her way around hills of potatoes, bunches of basil, staked bush bean plants, and the green points of scallions. Carline let her mind wander as she worked.

A waltz danced across her vocal cords as her mind’s eye saw her husband tilling a few rows away. He loved the garden as much as she did. He was always researching the best plants for their area. French marigolds, Tagetes patula, were his passion. He was fascinated by the chemistry of their roots, which kept underground bugs away from companion plants. He was certain that turning the plants into the ground as mulch in the fall would improve the overall health of the soil. And he was certain their smell kept flying bugs from bothering farmers while they worked. She bowed her head for a moment, letting the memories slip away with a sigh. It had been four years, and each day she still turned her head expecting to see his broad shoulders a few feet away.

Carline’s garden was planted to keep the moisture in the roots and let the plants support each other. It looked wild and untamed, and she loved it. The woman and her plants were old friends. She harvested seeds and offered them back to the earth each year to continue a cycle older than the stories shared with her as a young girl. Her eyes wrinkled with a smile as she heard her grandmother's voice whispered in her mind. "See here, boobala, see this worm? A garden is healthy when its burrowing friends are happy. We make sure the soil is right for them, and they make sure the plants get the rain they need. The sun does the rest."

Adara rounded the curve where the trees hugged shadows over the road and looked up when the sun stopped glaring off her screen. She saw Carline's silver head bowed over her plants and smiled. Tucking her phone into her pocket she started jogging down the lane and called out, "Carline!" She burst back into the sunlight and jumped over the low white fence that outlined the front yard, not caring about the grass and sage she trampled.

Without looking up the woman's eyes crinkled again, her heart lifting as she kept her face still feeling the energy of the youth jogging toward her. Carline never had children, and this troubled youth reminded her of the fierce spirit of her grandmother. It warmed her to see the girl animated. Adara had a rough life, and her friendship with Carline was an unexpected joy for them both.

With a dirt-stained finger Carline pointed to her left, "Get the pots, Adara. You took your time today. Did you eat?"

Adara rolled her eyes, and hurried to pick up pots of French marigolds, shining red, yellow, and orange against the green and brown of the garden. She sunk to her knees beside Carline and held out a pot.

"Yes. I ate."

"Good. We are what we eat, you know."

Adara snorted, "So you keep telling me."

Carline took the pot and inverted it, letting soil tumble from the top as she held the plant by packed roots.

"Where does this go, Adara?"

She raised her eyes to stare at Adara's with eyes so pale they almost seemed white. The youth was comfortable with Carline's eerie stare. She scrunched her face in annoyance, complaining, "They go by the potatoes, but why does it matter? If they are in the garden, they help keep the bugs away, don't they?"

Carline snorted derisively, "So smart and so much to learn."

She held out a spade to Adara, who used it at once to dig a hole beside the potatoes as the woman kept talking, "They go beside the potatoes because they keep bugs from eating the potatoes. They do not go by the beans, because they would attract bugs to the beans that would eat them. Everything in the garden has a place, Adara. Everything. When we plant this way, we encourage the most food and beauty out of Nature's plants."

Adara pondered as she dug, making holes, taking the marigold plants from Carline, and tucking them into the earth. Her palms pressing the ground back around them in a tight hug. A row of sunshine beside the ugly potato plants.

"But wouldn't the potatoes grow anyway?"

"Yes," Carline agreed, "They would not grow as well."

Adara looked around the garden with new eyes, picking out plants she knew by sight after weeks of working with the woman.

"So, can we plant some by the basil or the onions?"

Carline smiled, "We can. Why don't you take four and put them over by the scallions."

Carline lifted herself from the earth and walked down the row trailing her fingers along the line of plants reaching to her thigh until she was about halfway down. She leaned over and lifted the foliage looking for the bright fruit.

"It's kind of like people, isn't it Car?"

Carline smiled at the bemused tone in Adara's voice, "What is, dear?"

"Some people are close to each other and help each other grow, and others cause problems."

Carline threw her head back and cackled into the late morning breeze.

"Yes, darling girl. Nature shows us how to live, Adara. All you have to do is watch and listen."

“Bobby is like the bean plant.”

“How so?”

“His hair is all over the place and you have to look for what makes him sweet.”

They both laughed at that.

In the distance a bell rang out. Adara glanced at Carline who showed no reaction.

They worked in companionable silence for long minutes. Carline lost in thoughts of her youth. Adara was lost in thoughts of the intricacies of an adulthood she was beginning to explore.

"People should learn about this instead of what we learn in school."

“Perhaps people in school should learn about this too.”

“What do you mean?”

“Don’t you have a project due?”

Adara groaned and threw herself onto her back in the dirt, staring up at the sky.

“I hate the stupid project. We are supposed to present on a topic we love. I don’t love anything.”

Carline calmly walked past the teen with a basket full of tomatoes and dropped a marigold pot on her.

“Hey!” Adara complained, quickly brushing dirt from her shirt.

Carline moved toward the house, laying the tomatoes out on newspaper humming a waltz softly. The morning was alive with the sound of bugs and birds. There was no movement behind her for a long time.

Adara looked at the pot for a long moment. Her eyes shifted to the garden with its tightly packed plants and the freshly planted marigolds. She looked over at Carline and sighed silently. She swallowed tears, loving this strange woman fiercely, and hating school just as fiercely. Her decision made, she rolled to her feet.

A faint smile crossed Carlines lips when a stack of empty pots and the marigold plant settled beside the tomatoes.

“See you tomorrow, Carline,” Adara said.

“Tomorrow, boobala.” Carline asserted.

It wasn’t until she heard the tell-tale thump of the girl’s shoes hitting the ground on the other side of the fence that she turned to watch. She watched until Adara made the bend toward the road that led to the school.

Carline picked up the marigold and brushed her thumb over the ruffles of the flower, thanking her grandmother for the gift of gardening that taught so much with so little.

“Thank you for reading my story. If you liked it, or were inspired by it, click the heart-shaped button to let me know! Your tips and likes fuel my desire to learn more, grow more, and write more! Shout out to M.T ElGassier on Unsplash for the photo."