Soon as I realized where we were headed, I started shaking my head. “Whit, I don’t know about this.” I said this over and over, until I lost count.

At one point she reached across the seat and squeezed my hand. “It’s time,” she said. “It’s been time.”

Autumn leans forward in the back seat, palms my shoulders in a show of support.

I spot the sign first. Elytown Greenhouse Emporium. We pull into the drive and I can’t look.

I squeeze my eyes tight, like a belt that’s skipped a notch.

“Jamal,” she says softly.

But nope. Can’t do it. I’m sorry. I can’t.

“I come back here . . . a lot actually,” she says. “I sit in that parking lot across the street and wait until they close, wait for the last car to pull out. And then I walk right over. Must’ve come here half a dozen times before I realized there’s a small gate in the back that’s always unlocked. Takes you right to the trees. I walk through them, around. All types of trees. Every type. And I remember the four of us moving up and down these aisles. You leading the way, because it was your day. Mom and Dad, they were extra corny that day. Dad kept nuzzling Mom with his new beard.”

I laugh, but I don’t open my eyes. “Mom hated that beard.”

“It was pretty terrible. But like in this gloriously awesome way.”

“Yeah. It’s hard to tell, looking at us, but our parents were kinda cool.”

She shushes me. “You can’t say that out loud. They’ll arrest you for that.”

I smile. “God, can you imagine how big their heads would’ve gotten had we actually told them that? That we thought they were cool?”

“I don’t know that I thought so back then. I mean, I loved them, but they had their things too. They’re only perfect in our heads.”

I nod. “True.” I open my eyes. And my head is buzzy and for a few seconds everything is a blurry technicolor. It’s strange, how every time I remember that day, when I see this greenhouse vividly in my head, it seems so huge. Looming. But in reality, the lot’s maybe large enough for ten vehicles, and the greenhouse is the size of a three-car garage. “You still come here?”

Whit bites her lip, maybe to stop it from trembling. “I do.”

“Often?”

She nods.

“Makes you feel closer to them? In your own way? Makes them feel alive?”

She nods again.

“A fortress for your heart.”

The greenhouse only has seven saplings.

“We could go to other nurseries,” Autumn suggests.

Whit agrees. “Combined I bet you we get to twenty-five.”

But I shake my head. “For this, I think it’s less important how many trees and more important that all the trees only come from here.”

“Fair,” Whit says.