Mama Vivian’s attention indicated that she liked this one, especially when Dune let her voice open and fill the house up for the last little verse. Dune sang then, gospel hymns with gaps in the words, Sam Cooke, Ella Fitzgerald, until Vivian fell asleep.

The gate on the chain-link fence guarding the community garden on Brainard was sagging open, detached, done.

Dune almost passed it by without stopping, but her eyes darted in, parsing amongst the overgrowth. She first recognized small green watermelons fat on the vine, then speckled pears fallen from a tree heavy with the brown fruit. She slowed, checking the street for owners or witnesses. Seeing none, she slipped inside.

Kama and Brendon’s voices entered the front room of her memory, arguing over this garden. Brendon made the case that, “good fences make bad community gardens.” Kama countered, “I fully get the desire to protect the wealth in the soil.” Although, her strategy was more gardens, not more fences.

The week before, Dune had biked over to stand in line for a grocery bag of free food and bottled water at the emergency center at Woodward and Grand. She couldn’t sort out within herself if she did this for Mama Vivian, for herself, or simply to have something to do. Like most free food, the bag of cans and boxes was underwhelming.

Whole Foods had closed its doors once those with money fled the spreading sickness, evacuating their workers in what was viewed as unexpected benevolence. Dune’s vague interest in boutique international cuisine had faded accordingly. She went to University Market to get non-perishables. It was one of the few shops bigger than a party store that was still consistently open in the city limits, though the shelves were getting light as less vendors were willing to resupply within city limits. The only meat options they had were frozen piles of ground beef, fish, thousands of drumsticks and chicken breasts to thaw. Even the Detroit Community Co-op closed their doors after three volunteers had gotten sick on the same day.

They said temporarily. Everyone did.

Time was losing meaning. Food was reduced to fuel; Dune was primarily concerned with what would give her and Mama Vivian nutrients. Right now, they needed vegetables, not the processed stuff left on the shelves, stacked in the donation bags.

This garden was definitely picked over, footprints and haphazard vegetables here and there, as if people had rooted through it looking for something else. Still, there were perfectly fine cucumbers and tomatoes left on the vine and a lot of things she didn’t quite recognize that looked like lettuce or collard greens.