Hanna cherished the button box because it had belonged to Mama. Every inch of space in the wagon was needed for traveling essentials, so most of Mama’s things had been left behind. And her most prized possession—an enormous mirror fixed to the wall—could not be moved at all. Hanna had managed to rescue the button box and Mama’s favorite woolen shawl, brown with a red plaid pattern.

Hanna emptied the buttons onto the bed. She began by digging through the pile and putting one button into each compartment. Rows by size. Columns by color. The square in the lower left corner contained the smallest white button. Above it, she put the next size, also white. Each square held a bigger button until she reached the top left, which held the largest white button.

In the next column she put cream-colored buttons. Then beige, shades of brown, gray, black. After that came the rainbow colors, red, orange, yellow, shades of green and blue, and finally violet. Several more columns and rows held novelty buttons, shaped like animals or stars or cherries.

The buttons were pretty to look at and pleasantly smooth under her fingertips. The orderliness of each button in its proper place was soothing. Best of all, sorting the buttons kept her occupied.

She put the last few buttons in their compartments, then closed the lid and latched it. She ran her finger over the carving on the lid, a simple five-petaled lotus. Mama’s favorite flower. It was her trademark: She would use tiny lazy-daisy stitches to embroider a lotus in the lining of every garment she made, and she had taught Hanna to do the same. Hanna had never actually seen a lotus plant, but Mama had shown it to her in Chinese paintings and on ceramic vases.

Hanna still had the first little lotus flower she had ever embroidered. Pressed carefully into the Bible Miss Lorna had given her when they left Los Angeles was a square of plain muslin with two lotuses: one done by Mama as an example, and the other by seven-year-old Hanna. Mama’s stitches were even, symmetrical, with perfect tension. Those by Hanna were wobbly and uncertain. But Mama had praised her effort, and since then, Hanna had embroidered a lotus countless times, always striving to make hers as even and graceful as Mama’s.

Hanna was putting away the button box when Papa’s boots thudded on the stairs.

“Is there a school?” Hanna asked.

It was always her first question. Some of the towns they had passed through didn’t have a school yet. Those that did, they hadn’t stayed in long enough for her to enroll.