I wanted to give him a hug, but instead just mumbled “Thanks.”

“Next, please,” he said.

We walked quickly through the gate. I pulled Lou behind me. As soon as we were inside, I became aware of a sound: crickets. They were sitting in a tree above us, rubbing their wings together feverishly. There was no water, but they kept it up, as energetically as hell, did not give up. That was perhaps how one should take this. I tried breathing more calmly.

The camp consisted of some huge old warehouses spread out across a flat field. Big trees cast shadows. They still had leaves; the roots must go deep. A sign on the wall informed us that the place had once been an awning factory. Sunshades for All Your Needs, it read. No doubt they’d done good business.

We continued walking in through the camp. Between the buildings were a dozen or so military tents and just as many barracks. They were set up in straight lines and all of them had solar cells on the roof. There was no trash anywhere. People sat here and there, resting in the heat. Everyone was clean and wore clean clothes.

Anna had been right: this was a good place.

“There,” I said, pointing to a flag that was flapping on the roof of a barracks a short distance away.

“What country is that from?” Lou asked.

“It’s not a country, it’s the Red Cross. They know where Mommy and August are.”

“Do they?”

“Yes.”

Lou held my hand, with her dirty, sticky child’s hand. Anna used to nag her about washing her hands. The same ritual took place before every meal. Remember to wash your hands, remember the germs. If she could see Lou now.

We turned a corner, and Lou came to an abrupt halt.

“A line,” she said softly.

Damn.

“We’re good at that,” I said, trying to make my voice sound cheerful.

During the past year everything was rationed. We stood in lines for a gallon of milk. For a cut of meat. For a bag of apples, every other kind of fruit. The lines for fruits and vegetables were the longest. There were so few bees, so few insects. They had disappeared gradually, but when the drought came, it accelerated. No insects, no fruit. I missed tomatoes. Melons. Pears, plums. Digging my teeth into a juicy plum, cold from the refrigerator . . .

Lou couldn’t remember a life without lines. And she was the one who had come up with the idea that we could sit in line, instead of standing in line.

The first time she sat down, it was from sheer exhaustion. She was whining. On the verge of tears. But when I sat down beside her and said we were on a picnic, she laughed.

Sitting in line had now become routine for us. The lines were a place for games. Outings in the country. School. Dinner parties. There were especially a lot of the latter. Lou loved games about eating.