“I gotta go, K, but promise me you’ll think about Spain, okay?”

Sero sat scraping at the apple core with her fingernails, digging out the small dark seeds and recalling the biology lesson in which she’d learned that benign-looking apple seeds contain arsenic. She was truly happy for Izzy, but she felt a sadness cloaking her, remembering how easily James had let her go for the summer to Ecuador, and afterwards. She hadn’t found the kind of love that Izzy had with Alvaro, and she wasn’t sure she had it now with Micah either.

* * *

The next morning, she went to see Micah in his room. “Hey, can I come in?”

“Uh, sure.” Micah was sitting on his bed with a towel wrapped around his waist, fresh from the shower. Sero forced her eyes away from the broad expanse of his shoulders, to focus on what she needed to say.

“I think Buddy needs to see a vet. He’s acting strange and hasn’t been eating at all.”

“Maybe he’s fasting with us today.” Micah smiled.

“I’m serious. He might have a tooth abscess.”

“He’ll be fine. He’s a hearty animal. Besides, we don’t have the money for a vet right now. We have to invest every dollar into Greenfields. And now we have some extra expenses, don’t we? To replace the plants you lost?” There was a smirk on his face at her startled expression. “Yeah, I heard about that. You thought I wouldn’t?”

“No, I . . . I was going to. You just seem so stressed that—”

“You know what stresses me out, Sero? When I can’t trust someone.”

Shaken, she tried to steer the conversation back to Buddy. “Okay, what if I paid for the vet? Or can I borrow the money I put into the solar fund?”

“The money in the solar fund has been paid as a deposit for the solar panels. That’s the way these things work.” Micah’s voice was harsh and condescending. “If you want to waste your own money on a vet, that’s up to you. But if you have extra money, I hope you would contribute it to our collective fund, where it can be invested for our collective benefit.”

Sero knew she should stop before he lashed out at her as he had at Justin. As she turned to leave, her eyes fell on the nightstand, upon which sat a mobile phone and the familiar crumpled brown wrapper of a Snickers bar. She paused, taking this in. Then she turned around and said, “Micah? How do you know those chicks weren’t killed by a coyote? I see them out there in the early morning all the time.”

“I know, Serotina”—Micah pronounced her full name slowly—“because that asshole neighbor told me at the last meeting that he would sic his dog on our chickens to teach me a lesson.” He stood up, adjusted the towel around his waist, and walked into his closet, making it clear he was done with the conversation.