Summer was finally cooling into autumn. The whole island was slowly turning red and gold against the Pacific Northwest clouds and a few remaining bright blue skies. Kids spilled from the buses, including Zola, whose familiar face made me secretly so happy I could barely keep it in. She ran to me, and I let my arm hug her shoulders for a moment. “How’s things, kid?” I asked.

Her arms were little and strong as ever around me. “Okay,” she said, definitely not meaning it.

“Hey,” I said, and knelt beside her in the grass. “What’s up? Your mom doing okay?”

She shook her head. “I’m at my grandma’s house, but she’s really old. They think she’s too slow to take care of me.”

“Too slow?”

“Tired. She can’t walk a lot. She doesn’t live by my school, but I take the city bus. I don’t know.”

Goddamn it.

I let her hold on to me until Jane came out and called for the kids to line up.

“Hey,” I said, holding Zola back. “You doing okay in school?”

“I guess.”

“Make sure. Keep your grades good.”

“We don’t get grades yet.”

“Okay, well, just—show up. Always on time. Pay attention, do all the worksheets and stuff. Make sure you’re learning. Got it?”

She nodded.

“Zola. Okay?”

“Okay,” she said. I zipped her sweater all the way up and watched her run to join her class.

“Is Zola all right?” Sean asked, suddenly beside me.

“I don’t know.”

“Well,” he said, “could— I mean, could Francine do anything to help?”

My brain was not fast enough to stop my arms from wrapping around him. His huge, selfless heart. The blue-gray knit hat on his dark hair. I hugged him so hard he stumbled a little but righted himself and hugged me.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

I collected my wits and pulled back. “Sorry,” I said. “You’re just…you are so kind.”

“Muir.”

“Francine can’t help her. But it’s so nice of you to even think of it.”

He squeezed my hand.

We took the kids, Zola beside me the whole time, tromping through the forest to find late-summer birds’ nests and moss gardens, and I waved to her as the buses pulled away. I brought my lunch to the picnic table to sit if not beside, at least near, Sean.

“Muiriel,” Natan said, eyeing my container of roasted carrots Francine made that morning. “You know women need essential fats in their diet, especially at childbearing age.”

I swallowed wrong and choked until Sean whacked me on my back.

“Jesus Christ, Natan.” I coughed. “What is wrong with you?”

“See, again, this is what’s wrong with our patriarchal society. Men can’t even talk about a woman’s cycle—”