The Probability of Miracles (20 page)

Cam moved her hips first and then her arms over many mountains to indicate long, long ago, and then signed
man
and
town
with little roofs made from the triangles of her thumbs and index fingers put together.

“He was a wise and benevolent man. He made honest treaties with the Indians, and he lived among them. I think we even have some Indian blood in us. He sheltered a woman running from the law, and then he married her.”

Cam changed the sway of her hips and indicated
wise
and
benevolent
by touching her thumbs to the center of her forehead and then moving her hands from her chest out into the world. She did
woman
,
running
, and then the signs for
love
and
safety
.

“Her name was Olivia Hutchins, and later, as if to prove she did not have an adulterous bone in her body, when Asher's great-great-great-great-grandfather was lost at sea, she waited in the widow's walk for five years for him to return. She never lost hope. And then she died.”

Cam danced
dangerous sea
. She danced
woman
. It was difficult to dance
waiting
, so she took a long pause.

“Many strange things have happened since then,” Elaine continued. “There was ladybug tide, when millions of ladybugs washed onto shore. They had to scoop them up with steam shovels. Or the time that girl walked away from that airplane crash. Or when my broken foot healed overnight . . .”

Cam was improvising now, making up hand movements for
ladybugs
and
steam shovels
and
airplane
.

“People started to believe the town was enchanted. Or haunted by the ghost of Olivia. Everyone, especially our family, seemed lucky. And then one day Asher's young parents decided to go on a vacation for their anniversary. And somehow, for some reason, their luck ran out. On their way to Hawaii, they were sucked out of the side of an airplane.”

Cam did the steps for
travel
and then
danger
.

“My father, Asher's grandfather, was devastated and went on a walkabout, from which he never returned. And my mother died of a broken heart.”

Cam turned around in a circle, still moving her hips but holding her head down, her arms crossed sadly across her chest.
Sorrow
.

“Asher thinks they died because they left this magical place. Part of him is afraid to leave. This town has a hold on him. It's time for him to get on with the rest of his life and instead, I think he'll stay here forever.”

Cam finished with the hand motions for
town
and
forever
. And when she stopped, she felt heavy with sadness. She had put Asher's story into her body and it weighed on her like a lead suit.

Elaine startled her with a loud, “That was amazing!”

“Thanks.”

Cam turned the stereo off and went to pet Bart. She was a little embarrassed, and she needed to change the subject.

“But the magic,” Cam said. “The purple dandelions, a freak flamingo visit. It's all just coincidence.” Bart was still curled up on the chair. He looked like a furry letter
Q
. Cam felt his nose. Yesterday it was dry and leathery, and now it was cold and wet.

“Some people say you should pay attention to coincidence,” Elaine said. She tied off her orange thread, put her needlepoint down, and stood up. “It can show you your path. Besides, these coincidences are enough to keep people believing. To give them some hope.”

“Believing in what, flamingos? Hoping for what?” Bart stirred and then lifted his head, looking at her sleepily.

“Hope, my friend, is its own reward,” Elaine said as she walked down the hallway to put her coffee cup in the sink.

“Hope, Dr. Whittier, is a tease,” Cam called after her.

Bart jumped his front paws up to her knees and scratched at her jeans, reminding her that she had a promise of her own to keep. She called into the other room, “Mind if I borrow Bart? I promised him the ultimate puppy day.”

“Sure, just don't tire him out.”

“Okay, buddy. Let's go for a ride.”

Cam might not have believed in hope, but she believed in keeping her promises.

CAM LET BART SIT ON HER LAP WHILE SHE DROVE ALONG THE OCEAN, hugging its deep blue curves before turning up the big hill to Avalon. Bart kept his little snout out the window the whole time, his tongue wagging behind him in the wind. He was a happy pup.

She played a little tug-of-war with him on the front lawn, fed him the special lamb-and-rice food she had brought with her from the vet's office, and then she let him fall asleep in a sunny spot on the porch. She wandered around back to where her mother was on her knees in the dirt. Big bags of topsoil and fertilizer and trowels and seedlings were scattered around her.

“What's all this?”

“I'm planting a garden. I saw you with the puppy. He's adorable, but don't let him in the house.” Her mom looked beautiful. She wore a wide-brimmed straw sunhat with a red scarf tied around it, a white peasant blouse, and a red skirt that circled around her. She stood up and wiped her forehead with the back of her brown-gloved hand.

“You look like the lady on the raisin box.”

“Is that good?”

“You're just all, like, harvesty. Like you're going to stomp on some grapes later.”

“Maybe I will.” Alicia held her arm up, her wrist cocked to the left, and hopped her knees up in the air.

“Since when are you into gardening?” Cam asked.

“One of those things I've always wanted to do and never had the time,” Alicia said as she threw her tools one by one back into the tool bucket.

“Do you know what you're doing?”

“You're supposed to say, ‘It won't come up.'”

“What?”

“You had a favorite book as a toddler called
The Carrot Seed
. Do you remember it?” her mom asked, taking off her gloves and putting her arm around Cam's shoulders.

“No.”

“A little boy planted a seed, and each of his family members stopped by to tell him, ‘It won't come up.' You used to giggle and recite, ‘It won't come up,' whenever I turned the page.”

“How did it end?” Cam said.

“Campbell. It was a children's book. How do you think?”

“Joking, Mom, God. I miss the old sarcastic you. I should get Bart back to the vet's.”

On the drive back, with Bart once again seated on her lap, she thought about the argument with Perry last night. About her mom planting a garden. About how desperately they wanted to
believe
. She was tiring of her role as the naysayer. She pictured herself as a three-year-old saying, ‘It won't come up.' She was turning out to be predictable. Cam hated predictable.

She thought about all the things her mom had done for her to create a happy childhood—to perpetuate the innocence for as long as she possibly could. The cookies for Santa, the notes from the tooth fairy, the fabulous birthday parties, all creating the illusion of comfort and safety and magic, when none of that actually existed. Maybe it was Cam's turn to perpetuate some innocence.

She did not believe in the hokey story of how the town got its magic. She did not believe in the “magic” itself. She herself could not hope.

But she could give the gift of hope to her mother and sister. She could help them believe. That was easy.

She just needed to steal some tomato plants.

She found some on the side of the road in a garden that seemed to belong to no one, stretching for acres in all directions and blooming with produce. She climbed over the fence and stepped into it. Vines grew laced and tangled around one another and brushed against her legs as she walked. She swatted at imaginary bugs.

She found three tomato, two zucchini, two eggplant, and an enormous sunflower plant. She used her mother's trowel to dig them up from the roots, extricating them without letting the heavy fruit drop from the vines. Then she placed the plants gently in her trunk and covered them with a wet towel to keep them fresh.

Something about locking them in the trunk felt sinister. As if she were some mafia killer transporting a debtor to the docks for execution.

“I'm sorry,” she said to the fearful face of the sunflower. “It's only temporary.” And then she slammed the trunk.

At midnight, Cam slipped out into her mother's garden to replant her haul. Even with the half moon bulging toward her with its pregnant yellow belly, night was deeper here, without streetlamps or nearby houses to leaven the darkness. Night even had a specific smell to it in Maine. A fresh, wet, dewy smell that jumped out at her as she pierced the earth with the sharp tip of her shovel. She was thankful the earthworms were asleep.

She was able to get the first two tomato plants to stand up using the stake her mom had placed next to the seedling. The long green vines wound around the stake like a ladder of DNA. She began the last plant, sticking the trowel into the earth with a satisfying scrape.

“What are you doing?” said a voice from way too close behind her.

She screamed, turned, and threw the trowel. It bit into the side of Asher's forehead before falling to the ground with a thud.

“Ow. Jesus.” His hands flew to his face.

“Oh my God! Shit! Are you okay?”

“Yeah. Ow. I think so.” Asher said, drawing his fingers away. They were streaked with blood.

“Oh. You're bleeding. I'm so sorry. Here,” she said and handed him a towel. “You really need to stop sneaking up on me like that!”

“I thought you heard me coming,” said Asher, looking at the bloody towel.

“Direct pressure. Direct pressure. Hold it on there. No, I didn't hear you. You're surefooted, like your deer-hunting ancestors.” Cam thought she had remembered Elaine saying something about them having Native American roots.

“What?”

“Never mind.”

“Why are you night-gardening?” he asked. Cam now saw his resemblance to Elaine. It was glaring, actually, and she was surprised she hadn't noticed it earlier. They shared the same distinct high cheekbones, square chins, and of course the parentheses dimples around their smiles when something—usually Cam—amused them. She wasn't sure she enjoyed being such a source of amusement.

“What are you doing prowling around here at midnight?” she asked.

“I asked you first.”

“My mom likes to believe in all this magical town business, so I'm helping her along. Creating a miracle. I'm a miracle worker.”

“Oooooh, that's a bad idea,” Asher said, still holding the towel to his head. His shirt was hiked up above his belly button.

No tocar. No tocar
, Cam said to herself, remembering the time she went to the museum with her Spanish class and they were told not to touch. “Why?”

“It just is. You can't force your will with the universe. You just have to trust how things unfold,” he said. “This could blow up in your face.” His uninjured eye was disappointed in her. “It's already blown up in my face, for example. Think of what else could happen.”

“Yeah, well, some of us don't have time to wait for the universe to unfold itself. Are you going to be okay? You should probably go clean that up,” Cam said as she packed up her stuff and stood back to admire her “garden.” She couldn't believe she had gotten the sunflower to stand up. “Looks good, doesn't it?” She threw some drier dirt around the plants to cover her tracks.

“It looks good, but I'm telling you, I have a bad feeling about this,” he said.

“What harm can possibly come from this? I'm doing a good deed for once. It's not like I'm putting a kink into the space-time continuum. It's good karma.”