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"Tell her I’ll hold you dohile she does it," Mission said, laughing "Buzz ate to the side for wheelbarrows and trolleys Mission didn’t feel like squeezing through the turnstiles with the massive puate buzzed Mission pushed his way through

"Whatcha haulin’?" Frankie asked

"Water pump from Winters How’ve you been?"

Frankie scanned the crowds beyond the gate "Hold on a sec," he said, looking for soh the turnstiles, jabbering away Sweat dripped froreen and asked if they could cover for him while he went to the bathroom

"C’mon," Frankie told Mission "Walk me"

The two old friends headed down the hts The s and familiar Mission wondered what those sarown up six levels down near the fetid stink of the water plant Perhaps this reeked to him the way the plant did to Mission Perhaps the water plant brought back fondnuts around here," Frankie whispered once they were away froates

Mission nodded "Yeah, I saw a few more stalls had sprouted up More of them every day, huh?"

Frankie held Mission’s arm and slowed their pace so they’d have more time to talk There was the smell of fresh bread from one of the offices It was too far fros Probably ground the flour so up in the cafe, right?" Frankie asked

"I took a load up that way a feeeks ago," Mission said He tucked his thuher onto his hips "I saw they were building so by the wallscreens Didn’t see what"

"They’re starting sprouts up there," Frankie said "Corn, too, supposedly" They stopped by the public restrooms The sound of a loud flush on the other side of the wall flicked a switch inside Mission’s bladder and uess that’ll mean fewer runs for us between here and there," Mission said, thinking like a porter He tapped the ith the toe of his boot "Roker’ll be pissed when he hears"

Frankie bit his lip and narrowed his eyes "Yeah, but wasn’t Roker the one who started growin’ his own beans down in Dispatch?"

Mission wiggled his shoulders His ar still with a load--he was used to ued He tried to re food"

Frankie shook his head "Yeah, but ain’t that hypercritical of him?"

"Youis everyone has an excuse We’re doing it because they’re doing it and so it a little et in a then the next group does it a little s work"

Mission glanced down the hall toward the glow of distant lights "I dunno," he said "The hed "You really think the e? The lanced back down the hall toThe nervousness and paranoia had been in hier; noas sad and a little worrisoe one day?" Frankie asked "How things would be different?"

"It doesn’t work like that," Mission said "By the tie, we’ll be old like them and won’t care any the sahed, and the tension in his wiry fraht"

"Yeah, well, I need to go before her up his back

Frankie slapped his shoulder "Yeah Good seeing you, o

"Oh, hey, Mish"

He stopped and looked back

"You gonna see the Crow anyti he’d live through the night

Frankie smiled "Tell her I said hey, wouldja?"

"I will," Mission promised

One e his friends for all the es he ran for thehty-four chits already saved up Half a chit for every hello he passed to the Crow, and he’d have his own apartment by now He wouldn’t need to stay in the waystations He could ask Jenine to hed far less than dark thoughts, so Mission didn’tup space They crowded out the other And Lord knew, Mission hauled his fair share of the heavier kind

•3•

It would’ve made more sense and been kinder on Mission’s back to drop off the pu it up was so his old man would see hi halls and toward the sarandfather had worked and supposedly his great-grandfather, too Past the beans and the blueberry vines, beyond the squash and the lurking potatoes In a spot of corn that looked ready for harvest, he found his oldhow Mission would always re the soil, his hands picked at weeds like a habit, the way a girl ers in her hair over and over without even knowing she was doing it