“What do you mean, ‘our liberties’?”
Mar Jacobi stepped aside, offering the open door to me. After a moment I stepped through. “I’d be happy to discuss it with you sometime. If you’ll stop by the library, I could give you some books to read. I’m sure it would do your mother proud to know that you’re considering what’s truly necessary to work tikkun olam.”
My lips tightening into a frown, I trudged past him. “All right,” I said. But I felt uneasy as I walked out into the dome.
The librarian only waved a hand at me. “Mazel tov, Terra,” he offered. I saw him press his hand to the button, and then I watched as the door slid shut again.
“Thanks,” I mumbled in return. But a thin birdsong was the only thing that answered.
I found a mossy incline spread out between a pair of trees. The artificial daylight was feeble, spotty; the ground muddy from the latest rain. Everything seemed cool and brown. But near my feet there was a flash of purple: a crocus head pushing up between the gravel. As I fumbled for my pencils, I gave the flower a wistful smile.
A spring flower, I thought. But it won’t last long. Spring will be short this year.
I turned to a blank page near the back of my book and ran my hand over its bumpy surface. When I first started drawing, I tried to draw people: Ronen and Rachel, my father. Momma. But in the dim light of my room, their faces looked all wrong—the eyes uneven, the mouths too wide. So I’d given up on that. It was only away from home, in this solitary space, that I had begun to look—really look—at the flowers and branches in front of me. Now my hands and my pencils confidently sketched the right shapes. I found my mind clearing, my heartbeat growing steady again. There was only color. Violet with yellow undertones. A touch of green where the petals picked up the shade of the moss around it. And I found myself happy, or something close to it.
I drew the crocus—how the petals folded in on themselves like the pleats of a purple dress. The way the green stem was thin and delicate and stately, like a woman’s slender neck.
I worked until it was too dark in the forest to draw anymore. In the distance the clock bells rang out. I pulled myself to my feet, tucking my pencils back into my bag. In the fading daylight I squinted at the image of the flower one last time. There it was, preserved for all time inside my book. I smiled, touching the crosshatched shadows with my index finger. Then I closed the cover and stumbled back toward the lift.
Dinner at Rachel’s was always an improvement over dinner at home. Though her quarters were the same shape as ours, they were different inside, warm and comfortable, decorated with paintings of fruit and lit with glass-shaded lamps. Her parents chatted amicably as they cooked together. Rachel and I poured drinks and set down plates. Even her little brother helped, laying out the tarnished silverware, chanting, “The spoon and knife is husband and wife.” He didn’t even complain about it. I don’t think Ronen had ever helped with dinner without whining.
It was nice, really. It let me forget about the weird run-in with the librarian, if only for an hour or two.
Before we ate, Rachel’s mom took down a pair of electric lights from her cupboard and set them in the center of the table. It was something that was done once a week in her household. Her mother was so grave about it, serious. When we were little, Rachel had asked me if my mother did the same thing. I’d only frowned, given my head a shake. Momma hadn’t done anything like that. Rachel said that it was something that the women in her family had always done.
“Will you join us, Terra?” her mother asked now. “My mother always said it was a mitzvah for a woman to welcome in the end of the week.” I glanced over at Rachel’s father, who hovered over the kitchen counter, smiling. Rachel’s brother watched us too. Everyone was waiting for me.
“Sure,” I said, the heat spreading over my cheeks. I watched as her mother flicked the switch on the bottom of the lights.
“Blessed is the universe,” her mother said, veiling her face with her hands. Rachel did the same, lifting her long fingers to her face. So I did too, even though I had no idea why. “And the commandment to kindle the light in the darkness.”
We dropped our fingers, watching the bulbs flicker. Their yellow light danced across the dinner table.
“Well, now that that’s done with,” her father said, smacking his hands together. “Let’s eat.”
But by the end of dinner, Mar Jacobi’s words were weighing heavy on me again. Alyana said we need to protect our liberties. I gnawed at the dried fruit that was our dessert, thinking about his words. I hadn’t realized how quiet I’d become, until Rachel slipped her hand in mine under the table, squeezing my pinkie finger tight.
“I don’t think we’ll be having any tea, Mother,” she said, standing and pulling me along. “We have a lot to talk about.”
She gave me a wink as she dragged me up the stairwell. But when she shut her door behind her, she turned on me.
“What’s with you?” she demanded. And then, before I could answer, she broke into a grin. “Is this about a boy? Do you like someone?”
“What? A boy? No.” I fell against her bed. The sheets were pulled taut, tucked neatly under the mattress. Rachel made her bed every morning. I never did. “It’s about the librarian.”
“The librarian?” In the dim circle of light cast by her bedside lamp, Rachel wrinkled her nose. “You . . . you like Mar Jacobi?”
“No! He stopped me in the lift after the vocation ceremony. He said he has books for me.”
“That’s so weird. You know, he always kind of creeped me out. Every time I go in there, he’s all, ‘What books would it please you to read today, Ms. Federman?’ Like he thinks we’re chums.”
“Lies,” I teased. “You don’t read, Rachel.”
She threw one of her pillows at me. I caught it easily. Then I froze, looking down at the tiny floral print sewn into the pillowcase.
“He said he knew Momma.”
“So? Who doesn’t know everyone else on this ship?”
“I don’t know. It just seemed . . .” I trailed off. A frown was playing on Rachel’s features, just below the surface of her smiling eyes. “It just seemed strange,” I said at last.
“I think that’s just how he is,” she said. “You’re being paranoid.”
“Really?” I finally passed the pillow to her. She took it, tucking it behind her head.
“Really,” she said, in a tone that told me there would be no more talking about it. Then she sat up straight. “Besides, we have more important things to talk about.”
“Such as?”
“Our new jobs, silly. Botanist! That was a surprise.”
I groaned, hiding my face in the crook of my arm. But Rachel didn’t want to hear it.
“It’s not so bad! A specialist position. Your dad will be happy.”
I bit down on the inside of my cheek, thinking about it. “Maybe. You should have seen him after Ronen got his assignment. It was bad enough that Momma had a service job. I think he’d just about die if both of his kids did.”
Something hardened inside Rachel. I realized too late how I’d misspoken. A merchant was ranked lower than a service worker. “He must have known it was a possibility. It’s not like everyone can be a specialist.”
“Of course! And it’s not like everyone should,” I assured her. But my words didn’t help. It was like a door had closed inside her and I was standing on the other side. “You know it’s my dad’s issue, not mine.”