Dean was still working on his crutch, and Luther and Scarlett were busy scavenging the rubble for melee weapons to replace the ones they had lost during their bridge ordeal. Hmm, what about those prickly pears? The Survival Tabs left her stomach feeling empty.
She eyed a sprawling healthy-looking prickly pear. Nopalitos! She had eaten them plenty of times. The flat leaf-like pads were a popular dish in Mexico, loaded with vitamins. But she needed tongs. Pliers would work.
She hurried to Dean, pleased she could finally do something to help her friends. “Dean, do you have pliers?”
“You need me to fix something?”
“Uh, have you ever had grilled prickly pear pads—the leaves?” She loved them diced in pico de gallo served with huevos rancheros. Mmm, or sautéed in olive oil with onions, garlic, and jalapeños. Her mouth watered just thinking about it.
Dean put down the crutch. “Can’t say that I have.”
“Well, they taste sorta like lemony green beans. With the pizazzy crunch of bell pepper,” she embellished as if writing one of her MeChat food blogs.
“You’re making me hungry.” He handed her the pliers. “The crutch is taking longer than I expected. The dern wood split on the first one.”
“You’ll figure it out,” Ella said, excited to get started.
“And don’t forget its medicinal properties,” Shari’s voice seemed to play in the background. “Opuntia makes an excellent anti-inflammatory. Ameliorates mouth sores and works wonders for high cholesterol and diabetes . . .”
“Thank you, Shari.”
Ella harvested the pads, snipping them off while she daydreamed about her prickly pear picking days with her cousins every August—until that horrible August of the Super Summer flu.
After she had collected a pile, she painstakingly scraped off the barbs. If they had time, she’d get Justin to help her roast them on sticks, and they could munch on them during the day. Yum, fire-roasted nopalitos!
***
After a lunch of nopalitos, they hiked the hateful desert, following the train tracks that lead to . . . only God knew where. Her feet were killing her. At least the ground sloped down gradually into an endless flatland. The world didn’t seem so claustrophobic once they made it out of the canyons.
Justin alternated between walking with Dean in the front of the pack and in the back with Luther. To avoid her boredom, she pointed out familiar plants to Twila and noted their medicinal properties thanks to Shari’s teachings.
Besides the Juniper and Piñon trees, she practiced identifying the drought-resistant plants braving the desolate desert’s climate, like yucca, algerita, chimaja, manzanita, and the various sages. After all this time, she still carried Shari’s prized herbal journal in her pack—full of plant sketches along with tons of los remedios notes.
Lost in her herbal world, she happened to look up at the skyline. Hey, I recognize those mountains! Quickly, she forced her mind to go blank by envisioning the familiar horizon melting into the sandy beaches of a bottomless ocean.
Mindy caught up to her without saying a word. She nodded, as if she also recognized the mountain range. They fell into step together, softly snickering at a hatless Dean hobbling on his silly-looking crutch. She had assumed they would be great friends. Someday. If they ever had time for such things.
Mindy hardly talked. And even though Justin had become Ella’s new post-apocalyptic BFF, she was in dire need of girl-talk. She used to chat for hours with her girlfriends. Scarlett was cool, but older than her, and Twila was too young for the female companionship she craved.
As they walked, a sort of silent friendship seemed to waft in the cooling breeze. But what should she say? Sure, she wanted to know what they had in common, like what movies Mindy liked. Her favorite bands. Did she have brothers and sisters? What year was she graduating from high school . . .
Such frivolous questions were now totally irrelevant. Talking about the past would probably just make them more depressed. Ella realized avoiding friendship was way easier than going through the pain of losing a newly found friend.
“Hey.” Mindy took her by surprise. “Whatcha thinking?”
“Baskin-Robbins’ Cotton Candy Crackle ice cream,” Ella fantasized aloud.
Mindy licked her chapped lips. “Mint chocolate chip. Triple scoop. In a bowl with whipped cream!”
Ella didn’t want to spoil the moment. They continued in step, just happy in each other’s presence. They would be friends. She just knew it, only in a more serious way than her old life.
“I’ve been wanting to ask you something,” Mindy said mysteriously.
“Sure.” Maybe Mindy yearned for friendship just as much as she.
“How did you know to put Mateo and your baby things in my cart?” Mindy asked with the clearest blue-sky eyes ever.
Ugh! It was not what she wanted to discuss—to anyone. Not even Justin. But if they were destined to become friends, and perhaps family one day, she shouldn’t blow-off Mindy. “Sometimes, I see images in mirrors. Things that come true.”
Mindy gasped. “Really?”
“I think it’s one of my spiritual gifts,” Ella reluctantly admitted. Although it certainly didn’t feel spiritual. More like borderline evil. But this time it had saved baby Mateo.
Dean stopped to look through the binoculars. “We’re getting close.”
“Yay!” Twila shouted.
“All I see are damn train tracks,” Luther grumbled.
“Exactly.” Dean took a rest from the crutch and stood on one foot. “The message I got the other day, showed these old tracks would take us off the beaten track, thereby misleading our enemies. The goal was to meet up with these tracks.”
