Lannie Butterworth's Arc

Chapter 6 of 6

Lannie stepped out of the greenhouse and pulled the blue door shut behind her. Coach Martinez stood in the gravel with her arms crossed, ponytail tight, whistle flat against her track jacket. She was the one who had rolled Lannie's laminated footpath card into a paper airplane on the first day of school. Lannie still had the photo. "Butterworth." "Coach." "You have bugs in there." "Not yet." Coach Martinez looked past her at the ivy-wrapped panes. "Sunday. That's what the first grader told the lunch lady. Sunday you're moving them." Lannie's throat tightened. Oliver was still inside. She heard him go very still on the potting bench. "I need containers," Lannie said. "If I move them loose, they'll scatter. Or get stepped on. That's the whole thing I'm trying to stop." Coach Martinez didn't answer right away. She looked at her runners. Then at the greenhouse. Then at Lannie. "Field day is Saturday now. Not next week. Principal moved it." Lannie felt the ground shift. "Saturday." "My anchor runner drops the baton every practice. I kept him. We race Westbrook in five days." Coach Martinez pulled something from her jacket pocket. Six clear deli containers, stacked, lids rubber-banded. Small holes punched in each lid. "Cafeteria was tossing them." Lannie stared. "I don't want them on my track Saturday," Coach Martinez said. "I don't want them under a shoe. Mine or a kid's. Take the containers. Move them tonight. Not Sunday." "Tonight." "Building's open until six for custodial. After that the alarm's on." She held the stack out. "You have until six." Lannie took them. The plastic was still warm from the coach's pocket. "One more thing," Coach Martinez said. "The dog by the hedge. Keep him off the field Saturday. Kids will trip." "Okay." Coach Martinez turned and walked back through the gravel. She didn't look back. Lannie shoved the door open. Oliver was already climbing down from the bench. "Six containers," he said. "Five Georges. One spare." "We move them now." They ran. The cabinet behind the science room was three buildings over. Lannie unlatched each compartment and coaxed the Georges into the deli cups one at a time. The bumblebee went first, calm. The ladybug walked in on her own. The masked hunter took the longest; she used a folded index card to guide him. The junebug clicked against the plastic. The woolly caterpillar curled in a tight ring at the bottom of his cup. She snapped each lid. By five-forty they were back at the greenhouse. Lannie set the five cups on the clean bench in a row. Above them, on his web by the rafter, George Silkweaver watched. "Corner rafter's ready," he said. Lannie unbanded the lids but didn't lift them. Sunday was gone. Saturday was coming. The Georges were housed, sealed, and safe on the bench, and the field day she'd been counting toward had just moved a day closer.