Page 21 of Among the Screaming Trees

Aspen and Tali sit cross-legged on the floor, even though there is a perfectly comfortable sofa behind them, acting as their backrest. Their dorm is twice the size of mine and Fox’s. It could be plain luck they snagged this suite, which is the biggest I’ve seen since I arrived here, and last year Paul and I had two separate dorms after the idiot flooded our first one.

Tali clutches her beer by the neck so it dangles from her thin fingers. She’s going on and on about base-note scents and emulsifiers, as if Aspen and I give a shit about her side hustle or what moisturizers should smell like. Aspen feigns interest, nodding along as Tali prattles on. She asks questions occasionally, which only serves to send Tali off on some tangent about the quality of vanilla and why sandalwood is superior to cedar. Who cares? I don’t. Aspen attacks her pizza with ferocity, folding each slice in half before tearing into the greasy chunks. That’s after she’s removed all the pineapple chunks though. Chunks I scoot forward and steal when Tali pivots to oils that are actually toxic.

“Hey, Tali. Pause for breath, yeah? We’ve eaten half, and you’re still on your first slice. Eat!”

“I can eat and talk,” she protests, shoving as much in as possible before humming and nodding.

“Don’t you dare chew with your mouth open.”

“I’m not,” she glares, opening her mouth to talk and chew. Gross.

This is my opportunity. If I don’t pounce, who knows when or if it will come around again. Given how quiet Aspen remained on the walk here from Wyldan’s office, something is on her mind.

“Aspen. Tell us more about yourself. I feel like we’ve heard the unedited sales pitch for Tali’s tonics. What are you majoring in, or what do you plan on doing after your degree? Tell us about the authentic you. Where you grew up. What your family is like.”

“Where do you see yourself in five years…” Tali interjects, before my glare shuts her up. She finishes her first slice and moves on to another with glorious, golden chunks of juicy pineapple suspended in cheesy goodness.

Aspen chews the last of her second slice before downing the remainder of her beer. Her knees are gathered to her chest as she draws in a fortifying breath.

“Okay. A little about me. My parents, Arthur and Aster, were both botany nerds. My dad lectured in Colorado, and my mom began as his student. They kept the relationship on the down low as long as they could until me,” she says, gesturing to her softly rounded stomach.

“Rather than it being some scandal, their relationship was tolerated as long as it remained quiet. A sixteen-year age gap between them never came up. They began working on a research project together, several actually, until Mom became sick.”

“With what?” Tali asks.

“MND.”

“What? How old?”

Aspens sighs, her brow wrinkling.

“Twenty-eight when first diagnosed with motor neurone disease. But she had been deteriorating for a while. She passed it off as exhaustion, or forgetting to eat in the field. I picked up that something was wrong when I couldn’t read her handwriting anymore, when she always had the most glorious penmanship.”

Every instinct I have screams at me to go to her. Sweep her onto my lap and offer her comfort. Instead, I ask a question I hope will break her open. “How old were you?”

“Seven when she passed.”

“Fuck,” Tali and I exclaim together. Aspen nods, an abbreviated movement.

“Part of me had been hoping the fatigue resulted from her field studies. It is not that she forgot to eat, because I made her sandwiches and fruit plates. She didn’t eat because it hurt her to swallow. She masked so many symptoms and the disease progressed untreated for so long.”

“How do they treat MND?” I ask, hopeful.

“Not well,” she laughs, bitter and shallow. “The nerves decay to a point where the muscles don’t get the messages from the brain to move. Then they atrophy. Any treatment is palliative at best. Even though my parents tried to alter that.”

“Your parents were studying botanics for treating disease?” Tali asks, now on her fourth slice.

“Yep. When Mom became ill, she had an idea of what she had. Or what it could be, so she pivoted her research to help herself. Dad stopped teaching to fast track any research findings and clinical trials with the stipulation that Aster be the first. She didn’t survive long enough for that to happen. Less than two years after diagnosis, Mom passed away.”

“Oh, Pen. I’m so sorry,” Tali moans into her friend’s shoulder.

Seven-year-old Aspen watched her mother die. How the fuck do you deal with that and still grow up to be a decent human being studying the same field?

“And your dad?” I press.

A second sigh escapes as Tali’s head rests on her fist.

“After Mom passed, he was a mess. I guess I was too young to understand the full extent of what it meant to lose a parent, but Dad lost his best friend. They spent ten years by each other’s side, and he couldn’t cope with losing her like that.”