Page 16 of Big Island Neighbors
She walked out front and through the gate, and there was Piper.
“I made seventeen dollars so far,” she greeted her brightly. “I used one of the bottles of juice you froze from the Meyer lemons. Is that okay?”
“That’s amazing.” Tara kissed the top of her spiky red hair, warm from the sun. “Come on inside and eat some lunch.”
“I’ll bring the lemonade. There’s enough left for me and Paige.”
“Sounds good.”
“Here.” Piper pulled a wad of cash from her pocket and held it out.
Tara’s breath caught in her throat. “What’s that for?”
She shrugged. “For bills and stuff.”
“Sweetheart, that’s not for you to worry about. You can use that on whatever you want.”
Piper scowled. “I want to use it on bills and stuff.”
Eight years in, Tara knew better than to argue with this one. She accepted the seventeen dollars and said, “Thank you. We can put it towards chicken feed, how about that?”
“About that,” Piper said as they walked back through the gate, squeezing through with it barely open so that no animals escaped, “You know how that one guy grows his own bugs?”
Tara thought for a minute. “You mean Mr. Ramos and the black soldier fly larvae?”
“Yeah, those! I was watching videos about how to grow our own bugs. It’s way healthier, and it’s what they’re supposed to eat.”
“Oh yeah?” It was a filler phrase, an ‘I’m listening’. She loved it when her kids got excited about new projects, but a tub full of maggots wouldn’t have been her first choice.
“Yeah,” Piper said in a tone that impliedduh. “That’s what they eat in the wild! Bugs! If we can grow enough bugs, then we don’t have to buy chicken food.”
“It’s a good idea.”
“Cody already said he would help me build something from one of the videos. It’s like this compost bin that the larvae can crawl out of, and then the chickens can eat them!”
“Sounds like a brilliant way to reduce feed costs,” Tara said. “But I want you to know that I’ve got this. You don’t have to worry about money.”
Piper gave her a frank, assessing look. “You don’t have a job. And now Daddy doesn’t have a job.”
“I’ll figure it out.”
Her daughter held her gaze for another beat, and then she shrugged. “Okay. Hey Paige!” she shouted as she charged into the house. “Want some lemonade?”
“You’ve got to eat,” Tara said when she saw that there was just as much food in front of Paige now as there had been before. “We leave for your riding lesson in thirty minutes.”
Paige glanced at the clock. “We don’t have to leave that early.”
“Kalea down the street just had her baby. I’m going to drop some food and see if she needs a hand with anything.”
“Really?” Piper said. “You’re giving food away?”
Tara felt her brow pull together as she looked at her daughter. “This family may have its trials, but lack of food is not one of them. And it never will be.”
“But Daddy’s job…”
“Daddy’s job paid for this house,” Tara said. Whatever else she felt about Mitch, she could be grateful for that. And she could let her kids know it. “We own our home, and we own our land. That means that we will always have shelter, food, andwater. Everything else is just details. We’ll figure it out.” She frowned and corrected herself: “Iwill figure it out. Okay?”
“Okay,” Piper mumbled through a mouthful of buttered radishes.
