pecked up the last of the banana pieces, hopped on the windowsill, spread his wings, and lifted off into the sky.
Mr. Flax, the botany teacher, was setting up his Power-Point as PJ rushed in late. Pencils tumbled out of her backpack and clattered all over the floor. Mr. Flax was a gangly, craggy man with smiling blue eyes, and he said to the class, “Seeds scatter just like our PJ’s pencils. Look!” He began showing various views of his garden that he had photographed last summer. Tall, wavy sunflowers zigzagged across a path and made crazy patterns on the lawn and soared out of beds of lavender and mint.
“Oooh.” “Oh wow.” “Cool.” “Look at that!” everyone said at once.
“I didn’t plant any of those sunflowers,” Mr. Flax chuckled. “Nature did the work. They’re all spontaneous. In some areas they sprouted out of compost. Or they grew out of seeds dropped by birds around the bird feeder. Or breezes brought them onto my path from sunflower farms in the next village. Come and look at what I saved,” he said, scattering sunflower seeds on his desk along with dried sunflowers, brittle stalks, and roots from his shed.
PJ remembered an earlier class when he had prompted them to be aware of tiny plants and trees sprouting out of crags and crevices in the cliffside. She felt thrilled, thinking about Lemon Pie’s plan to scatter seeds from the big fig tree by the port all the way down South Africa’s south coast.
“Mr. Flax,” she asked, “do sunflowers also grow out of trees when they fall down and rot and go all crumbly?”
“Good question, PJ. What do the rest of you think?”
Hands shot up. “Sunflowers need sun, don’t they?” piped a voice from the back.
“Sure.” Mr. Flax nodded. “I’ve seen sunflowers growing out of rotting tree trunks. Their stalks bend every which way to tilt their faces to the sun.”
“Broken trees in our backyard are full of creepy-crawliesand funny mushroomy plants. But no sunflowers,” said another voice from the front of the class.
“Creepy-crawlies, heat, and rain help to break down the inside of a tree into all sorts of ecosystems,” said Mr. Flax. “In some places deep in the rain forests, you’ll find beautiful orchids, ferns, or mosses growing out of old tree trunks lying on the ground.” Turning to the whiteboard, he reached for green, red, and brown markers and began writing out their homework assignment for the next class. “See how many forms of life you can find in any old broken tree trunk. Spiders weaving webs. Mushrooms. All kinds of grasses. Twisted roots. Wildflowers, or maybe some young sunflowers?”
“Bugs?” PJ suggested.
“As many as you can spot,” said Mr. Flax. “Only don’t touch anything in case hundreds of fire ants come scurrying out!”
waterfalls
“Jump in, PJ,” said Mrs. Patel, rattling to a stop outside PJ’s school in an old VW Beetle of a brilliant rose red like the bougainvillea tumbling over her house.
“Oh, Mrs. Patel, I have homework,” pleaded PJ.
“No arguments,” said Mrs. Patel. She wagged her finger so fast, her jangly bracelets sounded like castanets. “I’ll have you home before sunset. Here, let me call your mom,” she added. She reached for her cell phone and speed-dialed the Picklelime home to leave a message.
“Done,” she said. “Come. I want to show you my waterfall.” And with that, she spun the VW around in a single motion and sped off toward the cliffs.
PJ eyed the sky just in case young Lemon Pie had decided to fly home, but in her heart she knew that was impossible. She told Mrs. Patel about the wonderful surprise in Messenger Gull’s b-mail and how Lemon Pie had ended up in the huge old wild fig tree down by the harbor of Port Elizabeth on the east coast of South Africa.
“A wild fig tree? Did he say anything special about it?” asked Mrs. Patel.
“Special? Well, it was filled with all sorts of birds, waiting to eat new figs.”
“No, there’s more.
Eleanor Coerr, Ronald Himler