3
It wasn’t easy for Ben to get his plants into Dr. Parsons’s hands. (He couldn’t call her Winnie, even in his head. And to her face, during their video call, Ben found it easier to call her nothing. Dr. Parsons reminded him of his stately grandmother, and the woman always had a sharp word for any young people who dared call her by her first name.)
There was the careful packing, trying to preserve what few plants had survived. Then the round-trip cross-country ski trek from his cabin to the tiny general store in Worster Bend.
“Another storm this afternoon,” said Jason, the owner of the store. Ben could see Jason’s wife down at the end of a nearby aisle unpacking a box and stacking cans on the shelf. “Can’t guarantee this will go out today,” Jason said of Ben’s package. “Might not be ti
