The Atlantis Girl by S.A. Beck

Author:S.A. Beck [Beck, S.A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Beck Books

Chapter 9

APRIL 13, 2016, SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA

3:30 PM

Jaxon slipped away from the main house at three thirty when classes were over to spend the hours set aside for extracurricular activities in the greenhouse. She had been reluctant to try what she was about to try, but she couldn’t get the idea out of her head. She hurried under the archway from the backyard to the secret garden. Wisteria blossoms trailed and dropped fragrant, feathery flowers in her hair. She passed the flowing fountain. She skirted the tidy rows of apple trees alive with the buzz of bumblebees, and she came upon the greenhouse at the back of the yard.

The building was small, only eight by six feet, its steel framework painted rust red with stabilized frosted-fiberglass walls and rooftop. From the outside, she could see the contours of plants. The door was unlocked, as it had been before, and when she walked into the much warmer room, she instantly started to sweat. Jax inhaled, feeling the tingle of awareness and the rich connection with the dirt beneath the mulch. The sensation of an unseen energy moving between her and the earth had only gotten stronger with her time at Forever Welcome, which she attributed to the group home’s verdant, vibrant gardens and landscape. But Jax wasn’t in the greenhouse to escape with her thoughts—she was there to experiment with the potting soil and seeds Dr. Hollis had procured for her.

On the back shelf where Dr. Hollis kept his plants, the citronella she had touched days before had grown another three inches, leaves spilling over the sides of the pot and a yellow flower blooming from a stalk near its center. Jaxon made a beeline for the grouping of mosquito plants and studied them in awe. “Unbelievable,” she murmured. She had done that. She had the power to do things like that. It was stunning and somewhat terrifying. She wondered what else she could do.

Jaxon didn’t know a thing about planting, but on the table in the middle of the cozy greenhouse were a bag of potting soil, several small earthen pots, and a tiny rake and trowel. She was out of her element, but she pushed up the sleeves of her denim shirt. Her hair was tied back with a silk scarf. She tore a tiny hole in the potting soil bag and scooped some of the rich, black dirt into each pot.

“All right. That looks about right.” Jax put her hands on her hips to survey the handiwork. There were crumbs of soil littering the table and spilling from the overfilled pots, but it didn’t look too bad. She set about opening each packet of seeds she had requested and poked them down into the soil. Jax had asked for herbs because she’d read somewhere they were easy to cultivate. She wasn’t sure how deeply the seeds needed to be planted. She didn’t know how much water they required or which fertilizer to add. Jax moved instinctively.

As she moved from the first pot to the second, she hummed a tuneless melody.

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