I let out a long, despairing sigh. Therehadbeen savings. But Kayley’s unexpected arrival had changed everything. My parents had suddenly found themselves with a second child to care for and that had meant radically changing their outlook. They’d gone from comfortably prepared to scrambling for Kayley’s college fund and that had meant taking risks they otherwise wouldn’t have. Not all of them had paid off. Long-term, we probably would have been just fine. But when they died, they’d left very little behind. I still had college loans to pay off and my job barely covered the rent and bills. “We’ve got a few thousand. That’s it.”
“Could you run up debt? I mean, even if it takes the rest of your life to pay it off….”
“I’m going to have to do that anyway. Even with insurance, there’ll still be hospital bills. And my credit’s nowhere near good enough to borrow half a million—not even close.”
“And the Swiss clinic needs the money in advance? They won’t let you pay it off in installments?”
“I called them. They won’t. Why would they? They’re for the rich. You pay up front or they don’t want to know.”
We both stared at the notepad and its vast, empty white space.
Stacey flipped over the page. “Okay,” she said. “You’ll just have to earn the money.”
“You’re nuts. I mean, I love you, but you’re nuts. Half a million in six months? You think someone’s going to take me on at a million dollars a year?”
“You could start your own business,” she said, undeterred. “You don’t give yourself enough credit. You’re smart.”
I sighed again. I knew she was just trying to help and being an entrepreneur was what she was all about: of course she’d suggest that. But it was ridiculous. What was I going to do: jewelry making? Kids’ parties?
“Let’s make a list of your skills,” said Stacey.
I shook my head. “The only thing I’ve ever been good at is growing stuff.”
“Well,” said Stacey, “what can you grow in six months that’ll make you half a million dollars?”
Sometimes, you just have to hear the right question. I blinked at her as my brain lit up.
No, that’s insane. I couldn’t.
Could I?
8
LOUISE
I politely buthurriedly got rid of Stacey, telling her I’d had an idea involvingimporting rare flowers from Africa, or somethingand needed to think. She looked doubtful, but she had to get to her store so she hugged me and ran.
I sat down at my aging laptop and, in a testament to my naivety, typed “How to grow marijuana” into Google. It didn’t occur to me until later that doing that from my own computer might not be a good idea.
For the next seven hours, I didn’t move. I fumbled for my phone, dialed the garden store, and called in sick without my eyes once leaving the screen. For the first hour, I was hesitant and tentative. I was so afraid of getting my hopes up, I was like a scientist trying to disprove a theory. I tried every way to destroy the idea that I could.Maybe I couldn’t grow a crop in time. Maybe it wouldn’t be worth enough. Maybe the startup costs are too high.
One by one, I eliminated those questions. It began to look viable, in terms of money. That left the botany.
I immersed myself in science. I read up on the plant itself, on gene lines and fertilizers and pest control. There was a huge amount to research, but the internet had all the information I needed. As Iread more and more, I started to get excited. Growing weed, I learned, is complicated and tricky...if you’re a civilian. But for a botany student and gardener like me it was actually relatively simple. Hell, I’d actually specialized in this stuff at college. I could even see a few ways I could improve on the methods people were posting about online.I could be good at this.The skill I’d thought was so useless might actually be able to save us.
It was possible.
That left: could I actually go through with it?
I sat back from the screen. Ineverbroke the law. I never even broke the rules. This was so far outside anything I’d normally consider, it was absurd.Me? Grow drugs?
I hesitantly clicked a few more Google links and read about raids on local grow houses, about the farmers being sentenced not to three months in county jail, but to 20 years in a federal penitentiary. Weed may be effectively legalized, especially in liberal California, but growing your own large-scale crop of it certainly wasn’t. I saw pictures of hollow-eyed men—and even a few women—in orange jumpsuits. Some of them weren’t much older than me.
It wasn’t just that I’d go to jail: it was that Kayley’s only chance would evaporate. Worse, I’d miss the remaining time we had together.
I can’t do this.
But if I didn’t, she was going to die.
