A Field Guide to Getting Lost, page 12
Sutton knew that part of the question was whether or not Luis would be able to eat anything. Elizabeth had told them not to go to any trouble—they always traveled with special food for Luis. But when Sutton had told Mrs. Banerjee about Luis’s allergies, she had taken it as a challenge.
“This,” Mrs. B said, starting with a casserole dish full of what looked like mashed carrots, “is gajar ka halwa. A sweet dish that includes carrots, raisins, cardamom, coconut oil, and lots of sugar. It is normally made with cashews, but I left them out. And the milk has been replaced by rice milk. So I believe it should be a good choice for Luis.”
Luis’s eyes widened. He looked shocked that his food allergies had been considered.
She then went on to describe the two other Indian dishes—rasmalai, paneer balls in a sugary, creamy sauce; and jalebi, a sort of funnel cake soaked in saffron sugar syrup. She was careful to describe the allergens in each of them, but Luis had already started devouring the carrot dish with his eyes.
“And that one?” Mr. Wong said, pointing to the fourth dish.
“That,” she said, with a twinkle in her eye, “is a traditional birthday dish going back many decades in my family. It is called Oreo pie.”
The food kept everyone busy for a few minutes as they served themselves and found seats. Mrs. B kept up a cheerful stream of chatter, asking Elizabeth about her job, telling her all about Moti and Freckles, and asking pointed questions about how long Elizabeth and Sutton’s dad had been dating.
Riley, her moms, and her little sister (wearing a tutu and construction helmet) arrived with more food and another not-birthday present. Finally Sabina and Sadiq were there too, sweaty in their soccer uniforms, but not too tired for a Ping-Pong tournament.
Luis and Sutton watched the twins take turns demolishing Riley in Ping-Pong for a bit, and then they drifted off to a bench a little ways away. “Thank you for inviting us,” Luis said. “I hope your dad didn’t make you.”
Sutton flushed. She couldn’t blame him for thinking that, but she wished he hadn’t. “It was my idea.”
“Oh! Well, thanks.” Luis took a big bite of gajar ka halwa. “This is amazing,” he mumbled around the sweet carrot mush.
Sutton had had gajar ka halwa before, so she started off with the jalebi and groaned as the sugar bomb exploded in her mouth.
Luis grabbed the smooshed not-birthday present off the nearby table. “Here. Open this.”
Sutton took the package and turned it over curiously. Not that she’d expected a present at all, but if Luis was going to bring her something, she would have expected a book. This was way too small to be a book.
She set her plate aside and ripped into the package. “You really didn’t have to bring me anything.”
Luis shrugged. “You saved my life multiple times, so.”
Sutton grinned. “I’d say we worked together to avoid dying in the wilderness of Discovery Park.”
Inside the paper was another layer of tissue. She unwrapped and unwrapped and unwrapped. Luis had wrapped this package like it was about to go on a wilderness expedition. Finally her fingers found metal.
She pulled out what looked like an oversized silver locket at first. She fingered the cover, almost afraid to open it. She wasn’t ready to find a photo of their parents inside, like Elizabeth was already her mom or something.
“Open it,” Luis urged.
Sutton pried open the cover and found not a photo, but—
“A compass!” she laughed. “Wait, it’s not your dad’s, is it?”
Luis shook his head so fast it blurred. “No, no, my mom and I went to a bunch of Goodwills, looking for one that worked. This is the one we found for you. I know you have GPS and probably won’t ever go hiking again, but…”
He suddenly looked nervous, like he’d made a big mistake.
Sutton looped the compass’s chain around her neck. “I love it,” she said. “Thank you. So I can always find my way home.”
Luis sighed in relief. “Exactly.”
She would always find her way home. She knew that now. Just like her mom would make it home, when the time was right. Even if she didn’t take the route Sutton expected.
“Can I show you something?” Sutton retrieved her backpack from a corner.
“Isn’t that your hiking backpack?” Luis eyed it warily.
Sutton grinned. “The only place I’m hiking is down to my apartment at the end of the night.” She pulled out her mini-bot and the maze. “But I wanted you to see this.”
She spread the maze out and calibrated her bot. “How’s it going with the bot I loaned you?”
“Bumble? Buzzing right along.” He grinned. “I mean, mostly he just goes in wonky circles. I think he’s dancing.”
Sutton rolled her eyes.
“What?” Luis laughed. “It’s science. Bees share information with their bee friends through something called a waggle dance. I’m not even kidding.”
Sutton fought to keep her own grin from showing through. “Who’s the bot communicating with? You only have one.”
“My guess is it’s sending a signal to our robot overlords, who will soon seize all power from humans.” Luis shrugged. “But what do I know?”
“Well, I’m still overlord of this bot.” Sutton pulled out her tablet and opened up the app she needed, telling it to run the bot’s code. They watched as the tiny machine, powered by ones and zeroes and the brain of a now-ten-year-old girl, motored through the maze. When it reached the spot where it had been getting stuck, Sutton watched the bot turn and go its own way.
It would still reach the other side.
The grown-ups had drifted over, drawn to the technology none of them understood. (Mrs. B understood the fundamentals, but when she’d taught computer science, a single computer had been the size of Sutton’s bedroom, so it was understandable that she marveled over the tiny bot.)
When the bot reached the exit, they cheered. Sutton picked it up and started it at the beginning of the maze again. This time, instead of turning left at the tricky spot, the bot went straight.
“That’s not what it did the last time!” Luis said.
Sutton nodded. “I found a bunch of different ways for it to get through. I decided instead of focusing on speed, I’d focus on possibilities. Eventually I want to teach it to choose the best route, depending on changing variables.”
The variables might change sometimes, and the bot could learn to adapt. So could Sutton. She’d already started.
Just sitting here under the hazy Seattle sky, the same sky as the one a world away where Sutton’s mom was tracking penguin migration, she was adapting. She was forging new paths.
She reached up and closed her fingers around the compass resting against her heart.
She was home.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The idea for this book was first sparked when my father made a funny comment about being lost in a park. (We weren’t as lost as Luis and Sutton, but like them, we couldn’t find the parking lot.) At first I thought the story would be a picture book. But it wasn’t. Then I thought it might be a chapter book. It wasn’t.
That’s when my lovely editor Reka Simonsen saw the potential for the middle-grade novel it became. Many thanks to Reka, my cartographer, for seeing what Luis and Sutton could be and providing the map to get them there. Thanks also to her wonderful assistant, Julia McCarthy, for carrying the first aid kit (aka providing insight and support as needed).
My agent, Jim McCarthy (no relation to Julia!), is my compass through the publishing wilderness. I don’t think he would be a lot of help in an actual wilderness, but that’s okay, because I’m staying inside with my computer, where I can email him at any moment with frantic questions.
A serious explorer doesn’t mount an expedition without the support of many specialists. Publishing a book is sort of like mounting an expedition, but with a lot less potential for freezing or starvation. I am so grateful to these people at Atheneum and Simon & Schuster for making this book everything it could be: senior managing editor Jeannie Ng, copy editor Clare McGlade, designers Greg Stadnyk and Irene Metaxatos, and publicist Audrey Gibbons. And a million thank-yous to the incomparable Isabel Roxas for the most perfect cover.
My writing friends are my cairns along the way, but a lot warmer and more encouraging than a pile of rocks. Many thanks to the following people for their critiques, insights, support, and answers to my many questions about allergies, biracial identity, Indian food and culture, and more: Jessica Lawson, Rajani LaRocca, Alexandra Alessandri, Shanna Rogers, Summer Heacock, Ann Braden, and Tara Dairman.
Finally, my husband, Mariño, and my children, Joaquin and Cordelia, are my true North; I will always make my way back to you. (It helps that I almost never leave the house.)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
JOY McCULLOUGH is not outdoorsy, and she has a terrible sense of direction. She did climb a Guatemalan volcano one time, and she has hiked through Discovery Park. But she much prefers to stay inside, writing books and plays from her home in the Seattle area, where she lives with her husband and two children. Her debut novel for teens, Blood Water Paint, was longlisted for a National Book Award and was a finalist for the William C. Morris Debut Award. Visit her at joymccullough.com.
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2020 by Joy McCullough
Jacket illustration copyright © 2020 by Isabel Roxas
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: McCullough, Joy, author.
Title: A field guide to getting lost / Joy McCullough.
Description: First edition. | New York City : Atheneum Books for Young Readers, [2020] | Audience: Ages 8 Up. | Audience: Grades 2–3. | Summary: Told from two viewpoints, STEM-oriented Sutton and imaginative, artistic Luis, ages nine and ten, must find some common ground when her father and his mother start dating seriously.
Identifiers: LCCN 2019035650 | ISBN 9781534438491 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781534438514 (eBook)
Subjects: CYAC: Dating (Social customs)—Fiction. | Single-parent families—Fiction. | Fathers and daughters—Fiction. | Mothers and sons—Fiction.
Classification: LCC PZ7.1.M43412 Fie 2020 | DDC [Fic]—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019035650
Joy McCullough, A Field Guide to Getting Lost
