Ahab Finds an Empty Table at Lunch
Today's lunch was pretty good. It was a soup with lots of beans and it came with some hot crunchy bread.
Then another boy sat down at the table, looked at Ahab, and half-smiled, almost asking for permission, but not exactly.
He looked at Ahab and spoke. "You and me are a little different than a lot of the others. In fact, there's really two kinds of kids here. There's the main group. The bright ones are the main group. Like Horus over there. He's a good example. He's smart, he's tall, he sings really well. You ever not see him smiling?
"That group -- they have potential and their communities saw that young and now are helping them thrive.
"Then there's the others. And really, we don't have many traits in common with each other. We're really just not them."
Ahab watched as the other boy looked at subtly pointed at a few other students, eating alone.
"Some of us are from in places where life is not as easy. My village sent me but couldn't send others. I'm supposed to come back and share everything I learned here, even though I won't be able to remember all of it, and I won't have all the books and equipment.
Ahab looked up and wondered if this boy knew Ahab was a bandit. If this boy did know, he didn't seem too bothered by it. This was confusing. It wasn't a secret, but it wasn't something volunteered either.
Ahab kept eating slowly. The boy continued, watching Horus at another table talking and laughing with others.
"I wonder sometimes if they are stronger deep down than us, because they grew up comfortably. Or if we are stronger than them because we had to deal with hardship."
Ahab knew exactly what this other boy meant. These were secret thoughts that Ahab had as well. Ahab finally spoke. "You had their peppers here? They're so mild."
The boy looked away from Horus and looked at Ahab. "Yes. They're not hot whatsoever, but they sure think they are, right?"
He smiled in a way that made Ahab feel like they shared a secret.
Ahab remembered the old lady in the greenhouse.
He went there a lot of times when he was younger mostly. It was one of the warmest places, and that first winter, the island got so cold.
He loved walking along the tables and looking at all the flowers and trees and plants.
He remembers watching the old botanist as she waved tiny instruments slowly over trays of tiny plants, each with nearly black leaves and green fruits.
Then she popped one of the tiny ones in her mouth and it amazed Ahab.
The plant was one he recognized from when he still lived with his brother and the other bandits.
The peppers were miserable to eat. They burned his mouth. He remembers eating one and then crying while his brother laughed.
The old woman saw how Ahab was watching her, and she held one out to her.
He said those are too hot for him. He said he couldn't believe she ate them.
She smiled back at him. "This is not like what you are used to." She said, while holding up the tiny fruit.
"This plant creates the irritant as a defense mechanism when it experiences stress.
"But here in my greenhouse, my darling plants get everything they could ever need, and I keep away the pests, so the plant can flourish, rather than develop those noxious compounds.
"The ones you had, they're mean as can be, but these aren't like that.
"And when these plants mature, they grow some fruit with the a more sophisticated version of the irritants, but only in a few fruit, while the other fruit aren't nearly as horrible.
Ahab took the tiny green fruit and ate bit it. The first taste was sweet, and it reminded him of how last time also, the pepper started off tasting sweet, but then quickly burned his mouth.
But this time, nothing burned. The sweetness changed into something else. Something like a hint of the burning flavor, but it wasn't painful. It was nice.
He ate a few more of the peppers while the botanist talked.
She set up fans to blow cold air across the plants. She explained how the cold air would cause the seedlings to grow more slowly rather than stretching up toward the hanging lights.
Ahab remembered her voice. "These lights are intoxicating for the little seedlings, and they would expend all their energy getting as tall as possible right away if they could. Then they'd fall over. So instead, these fans blow cold air, slowing down their growth rate, and forcing them to grow strong enough to survive."
It was the same concept. She loved the plants but didn't coddle them. They thrived.
Ahab realized he was still at lunch.
The boy was still watching Horus at the other table. "I'm jealous that he has a more comfortable life. But I wonder if he is naive and at some point in the future, he'll run into something really evil, and he won't be prepared for it."
Ahab spoke up. "I wonder that too. Or maybe it won't scare him. He won't be afraid because it won't tap into something that already terrified him."
The boy went on. "I think they may be physically stronger for sure, but mentally, they have a warm and fuzzy feeling that they're going to be taken care of no matter what. So, how hard would anyone like that really fight to survive? If we were talking about robots, I'd say they operate with a guideline that if they fail, something else will intervene on their behalf.
"The thing that defines that group is a relaxed peace of mind that the world we live in is mostly safe. Play by the rules, do your part, and you'll probably be OK.
"But it's not always like that, is it..."
Ahab realized he didn't have an answer and the whole topic made him uncomfortable. He imagined all the kids sitting in the lunch room were really tiny seedlings in a greenhouse.