January 4, 2026 • 36 mins
Margaret reads you a story about what enormous love it will take to rebuild the world and take back what's ours from the powerful.
Original Airdate: 7.21.2024
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Cool Zone Media book Club book Club book Club. It's
the Cool Zone Media book Club. That's our new intro.
I'm totally gonna get it exactly the same from now on.
I'm very good at consistently making up ditties. Welcome to
(00:21):
the Cool Zone Media book Club. I'm your host, Martaret Kiljoy,
and every Sunday I read you a story. It's like
a book club, only you don't have to do the
reading because I do it for you. And we read fiction,
and sometimes we read stories that are like the perfect
story for Cool Zone Media book Club. Sometimes we read
(00:42):
stories like the one today today is an example of
one of the perfect stories in case that didn't come across.
Because today I'm going to read you a story called
The Orchard of Tomorrow by Kelseyu. Who's Kelseu? Well, i'll
read you her bio. Kelsey You as a Taiwanese Chinese
American writer who is eternally enthusiastic about sharks and appreciates
(01:04):
a good ghost story. Over a dozen of her short
stories and essays appear in Clark's World, Apex, Nightmare, Fantasy, Pseudopod,
and elsewhere. Her debut novella, Bound Feet was a Shirley
Jackson Award nominee, and her next novella, Demon Song, will
be published by Titan Books in twenty twenty five. Kelsey's
first novel, It's Only a Game, is published by Bloomsbury.
(01:27):
Find her on Instagram and Twitter at a novel Escape,
or visit her website kelseu dot com. Her name is
spelled k E l sa yu dot com. Kelsey lives
in the Pacific Northwest with her husband, children and a
pile of art supplies. And as one Shirley Jackson Award
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nominee to another, did you get the rock? One of
the coolest things about the Shirley Jackson Award is that
if you're nominated, they give you a rock that's engraved
with you know, Shirley Jackson Award nominee, like whatever year.
And it makes me really happy because it's a clever
joke about the story of the lottery. Ooh, I wonder
if I can read that to you all one day.
(02:12):
I don't know to figure it out, but this story
that I'm about to read to you, The Orchard of Tomorrow,
originally appeared in Clark's World magazine in July twenty twenty
three and I just want to shout out. Neil Clark
is the editor of Clark's World. Neil keeps winning well
deserved awards for his work. He's one of the best
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editors in speculative fiction, and honestly, like, if this is
the only place you get your stories, that's great. I
love the stories that I read to you. But there
are a bunch of really good speculative fiction magazines out
there right now. Like we are actually living in a
golden era of short fiction, which is interesting. We are
not in a golden era of short fiction readership. We
(02:57):
are in a golden era of short fiction authorship and
publish ship. We're also not in a golden era of
Margaret making up words. We're in a pretty mediocre era
of that. But I highly recommend Clark's World, Strange Horizons.
I don't know, it's just the magazines that are out
right now full of good stuff. You should read them
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if you like stories, which you probably do, or you
wouldn't be listening to this. The Orchard of Tomorrow by
Kelsey U in the rich even tide glow, I wait
for her in the place where the peaches once grew,
mouth watering, little golden dusts to signal the arrival of summer.
Hefty o Henry's skin, dark as rust honey, yellow flesh
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bursting with flavor, Dainty summer ladies, impossible to eat without
juice dripping down your chin, and reliably sapid fair times
to close out the season. As our elders tell it,
this orchard was once bursting with variety of the fuzzy
skinned fruit. I kneel down, dig my fingers into the soil,
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and scoop up a handful. It's dry, too dry, and
it crumbles in my hand. I close my fist, sweat
from my palm, soaking the dirt as I try to
imagine a time when the ground was rich with nutrients,
when the landscape was filled with ripening peach trees, silhouettes
full and dark against the twilight sky, When my grandparents'
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backs and arms ached something fierce after a full day
of picking fruit. All I had, all Lane and I
ever had, were stories to show us what the world
had been like. The sun dips below the horizon, and
my hope sinks with it. So much has changed in
all the time that's passed, but her haunts remain the same.
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I would rather have sat outside her place, the one
that was once upon a time my home too, and
awaited her return. I knew I should give her the
choice to see me or not. After eight years apart
and everything I said to her when we last spoke,
It's the least I owe her, So I shoved a
note under her door. Meet me at the orchard at sunset.
(05:14):
It was the right thing to do. Yet here I am, now,
in the gloaming, all alone. I unclenched my fist and
a dead beetle tumbles out with the clumped dirt. It
lies belly up on the ground that once teemed with
its kind. I brush my hands off and reach into
the pocket of my thin coat, checking to make sure
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it's still there. The surprise I've saved for Lane, the
one that might be my saving grace if she gives
me the chance to show her. I turn, making my
way toward the tree at the edge of the field,
the lone survivor. It's bare and a fruit now, but
it's still standing, leaning back against its trunk. I close
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my eyes, thinking of when Laine and I spent all
our days whispering secret dreams for a hopeful future. So
what you're back now? I open my eyes to see
a hollow, cheeked version of Lane, wraith like and disconnected
from the version of her that lives in my memory.
Her sloppily patched shirt is too large, hanging strangely on
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her bony shoulders. Eight long years filled with who knows
how many hungry days, hungry nights, have whittled her away
to this. Guilt twists in my gut, leaving me momentarily speechless.
If she's shocked by how different I am, it shows
only in the slight narrowing of her eyes, the same
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warm brown as I remember, but ringed with dark circles. Now.
Lane was always closed off to anyone outside her tight circle,
and I'm no longer snugly on the inside. I suck
in a breath, sharp with the pain of distance between us.
This is a waste of time. She turns to leave.
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The movement is so like her, so very lame, that
it reminds me of how things used to be, of
why I'm here when I made her angry too many
times near the end, she did this. She was usually
the one to run from our fights first, but she
always came back, unlike me. I reach out to grab
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her sleeve. Lane. Wait, she crosses her arms. What do
you want to go back to the way things were?
I bite back the words. I miss you want to
share a tale with you? It's a dirty trick. The
Terrible Winter. After Lane's parents died in a flash flood,
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she moved in with me and mom. On cold nights,
when Lane's grief threatened to swallow her whole, Mom would
wrap us up in blankets and tell us stories of
Swan Wukong, the monkey King. I see longing cross Lane's face.
Then she straightens, her veil of indifference falls back into place.
She pulls away, forcing me to let go of her sleeve.
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I don't want to hear it. Please, I say, Andrea, Please.
She sighs, and I still know her well enough to
know it's a victory. However, small, somewhere inside the prickly
creature standing before me, the ghost of my former best
friend lives on. In the celestial gardens of Shi Wong Mu,
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the Queen Mother of the West, three types of peaches
of immortality grew. The first bloom to what once every
three thousand years, granting an extension of life equal to
its growth time to anyone who consumed one The second
grew for six thousand years, offering immortality and strength of body.
The third ripened every nine thousand years, and its gifts
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were the most precious of them all. For the consumer
of the rarest peach would become as eternal as the
sky above and the earth below, and live as long
as the fiery Sun and the frigid moon. To celebrate
the ripening of the peaches, Shi Wongmu and her husband
Yu Wong, the Jade Emperor, would invite all the deities
to their Azure banquet hall on Mount Kunlan for a
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magnificent gathering. There they would present the peaches of immortality
for all to partake, thereby ensuring the deity's continual immutable existence.
In the brief space of my tail, Lane's eyes have
grown wide and attentive. Her arms are still crossed, but
her posture has loosened. I can't help myself. I shift
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toward her. The movement so slight, I hope she won't notice.
Instantly she's on guard. Lane steps backward as if I'm
a creature bearing fangs. Her shoulders stiffened, and she presses
her arms tightly together again, narrows her eyes as if
to remind herself to stay wary. When she speaks, her
voice is pure ice. Let me guess you learned that
(10:00):
story from one of the dragons. She spits, the diminutive
that we and most other common born folk used to
refer to the world's wealthy elite. I WinCE, No, it's
not like that. Did you enjoy it there? Waking up
on a clean, fluffy bed every morning for eight years,
eating your fill each meal, and spending your leisure time
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enjoying all the things they stole from us, everything they
hoarded in their precious locked towers so they could continue
to live in comfort while the rest of us died
for scraps. Lane's voice breaks at the end. Her choked
sob is a thing with spikes lodging itself deep inside
my heart. This is so much worse than the way
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she screamed at me when I first told her the
dragons had offered me a job in one of their
distant preservation greenhouses. Back then, Lane and I spent most
of our days doing any work we could find in
exchange for food and basic comforts her mom for her
or me whenever we had moments free. My mom would
rest at home while Laine would visit the elders in
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the community, listening to their stories as she helped them
in any way she could. I, meanwhile, spent my time
applying the knowledge passed down through my family, trying to
work out how to restore the damaged soil so it
would grow things again. The planter at our tiny shared
house had barely begun to sprout my first successful attempt
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when a recruiter showed up. Lane was gone. Knowing the
dragons as I do now, he likely waited until I
was alone to approach me. I took in his clean
tailored clothes, his rosy cheeks, untroubled eyes, and perfectly styled hair,
the disdainful look he directed at the home I shared
with the ones I loved most, and I told him
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to go to hell. Sure, he said, with a dismissive
little laugh, I'll do that, but first you'll want to
hear this. We can give you all the resources you
need to grow things, real things, not this child's play.
Your grandparents were farmers, right, I glared at him. They
had an orchard back before the world broke, before assholes
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like you came and took the last of their fruiting trees.
And exchange for resources that should be freely shared. Now
get the hell out. I was ready to run inside,
grab my amahs old shovel and smack him on the head.
Consequences be damned. And then he made me an offer
I couldn't refuse. I did enjoy it for a time.
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I finally admit to Lane thinking about the day I
entered the Dragon's Lair. I won't lie to her. At first,
it was a relief. Lane stares at me, and I'm
afraid I've made things even worse. But she doesn't say anything,
so I go on. I it's useless to describe what
it felt like to get a full night sleep, to
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have so much food available that I gorged myself sick
for a week before learning to take it slow, to
know my mom would stay alive for three more years
thanks to the pills the Dragon's horse for themselves. I
can't say any of it. Lane would only hate me
all the more, so I say the only thing I
can say. I missed you, Blaane, I'm sorry I left.
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She presses her lips together and turns away. She's tense, agitated,
fingernails digging into her own arms, and she's about to
begin pacing. I can't tell if I'm closer to regaining
her trust or losing her forever. So I begin the
next part of the story knowing it'll be hard for
her to resist a tale about the one character she
always loved hearing about the most, which is these ads. No,
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it's not part of the story. I just there's ads
and they come here that This is where the ads go.
This is where the first of the two breaks go.
I trust you to find the four to fifteen second button.
I mean, listen to these wonderful deals that we all
believe in. Here they are, and we're back. In the
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course of his journey to the West, Swung Wu Kong
angers several gods and gains heavenly powers, thus attracting the
attention of the Jade Emperor. At first, Yu Wong appoints
him Keeper of the Horses, the lowliest position in heaven,
intended as both a slight and a means to keep
him under observation. An outsider to the deities politics, Swan
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Wukong does not immediately recognize the offense. Once he learns
of it, he's outraged to contain the vengeful, destructive monkey,
Hu Wong sends a band of his celestial warriors, but
Swong Wukong defeats them all. In doing so, much to
Hu Huong's chagrin, Sunghu Kong earns himself the revered position
as guardian of Chi Wang Mu's private orchards. Swang Wukong
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is pleased with his new role, having witnessed a fellow
monkey die of old age earlier in his adventures, he
fears death. He will do anything to avoid him, and
his fortune is great for his appointment come insides with
the rare ripening of the precious fruit. He watches as
preparations begin for the banquet, anticipating both the taste of
heavenly fruit and an end to his mortality. For surely,
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as protector of the peaches, he is guaranteed a spot
at the table. Yet the feast of peaches approaches and
still no invitation arrives. Swoon hou Koon thinks of the
peaches of immortality laid out on a serving dish in
the azure banquet hall, awaiting the arrival of Chi Wong
Mu's honoured guests. He thinks of the way that gods
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slight him at every opportunity. He thinks about how they
never wanted him here, and how now that he's forced
his way in, they still find ways to exclude him,
and he finds a way to sneak inside. Lane's eyes
are a war zone, torn between the hurt that must
have been festering during our time apart and the legend
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of the Monkey King. She loves so much, and this
tale is new to her. I discovered a translated copy
of Journey to the West in the Dragon's library the
month after Mom died. Each night, curled up alone and
on my warm, cozy bed, I read. If I held
the book at just the right angle, kept him only
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my bedside lamp on, and turned away from the empty
bed on the other side of the room, I could
almost pretend Mom was still there, just out of sight,
softly snoring as I whiled away the evening. Weeks passed
before I read far enough to discover the tale of
Swan Wu Kong and the Peaches of Immortality, a tale
Mom never told me. In Lane, despite the fruit at
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the heart of it, Despite my grandparents peach orchard, this
one where my mom and Lane's mom grew up playing
together while their parents picked fruit, Or maybe because of
this orchard. When Lane and I were a ten and eleven.
Lane's mom told us about the scorching hot summer when
a wild fire destroyed most of the peach trees. The
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way the sickly scent of charred fruit and thick miasma
of smoke lingered for days, The way volunteers from town
came over to help glean the salvageable fruit and discard
the ruined ones, to call the dead trees and cut
the rotten bits from the ones that could be saved,
To make jokes with my awe Gong, to distract him
from the pain of seeing his precious trees charred to ash,
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and bring my Almah discreet tissues to soak up the
tears she pretended she hadn't shed. Lane's mom was the
one to tell us because decades after the fire, it
was still too painful for my mom our grandparents to
speak of. And even though it was my family's history,
my family's tragedy, Lane, as much as I soaked up
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every word, it was Laine who wanted to write what
she saw was a terrible wrong. It was Laine who
wanted to bring the orchards back to life, to restore
the land to what it had once been. It was
Laine who first suggested it would be worth trying to
restore the soil, revitalized the land, to pick up the
work my mom had begun before she had me, The
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work Mom would have continued once I was grown, had
she not become ill. It's Lane who stands before me,
now surrounded by the ghosts of my family's peach trees
in the orchard that my grandparents had once thought would
sustain my family forever. Why are you telling me this tale,
she asks, voice wavering between confusion and anger. Did she
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did your mom? Is this one of her stories? Mom
died five years ago. My voice is even I've learned
to mask the ache that accompanies those words. Lane worries.
Her lip bites back a tear. I'm sorry, Andrea, I nod,
but I'm frustrated with myself. I would do almost anything
to repair Lane's in my friendship, but I won't use
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Mom's death. I won't use Lane's compassion, her grief, her
sympathy to my advantage. She didn't tell me about the
peaches of immortality. I learned about them later. Lane stiffens,
her voice grows hard again. The dragons they had a library,
and Lane kicks the base of the tree hard enough
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to make me flinch. A fucking course, a private little
library they keep for themselves and their sick offense. How
did it feel to work for them, to help them
preserve the fruits they plundered from us, from farmers like
your grandparents, to keep safe in their walled off greenhouses.
How did it feel to read the stories they made
sure to save, to collect for themselves under the claim
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of preserving knowledge for the good of humanity? Why are
you really here? Did they finally let you off your
leash for one evening? Or are you on some mission
for them? You know what, Andrea, it doesn't matter. I
don't need you anymore. I'm done. Lane turns and strides off. Lane.
I left, I left my work there. I'm done with them.
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She stops for a second, but doesn't turn around. I
see her take a deep breath. Then she shakes her
head as if to remind herself that she's done with me,
and starts off again. I hurry to catch up. I
didn't just leave, I call out after her. I also
stole something precious from them. This time she does turn around.
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You did what let me finish? The tale. Please, then
I'll tell you everything fine, but I'm gonna keep walking,
all right. I walk alongside lane, hoping like hell it
isn't the last time I get the chance. Swan Wokong
eyes the centerpiece of the celestial banquet table, a bowl
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of eternal peaches, larger than any earthly peach, perfectly proportioned
and plump with juice. His stomach growls something fierce, and
his heart fills with longing for the fruit of the gods.
The key to shedding his mortality lies within reach. He
takes one, waiting for Hu Wong to appear in a rage,
for a band of celestial warriors to attack, for the
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guests to arrive and show their outrage in any number
of ways, but no one stops him. Swan Wu Kong
eats the peach of immortality. One is all he needs,
One is all anyone has ever needed. But he eyes
the bowl of precious fruit grown in Shi wang Mu's sacred,
guarded garden, hidden away and cultivated for her innermost circle,
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a guarantee that they'll stay eternal, stay in power, a
gift for those who already have everything. The peaches are
not meant for folk like him. Swan Wu Kong eats
another peach, then another, his heart hardening with each bite.
He's full to bursting, so full that hunger is not
but a distant memory. But he keeps eating until he's
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finished every last one. He washes them down with a
vessel of heavenly wine, and just despite them further. He
seeks out the corner of Lautza, the father of Taoism,
and steals his infamous pills of immortality. Swan Wu Kong
swallows those two before he leaves shi wang mus palace.
He knows that what the hell, Andrea Lane interrupts, Is
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this supposed to be some sort of allegory? Are you
supposed to be Swan Wokong, the heroic monkey king who
stole something precious from the corrupt elite? Are you going
to try to convince me you work there because you
wanted to get close to them, to do something for
good for us commoners? Lane's practically breathing fire. She's so angry.
You know, when I saw your note, I wondered how
you'd play it. Half the reason I'm here is because
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I wanted to know what excuse you'd come up with.
Now I know you're going to paint yourself as some
sort of fucking martyr. At least I win that bet
with myself. No, Lane, I don't think I'm the goddamn
monkey king. I know I have no right to be mad,
but her accusations cut away at my self control. My
words tumble out unvarnished. Of course, I don't fucking think
I'm Swan Wokong. And he wasn't doing it for the
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common good? Didn't you listen to the story? He was
selfish as fuck. He only wanted to take because he
was pissed that he wasn't invited. Everything else was a justification,
unlike these ads that have no justification for being here
except for the way our economic system works. Here's ads,
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and we're back then? Why bother telling me the story?
Is it because you think I sit around all day
and daydream about stories, because I'm a dreamer who doesn't
understand what the real world demands. That sometimes people have
to give up childish ideals in favor of security and
shelter and medicine. That things are more complicated than I'm
willing to admit. That some people grow up and grow
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out of being dreamers, while others let themselves get left behind,
until all they have are dreams worth less than poisoned dirt.
Her words steal away my anger, my breath, because they're
not her words. They're mine, thrown at her in anger
on that last day before I left to work for
the Dragons. She says it like she's repeated the words
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in her head a thousand times, like she replays them
in her mind before she goes to sleep, like every
word is a fact, an inarguable truth, a bludgeon. Her
words hit me the same way my first taste of ripe,
juicy peach did four months ago, the moment that knocked
me from my comfortable complacency, that reminded me of how
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much I loved the woman before me, who should have
been there to taste that wonderful fruit we once dreamed
we'd share some day when we'd regrown the peach trees.
I feel it again, the self loathing for every fiber
of my well rested, well fed being, not only because
I was willing to leave her behind, but because I
was willing to stay long after I should have left
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the dragons. I want to crawl into a dark hole
in the ground and wait there until my body grows still,
my flesh cold, and I'm nothing, meat and bones, feeding
the insects. I almost turned to leave again, but Laine
deserves better. Lane always deserved better than I gave her.
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I'm sorry. The words are a drop of water on
a forest fire, as pointless as staying silent. I wish
I could take back what I did. All I can
do is tell you that I was wrong. I was
absolutely wrong. I know her words cleave mine, sudden and vehement. No,
she says again, that's the worst fucking part that you
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were right when you left. I had nothing without you.
My dreams felt worthless, all the things I thought we
could do to change the world. She shakes her head.
I've gone so many days without food, seeing so many
people suffer and die because of the greed of people
like the dragons, And as much as I want to say,
all it did was make me more determined, that would
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be a goddamn lie. Sometimes I wonder why bother. We're
too small to change anything, We're too insignificant to do
anything but do what we can to survive. She lowers
her voice to a whisper, and she won't look at me.
Too many nights I lay awake, wishing had gone with you.
I put my hands on Lane's shoulders to stop her
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in her tracks, because I can't let her go another moment,
believing this, because it breaks me to see her so broken.
Lane doesn't pull away. She's shaking, and when I draw
her close, I realize she's sobbing with her entire body.
There's so little of her left. I hug her, and
she cries on my shoulder, the same way she did
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half our lives ago, the day she showed up at
my house newly orphaned, face a wreck of blotchy tears.
I listen now as she tells me how the last
few years have been especially hard, so goddamned heart, I
swallow a reply when she whispers that this doesn't mean
that she forgives me. I wait until her tears run,
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until she wipes her face on the hem of her shirt,
until she's spent, Lane, I say, and she looks up.
You weren't wrong. Lane starts to shake her head, but
it's half hearted, like she's too tired to care anymore.
I put more force into my voice. I need her
to know I'm not just saying it. I'm the one
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who was wrong. We need dreamers. We need people like
you who can imagine the way things could be. Dragons
think they're the only ones who are truly free because
they've shackled everyone else. They think that access to all
the world's most precious things makes their lives richer, fuller.
But all they've done is create private, little fortresses of fear.
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They play petty games with each other because they fear
one another too. They've taken everything, and so they're afraid
to lose anything. I wish I could say that I
regret my choice to leave. I can't not when that
choice gave my mom three more years. Shouldn't have said
the shit I said just to make myself feel better
about what I was doing. I shouldn't have stayed for
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five years after she died. I want to say I
did it because I had some grand plan to learn
what I could from them and upend everything. But the
truth is I got comfortable. I told myself the security
was worth it. Leariness has seeped back into Lane's expression,
but she doesn't leave. At least she's listening. People like
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me lack imagination. I swallow hard. It's not an admission.
I like to make people like me can only see
what's right in front of them. Sometimes you never could
see the orchards the way I could. I look around,
trying to picture the trees the way they were in
Lane's mom's stories. I wished for so long that I could.
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I say, Lane's sighs. It's a long, weary sound. What
does it matter anymore, It makes no difference if you
regret it or not. It happened. You left, I stayed.
We're here now, and it's too late. The world has
only gotten worse. There's nothing to come back to. All
my dreams crumbled to dust, just like you knew they would.
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You should have stayed where you were. I shake my head.
There are two things I learned there in the dragon's enclave.
First that the fruit of today never tastes quite like
the fruit of yesterday. Thanks to breeding, to natural selection,
to climate change, fruit evolved in taste and texture over time.
There's evidence that peaches were domesticated as far back as
(29:32):
eight thousand years ago in northwest China. But those ancient
Chinese peaches, they're gone forever. She eyes me, okay. And Second,
there is one good thing about the dragons. Lane's lips
turned down. I almost laugh at the skepticism radiating off her.
Oh yeah, what the hell is good about them? They
(29:53):
keep really good records on how to care for their
precious things. I pull something from my pocket and hand
it to you. Lane's eyes narrow, but she accepts the
small journal filled with the notes I memorized and painstakingly
copied from the Dragon's records over the course of the
last four months. Her brows furrow. What's this? I hand
(30:14):
her the other item from my pocket, the thing I've
been saving, hoping it'll be enough, A small cloth wrapped bundle.
She unravels the cloth, and her breath catches. Is that
is it? What I think it is? The wonder in
her voice makes everything that went into this moment worth it.
It is. Lane turns over the ridged, blush pink peach pit,
(30:39):
running her fingers over its smooth grooves. She wipes her
eyes and laughs involuntarily, a little hiccup of a thing,
and then her shoulders slouch again. But it's a waste.
You should have smuggled out food in medicine. That's what
we need most. I did that too, She shakes her head,
still staring at the peach. Then why bother with this
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one tree won't change the world. Besides, it's not just
that the dragons stole the last fertile peach trees. It's
that this soil won't grow them anymore. Your grandparents orchard
will never go back to what it used to be. No,
it won't, I say, surprise a lights Lane's face. It
probably won't, I amend. Maybe someday the peaches will return here.
(31:25):
But there are pockets of the world that it will
still be able to grow them, or places that will
be able to grow them for the first time. This
isn't the only peach pit or the only fruit we
want to bring back to the world. Outside the dragon's
protective little bubbles, there are many of us, so many
more than I ever could have imagined, smuggling out the
things they hoard, the plants, the animals, the stories, the technology.
(31:49):
Others are fighting in small ways, setting up a future
where we take back what is ours. But this is
part of it. People wrote stories about fruit trees, built
legends around them because they mattered. You were right to dream. Lane.
Hope flares in her eyes, and it's the most beautiful thing.
(32:09):
We'll travel. Find a spot for this pit. I have
a few places we can start. I gesture towards the notebook,
and Lane hands it back to me absently. And if
those ones don't work, we'll find another and try again.
We'll test them, we'll grow them, We'll keep trying. We'll
do anything we can. Our world is never going back
to what it used to be. Peaches aren't what they
(32:32):
used to be. But with a lot of effort and
a little luck, maybe you and I will be the
first to taste the peaches from the orchard of tomorrow.
I reach out my hand, throat tight with hope. I
don't deserve a second chance, but Lane was always a
better person than I. Laane looks at me a gaze
that pierces me through. Then she looks beyond me. She
(32:53):
takes several deep breaths, and I brace myself for her refusal,
for the pain I know I deserve. This time, she'll
be the one to walk away. She wraps the precious
pit back up in the cloth and tucks it away,
and she places her hand in mine, and though her
skin is cold, warmth floods me, lighting up my entire body.
(33:15):
She glances my way, and her expression is still wary,
still uncertain, but she doesn't loosen her grip or let go.
You are going to tell me the end of that
swan Mukong taiale, right. I smile at her, blinking back
the tears that fill my eyes. I'll tell you on
the way. I'll tell you every tale I read. She
squeezes her hand in mine, and together we take our
(33:37):
first steps towards the place where the peaches will grow
once more. And that's the story. I hope you all
liked it half as much as I did, because then
you still liked it a lot. I don't know. It's funny,
like you know, I usually have so much to say
about these stories. And one thing I like about this
writing is that it's just clear right. There's allegories, there's
(34:02):
like thoughts and concepts in it and stuff, and they're
just written in a way where you don't need to
like really dig in to be like, well, I wonder
what this one little thing here means or whatever, you
just know. And it's also not heavy handed, like I think,
this is an amazingly well read, well written story. I
must said, well read story, and you know well that too.
(34:24):
I don't know, I have no idea if it did well,
but whatever, so if you enjoyed this story, if you
go to Kelseyu's website, which is k E L s
E a yu dot com, all of her publications are
listed and linked there, so you can read so much
(34:45):
more of her work. And when I asked her what
she wanted to tell you all, like what's a plug
here at the end, she said, the story's most likely
to fit a similar audience as the Orchard of Tomorrow
are in memories, We Drown from Clerk's World, a Scarcity
of Sharks in Reckoning, and Harvest of the Deep in fantasy.
(35:07):
I have two books out Bound Feet, which is a
horror novella and It's Only a Game, which is a
young adult thriller that just came out last Tuesday. And
I have another horror novella coming out next fall with
Titan that's called Demon Song. It also ties in Swan
Wu Kong and Chinese folklore, so anyone interested in that
story element might enjoy it. And I'm looking forward to
(35:32):
finding those books. They seem really good. All right. Well,
if you listen to this on Cool People Did Cool Stuff,
you should also check out it could Happen here. And
if you listen to this on it Could Happen Here.
You should also check out cool People Who Did Cool Stuff.
I'm Margaret Kildoy and I will talk to you all
next week with another episode of cool Zone Media book
Club Club It Could Happen Here, as a production of
(35:56):
cool Zone Media. For more podcasts from cool Zone Media,
visitor site cool Zonemedia dot com, or check us out
on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen
to podcasts. You can find sources for It Could Happen Here,
updated monthly at Coolzonmedia dot com slash sources. Thanks for listening,
Cool Zone Media book Club book Club book Club. It's
the Cool Zone Media book Club. That's our new intro.
I'm totally gonna get it exactly the same from now on.
I'm very good at consistently making up ditties. Welcome to
(00:21):
the Cool Zone Media book Club. I'm your host, Martaret Kiljoy,
and every Sunday I read you a story. It's like
a book club, only you don't have to do the
reading because I do it for you. And we read fiction,
and sometimes we read stories that are like the perfect
story for Cool Zone Media book Club. Sometimes we read
(00:42):
stories like the one today today is an example of
one of the perfect stories in case that didn't come across.
Because today I'm going to read you a story called
The Orchard of Tomorrow by Kelseyu. Who's Kelseu? Well, i'll
read you her bio. Kelsey You as a Taiwanese Chinese
American writer who is eternally enthusiastic about sharks and appreciates
(01:04):
a good ghost story. Over a dozen of her short
stories and essays appear in Clark's World, Apex, Nightmare, Fantasy, Pseudopod,
and elsewhere. Her debut novella, Bound Feet was a Shirley
Jackson Award nominee, and her next novella, Demon Song, will
be published by Titan Books in twenty twenty five. Kelsey's
first novel, It's Only a Game, is published by Bloomsbury.
(01:27):
Find her on Instagram and Twitter at a novel Escape,
or visit her website kelseu dot com. Her name is
spelled k E l sa yu dot com. Kelsey lives
in the Pacific Northwest with her husband, children and a
pile of art supplies. And as one Shirley Jackson Award
(01:51):
nominee to another, did you get the rock? One of
the coolest things about the Shirley Jackson Award is that
if you're nominated, they give you a rock that's engraved
with you know, Shirley Jackson Award nominee, like whatever year.
And it makes me really happy because it's a clever
joke about the story of the lottery. Ooh, I wonder
if I can read that to you all one day.
(02:12):
I don't know to figure it out, but this story
that I'm about to read to you, The Orchard of Tomorrow,
originally appeared in Clark's World magazine in July twenty twenty
three and I just want to shout out. Neil Clark
is the editor of Clark's World. Neil keeps winning well
deserved awards for his work. He's one of the best
(02:33):
editors in speculative fiction, and honestly, like, if this is
the only place you get your stories, that's great. I
love the stories that I read to you. But there
are a bunch of really good speculative fiction magazines out
there right now. Like we are actually living in a
golden era of short fiction, which is interesting. We are
not in a golden era of short fiction readership. We
(02:57):
are in a golden era of short fiction authorship and
publish ship. We're also not in a golden era of
Margaret making up words. We're in a pretty mediocre era
of that. But I highly recommend Clark's World, Strange Horizons.
I don't know, it's just the magazines that are out
right now full of good stuff. You should read them
(03:20):
if you like stories, which you probably do, or you
wouldn't be listening to this. The Orchard of Tomorrow by
Kelsey U in the rich even tide glow, I wait
for her in the place where the peaches once grew,
mouth watering, little golden dusts to signal the arrival of summer.
Hefty o Henry's skin, dark as rust honey, yellow flesh
(03:44):
bursting with flavor, Dainty summer ladies, impossible to eat without
juice dripping down your chin, and reliably sapid fair times
to close out the season. As our elders tell it,
this orchard was once bursting with variety of the fuzzy
skinned fruit. I kneel down, dig my fingers into the soil,
(04:05):
and scoop up a handful. It's dry, too dry, and
it crumbles in my hand. I close my fist, sweat
from my palm, soaking the dirt as I try to
imagine a time when the ground was rich with nutrients,
when the landscape was filled with ripening peach trees, silhouettes
full and dark against the twilight sky, When my grandparents'
(04:27):
backs and arms ached something fierce after a full day
of picking fruit. All I had, all Lane and I
ever had, were stories to show us what the world
had been like. The sun dips below the horizon, and
my hope sinks with it. So much has changed in
all the time that's passed, but her haunts remain the same.
(04:51):
I would rather have sat outside her place, the one
that was once upon a time my home too, and
awaited her return. I knew I should give her the
choice to see me or not. After eight years apart
and everything I said to her when we last spoke,
It's the least I owe her, So I shoved a
note under her door. Meet me at the orchard at sunset.
(05:14):
It was the right thing to do. Yet here I am, now,
in the gloaming, all alone. I unclenched my fist and
a dead beetle tumbles out with the clumped dirt. It
lies belly up on the ground that once teemed with
its kind. I brush my hands off and reach into
the pocket of my thin coat, checking to make sure
(05:36):
it's still there. The surprise I've saved for Lane, the
one that might be my saving grace if she gives
me the chance to show her. I turn, making my
way toward the tree at the edge of the field,
the lone survivor. It's bare and a fruit now, but
it's still standing, leaning back against its trunk. I close
(05:58):
my eyes, thinking of when Laine and I spent all
our days whispering secret dreams for a hopeful future. So
what you're back now? I open my eyes to see
a hollow, cheeked version of Lane, wraith like and disconnected
from the version of her that lives in my memory.
Her sloppily patched shirt is too large, hanging strangely on
(06:19):
her bony shoulders. Eight long years filled with who knows
how many hungry days, hungry nights, have whittled her away
to this. Guilt twists in my gut, leaving me momentarily speechless.
If she's shocked by how different I am, it shows
only in the slight narrowing of her eyes, the same
(06:40):
warm brown as I remember, but ringed with dark circles. Now.
Lane was always closed off to anyone outside her tight circle,
and I'm no longer snugly on the inside. I suck
in a breath, sharp with the pain of distance between us.
This is a waste of time. She turns to leave.
(07:01):
The movement is so like her, so very lame, that
it reminds me of how things used to be, of
why I'm here when I made her angry too many
times near the end, she did this. She was usually
the one to run from our fights first, but she
always came back, unlike me. I reach out to grab
(07:23):
her sleeve. Lane. Wait, she crosses her arms. What do
you want to go back to the way things were?
I bite back the words. I miss you want to
share a tale with you? It's a dirty trick. The
Terrible Winter. After Lane's parents died in a flash flood,
(07:44):
she moved in with me and mom. On cold nights,
when Lane's grief threatened to swallow her whole, Mom would
wrap us up in blankets and tell us stories of
Swan Wukong, the monkey King. I see longing cross Lane's face.
Then she straightens, her veil of indifference falls back into place.
She pulls away, forcing me to let go of her sleeve.
(08:06):
I don't want to hear it. Please, I say, Andrea, Please.
She sighs, and I still know her well enough to
know it's a victory. However, small, somewhere inside the prickly
creature standing before me, the ghost of my former best
friend lives on. In the celestial gardens of Shi Wong Mu,
(08:28):
the Queen Mother of the West, three types of peaches
of immortality grew. The first bloom to what once every
three thousand years, granting an extension of life equal to
its growth time to anyone who consumed one The second
grew for six thousand years, offering immortality and strength of body.
The third ripened every nine thousand years, and its gifts
(08:51):
were the most precious of them all. For the consumer
of the rarest peach would become as eternal as the
sky above and the earth below, and live as long
as the fiery Sun and the frigid moon. To celebrate
the ripening of the peaches, Shi Wongmu and her husband
Yu Wong, the Jade Emperor, would invite all the deities
to their Azure banquet hall on Mount Kunlan for a
(09:14):
magnificent gathering. There they would present the peaches of immortality
for all to partake, thereby ensuring the deity's continual immutable existence.
In the brief space of my tail, Lane's eyes have
grown wide and attentive. Her arms are still crossed, but
her posture has loosened. I can't help myself. I shift
(09:37):
toward her. The movement so slight, I hope she won't notice.
Instantly she's on guard. Lane steps backward as if I'm
a creature bearing fangs. Her shoulders stiffened, and she presses
her arms tightly together again, narrows her eyes as if
to remind herself to stay wary. When she speaks, her
voice is pure ice. Let me guess you learned that
(10:00):
story from one of the dragons. She spits, the diminutive
that we and most other common born folk used to
refer to the world's wealthy elite. I WinCE, No, it's
not like that. Did you enjoy it there? Waking up
on a clean, fluffy bed every morning for eight years,
eating your fill each meal, and spending your leisure time
(10:24):
enjoying all the things they stole from us, everything they
hoarded in their precious locked towers so they could continue
to live in comfort while the rest of us died
for scraps. Lane's voice breaks at the end. Her choked
sob is a thing with spikes lodging itself deep inside
my heart. This is so much worse than the way
(10:44):
she screamed at me when I first told her the
dragons had offered me a job in one of their
distant preservation greenhouses. Back then, Lane and I spent most
of our days doing any work we could find in
exchange for food and basic comforts her mom for her
or me whenever we had moments free. My mom would
rest at home while Laine would visit the elders in
(11:05):
the community, listening to their stories as she helped them
in any way she could. I, meanwhile, spent my time
applying the knowledge passed down through my family, trying to
work out how to restore the damaged soil so it
would grow things again. The planter at our tiny shared
house had barely begun to sprout my first successful attempt
(11:26):
when a recruiter showed up. Lane was gone. Knowing the
dragons as I do now, he likely waited until I
was alone to approach me. I took in his clean
tailored clothes, his rosy cheeks, untroubled eyes, and perfectly styled hair,
the disdainful look he directed at the home I shared
with the ones I loved most, and I told him
(11:48):
to go to hell. Sure, he said, with a dismissive
little laugh, I'll do that, but first you'll want to
hear this. We can give you all the resources you
need to grow things, real things, not this child's play.
Your grandparents were farmers, right, I glared at him. They
had an orchard back before the world broke, before assholes
(12:10):
like you came and took the last of their fruiting trees.
And exchange for resources that should be freely shared. Now
get the hell out. I was ready to run inside,
grab my amahs old shovel and smack him on the head.
Consequences be damned. And then he made me an offer
I couldn't refuse. I did enjoy it for a time.
(12:30):
I finally admit to Lane thinking about the day I
entered the Dragon's Lair. I won't lie to her. At first,
it was a relief. Lane stares at me, and I'm
afraid I've made things even worse. But she doesn't say anything,
so I go on. I it's useless to describe what
it felt like to get a full night sleep, to
(12:51):
have so much food available that I gorged myself sick
for a week before learning to take it slow, to
know my mom would stay alive for three more years
thanks to the pills the Dragon's horse for themselves. I
can't say any of it. Lane would only hate me
all the more, so I say the only thing I
can say. I missed you, Blaane, I'm sorry I left.
(13:11):
She presses her lips together and turns away. She's tense, agitated,
fingernails digging into her own arms, and she's about to
begin pacing. I can't tell if I'm closer to regaining
her trust or losing her forever. So I begin the
next part of the story knowing it'll be hard for
her to resist a tale about the one character she
always loved hearing about the most, which is these ads. No,
(13:34):
it's not part of the story. I just there's ads
and they come here that This is where the ads go.
This is where the first of the two breaks go.
I trust you to find the four to fifteen second button.
I mean, listen to these wonderful deals that we all
believe in. Here they are, and we're back. In the
(14:04):
course of his journey to the West, Swung Wu Kong
angers several gods and gains heavenly powers, thus attracting the
attention of the Jade Emperor. At first, Yu Wong appoints
him Keeper of the Horses, the lowliest position in heaven,
intended as both a slight and a means to keep
him under observation. An outsider to the deities politics, Swan
(14:24):
Wukong does not immediately recognize the offense. Once he learns
of it, he's outraged to contain the vengeful, destructive monkey,
Hu Wong sends a band of his celestial warriors, but
Swong Wukong defeats them all. In doing so, much to
Hu Huong's chagrin, Sunghu Kong earns himself the revered position
as guardian of Chi Wang Mu's private orchards. Swang Wukong
(14:49):
is pleased with his new role, having witnessed a fellow
monkey die of old age earlier in his adventures, he
fears death. He will do anything to avoid him, and
his fortune is great for his appointment come insides with
the rare ripening of the precious fruit. He watches as
preparations begin for the banquet, anticipating both the taste of
heavenly fruit and an end to his mortality. For surely,
(15:12):
as protector of the peaches, he is guaranteed a spot
at the table. Yet the feast of peaches approaches and
still no invitation arrives. Swoon hou Koon thinks of the
peaches of immortality laid out on a serving dish in
the azure banquet hall, awaiting the arrival of Chi Wong
Mu's honoured guests. He thinks of the way that gods
(15:34):
slight him at every opportunity. He thinks about how they
never wanted him here, and how now that he's forced
his way in, they still find ways to exclude him,
and he finds a way to sneak inside. Lane's eyes
are a war zone, torn between the hurt that must
have been festering during our time apart and the legend
(15:55):
of the Monkey King. She loves so much, and this
tale is new to her. I discovered a translated copy
of Journey to the West in the Dragon's library the
month after Mom died. Each night, curled up alone and
on my warm, cozy bed, I read. If I held
the book at just the right angle, kept him only
(16:15):
my bedside lamp on, and turned away from the empty
bed on the other side of the room, I could
almost pretend Mom was still there, just out of sight,
softly snoring as I whiled away the evening. Weeks passed
before I read far enough to discover the tale of
Swan Wu Kong and the Peaches of Immortality, a tale
Mom never told me. In Lane, despite the fruit at
(16:37):
the heart of it, Despite my grandparents peach orchard, this
one where my mom and Lane's mom grew up playing
together while their parents picked fruit, Or maybe because of
this orchard. When Lane and I were a ten and eleven.
Lane's mom told us about the scorching hot summer when
a wild fire destroyed most of the peach trees. The
(17:00):
way the sickly scent of charred fruit and thick miasma
of smoke lingered for days, The way volunteers from town
came over to help glean the salvageable fruit and discard
the ruined ones, to call the dead trees and cut
the rotten bits from the ones that could be saved,
To make jokes with my awe Gong, to distract him
from the pain of seeing his precious trees charred to ash,
(17:22):
and bring my Almah discreet tissues to soak up the
tears she pretended she hadn't shed. Lane's mom was the
one to tell us because decades after the fire, it
was still too painful for my mom our grandparents to
speak of. And even though it was my family's history,
my family's tragedy, Lane, as much as I soaked up
(17:42):
every word, it was Laine who wanted to write what
she saw was a terrible wrong. It was Laine who
wanted to bring the orchards back to life, to restore
the land to what it had once been. It was
Laine who first suggested it would be worth trying to
restore the soil, revitalized the land, to pick up the
work my mom had begun before she had me, The
(18:03):
work Mom would have continued once I was grown, had
she not become ill. It's Lane who stands before me,
now surrounded by the ghosts of my family's peach trees
in the orchard that my grandparents had once thought would
sustain my family forever. Why are you telling me this tale,
she asks, voice wavering between confusion and anger. Did she
(18:26):
did your mom? Is this one of her stories? Mom
died five years ago. My voice is even I've learned
to mask the ache that accompanies those words. Lane worries.
Her lip bites back a tear. I'm sorry, Andrea, I nod,
but I'm frustrated with myself. I would do almost anything
to repair Lane's in my friendship, but I won't use
(18:49):
Mom's death. I won't use Lane's compassion, her grief, her
sympathy to my advantage. She didn't tell me about the
peaches of immortality. I learned about them later. Lane stiffens,
her voice grows hard again. The dragons they had a library,
and Lane kicks the base of the tree hard enough
(19:10):
to make me flinch. A fucking course, a private little
library they keep for themselves and their sick offense. How
did it feel to work for them, to help them
preserve the fruits they plundered from us, from farmers like
your grandparents, to keep safe in their walled off greenhouses.
How did it feel to read the stories they made
sure to save, to collect for themselves under the claim
(19:31):
of preserving knowledge for the good of humanity? Why are
you really here? Did they finally let you off your
leash for one evening? Or are you on some mission
for them? You know what, Andrea, it doesn't matter. I
don't need you anymore. I'm done. Lane turns and strides off. Lane.
I left, I left my work there. I'm done with them.
(19:53):
She stops for a second, but doesn't turn around. I
see her take a deep breath. Then she shakes her
head as if to remind herself that she's done with me,
and starts off again. I hurry to catch up. I
didn't just leave, I call out after her. I also
stole something precious from them. This time she does turn around.
(20:13):
You did what let me finish? The tale. Please, then
I'll tell you everything fine, but I'm gonna keep walking,
all right. I walk alongside lane, hoping like hell it
isn't the last time I get the chance. Swan Wokong
eyes the centerpiece of the celestial banquet table, a bowl
(20:34):
of eternal peaches, larger than any earthly peach, perfectly proportioned
and plump with juice. His stomach growls something fierce, and
his heart fills with longing for the fruit of the gods.
The key to shedding his mortality lies within reach. He
takes one, waiting for Hu Wong to appear in a rage,
for a band of celestial warriors to attack, for the
(20:56):
guests to arrive and show their outrage in any number
of ways, but no one stops him. Swan Wu Kong
eats the peach of immortality. One is all he needs,
One is all anyone has ever needed. But he eyes
the bowl of precious fruit grown in Shi wang Mu's sacred,
guarded garden, hidden away and cultivated for her innermost circle,
(21:20):
a guarantee that they'll stay eternal, stay in power, a
gift for those who already have everything. The peaches are
not meant for folk like him. Swan Wu Kong eats
another peach, then another, his heart hardening with each bite.
He's full to bursting, so full that hunger is not
but a distant memory. But he keeps eating until he's
(21:41):
finished every last one. He washes them down with a
vessel of heavenly wine, and just despite them further. He
seeks out the corner of Lautza, the father of Taoism,
and steals his infamous pills of immortality. Swan Wu Kong
swallows those two before he leaves shi wang mus palace.
He knows that what the hell, Andrea Lane interrupts, Is
(22:05):
this supposed to be some sort of allegory? Are you
supposed to be Swan Wokong, the heroic monkey king who
stole something precious from the corrupt elite? Are you going
to try to convince me you work there because you
wanted to get close to them, to do something for
good for us commoners? Lane's practically breathing fire. She's so angry.
You know, when I saw your note, I wondered how
you'd play it. Half the reason I'm here is because
(22:27):
I wanted to know what excuse you'd come up with.
Now I know you're going to paint yourself as some
sort of fucking martyr. At least I win that bet
with myself. No, Lane, I don't think I'm the goddamn
monkey king. I know I have no right to be mad,
but her accusations cut away at my self control. My
words tumble out unvarnished. Of course, I don't fucking think
I'm Swan Wokong. And he wasn't doing it for the
(22:49):
common good? Didn't you listen to the story? He was
selfish as fuck. He only wanted to take because he
was pissed that he wasn't invited. Everything else was a justification,
unlike these ads that have no justification for being here
except for the way our economic system works. Here's ads,
(23:20):
and we're back then? Why bother telling me the story?
Is it because you think I sit around all day
and daydream about stories, because I'm a dreamer who doesn't
understand what the real world demands. That sometimes people have
to give up childish ideals in favor of security and
shelter and medicine. That things are more complicated than I'm
willing to admit. That some people grow up and grow
(23:42):
out of being dreamers, while others let themselves get left behind,
until all they have are dreams worth less than poisoned dirt.
Her words steal away my anger, my breath, because they're
not her words. They're mine, thrown at her in anger
on that last day before I left to work for
the Dragons. She says it like she's repeated the words
(24:07):
in her head a thousand times, like she replays them
in her mind before she goes to sleep, like every
word is a fact, an inarguable truth, a bludgeon. Her
words hit me the same way my first taste of ripe,
juicy peach did four months ago, the moment that knocked
me from my comfortable complacency, that reminded me of how
(24:29):
much I loved the woman before me, who should have
been there to taste that wonderful fruit we once dreamed
we'd share some day when we'd regrown the peach trees.
I feel it again, the self loathing for every fiber
of my well rested, well fed being, not only because
I was willing to leave her behind, but because I
was willing to stay long after I should have left
(24:51):
the dragons. I want to crawl into a dark hole
in the ground and wait there until my body grows still,
my flesh cold, and I'm nothing, meat and bones, feeding
the insects. I almost turned to leave again, but Laine
deserves better. Lane always deserved better than I gave her.
(25:12):
I'm sorry. The words are a drop of water on
a forest fire, as pointless as staying silent. I wish
I could take back what I did. All I can
do is tell you that I was wrong. I was
absolutely wrong. I know her words cleave mine, sudden and vehement. No,
she says again, that's the worst fucking part that you
(25:34):
were right when you left. I had nothing without you.
My dreams felt worthless, all the things I thought we
could do to change the world. She shakes her head.
I've gone so many days without food, seeing so many
people suffer and die because of the greed of people
like the dragons, And as much as I want to say,
all it did was make me more determined, that would
(25:55):
be a goddamn lie. Sometimes I wonder why bother. We're
too small to change anything, We're too insignificant to do
anything but do what we can to survive. She lowers
her voice to a whisper, and she won't look at me.
Too many nights I lay awake, wishing had gone with you.
I put my hands on Lane's shoulders to stop her
(26:17):
in her tracks, because I can't let her go another moment,
believing this, because it breaks me to see her so broken.
Lane doesn't pull away. She's shaking, and when I draw
her close, I realize she's sobbing with her entire body.
There's so little of her left. I hug her, and
she cries on my shoulder, the same way she did
(26:38):
half our lives ago, the day she showed up at
my house newly orphaned, face a wreck of blotchy tears.
I listen now as she tells me how the last
few years have been especially hard, so goddamned heart, I
swallow a reply when she whispers that this doesn't mean
that she forgives me. I wait until her tears run,
(27:00):
until she wipes her face on the hem of her shirt,
until she's spent, Lane, I say, and she looks up.
You weren't wrong. Lane starts to shake her head, but
it's half hearted, like she's too tired to care anymore.
I put more force into my voice. I need her
to know I'm not just saying it. I'm the one
(27:22):
who was wrong. We need dreamers. We need people like
you who can imagine the way things could be. Dragons
think they're the only ones who are truly free because
they've shackled everyone else. They think that access to all
the world's most precious things makes their lives richer, fuller.
But all they've done is create private, little fortresses of fear.
(27:42):
They play petty games with each other because they fear
one another too. They've taken everything, and so they're afraid
to lose anything. I wish I could say that I
regret my choice to leave. I can't not when that
choice gave my mom three more years. Shouldn't have said
the shit I said just to make myself feel better
about what I was doing. I shouldn't have stayed for
(28:05):
five years after she died. I want to say I
did it because I had some grand plan to learn
what I could from them and upend everything. But the
truth is I got comfortable. I told myself the security
was worth it. Leariness has seeped back into Lane's expression,
but she doesn't leave. At least she's listening. People like
(28:27):
me lack imagination. I swallow hard. It's not an admission.
I like to make people like me can only see
what's right in front of them. Sometimes you never could
see the orchards the way I could. I look around,
trying to picture the trees the way they were in
Lane's mom's stories. I wished for so long that I could.
(28:47):
I say, Lane's sighs. It's a long, weary sound. What
does it matter anymore, It makes no difference if you
regret it or not. It happened. You left, I stayed.
We're here now, and it's too late. The world has
only gotten worse. There's nothing to come back to. All
my dreams crumbled to dust, just like you knew they would.
(29:10):
You should have stayed where you were. I shake my head.
There are two things I learned there in the dragon's enclave.
First that the fruit of today never tastes quite like
the fruit of yesterday. Thanks to breeding, to natural selection,
to climate change, fruit evolved in taste and texture over time.
There's evidence that peaches were domesticated as far back as
(29:32):
eight thousand years ago in northwest China. But those ancient
Chinese peaches, they're gone forever. She eyes me, okay. And Second,
there is one good thing about the dragons. Lane's lips
turned down. I almost laugh at the skepticism radiating off her.
Oh yeah, what the hell is good about them? They
(29:53):
keep really good records on how to care for their
precious things. I pull something from my pocket and hand
it to you. Lane's eyes narrow, but she accepts the
small journal filled with the notes I memorized and painstakingly
copied from the Dragon's records over the course of the
last four months. Her brows furrow. What's this? I hand
(30:14):
her the other item from my pocket, the thing I've
been saving, hoping it'll be enough, A small cloth wrapped bundle.
She unravels the cloth, and her breath catches. Is that
is it? What I think it is? The wonder in
her voice makes everything that went into this moment worth it.
It is. Lane turns over the ridged, blush pink peach pit,
(30:39):
running her fingers over its smooth grooves. She wipes her
eyes and laughs involuntarily, a little hiccup of a thing,
and then her shoulders slouch again. But it's a waste.
You should have smuggled out food in medicine. That's what
we need most. I did that too, She shakes her head,
still staring at the peach. Then why bother with this
(31:02):
one tree won't change the world. Besides, it's not just
that the dragons stole the last fertile peach trees. It's
that this soil won't grow them anymore. Your grandparents orchard
will never go back to what it used to be. No,
it won't, I say, surprise a lights Lane's face. It
probably won't, I amend. Maybe someday the peaches will return here.
(31:25):
But there are pockets of the world that it will
still be able to grow them, or places that will
be able to grow them for the first time. This
isn't the only peach pit or the only fruit we
want to bring back to the world. Outside the dragon's
protective little bubbles, there are many of us, so many
more than I ever could have imagined, smuggling out the
things they hoard, the plants, the animals, the stories, the technology.
(31:49):
Others are fighting in small ways, setting up a future
where we take back what is ours. But this is
part of it. People wrote stories about fruit trees, built
legends around them because they mattered. You were right to dream. Lane.
Hope flares in her eyes, and it's the most beautiful thing.
(32:09):
We'll travel. Find a spot for this pit. I have
a few places we can start. I gesture towards the notebook,
and Lane hands it back to me absently. And if
those ones don't work, we'll find another and try again.
We'll test them, we'll grow them, We'll keep trying. We'll
do anything we can. Our world is never going back
to what it used to be. Peaches aren't what they
(32:32):
used to be. But with a lot of effort and
a little luck, maybe you and I will be the
first to taste the peaches from the orchard of tomorrow.
I reach out my hand, throat tight with hope. I
don't deserve a second chance, but Lane was always a
better person than I. Laane looks at me a gaze
that pierces me through. Then she looks beyond me. She
(32:53):
takes several deep breaths, and I brace myself for her refusal,
for the pain I know I deserve. This time, she'll
be the one to walk away. She wraps the precious
pit back up in the cloth and tucks it away,
and she places her hand in mine, and though her
skin is cold, warmth floods me, lighting up my entire body.
(33:15):
She glances my way, and her expression is still wary,
still uncertain, but she doesn't loosen her grip or let go.
You are going to tell me the end of that
swan Mukong taiale, right. I smile at her, blinking back
the tears that fill my eyes. I'll tell you on
the way. I'll tell you every tale I read. She
squeezes her hand in mine, and together we take our
(33:37):
first steps towards the place where the peaches will grow
once more. And that's the story. I hope you all
liked it half as much as I did, because then
you still liked it a lot. I don't know. It's funny,
like you know, I usually have so much to say
about these stories. And one thing I like about this
writing is that it's just clear right. There's allegories, there's
(34:02):
like thoughts and concepts in it and stuff, and they're
just written in a way where you don't need to
like really dig in to be like, well, I wonder
what this one little thing here means or whatever, you
just know. And it's also not heavy handed, like I think,
this is an amazingly well read, well written story. I
must said, well read story, and you know well that too.
(34:24):
I don't know, I have no idea if it did well,
but whatever, so if you enjoyed this story, if you
go to Kelseyu's website, which is k E L s
E a yu dot com, all of her publications are
listed and linked there, so you can read so much
(34:45):
more of her work. And when I asked her what
she wanted to tell you all, like what's a plug
here at the end, she said, the story's most likely
to fit a similar audience as the Orchard of Tomorrow
are in memories, We Drown from Clerk's World, a Scarcity
of Sharks in Reckoning, and Harvest of the Deep in fantasy.
(35:07):
I have two books out Bound Feet, which is a
horror novella and It's Only a Game, which is a
young adult thriller that just came out last Tuesday. And
I have another horror novella coming out next fall with
Titan that's called Demon Song. It also ties in Swan
Wu Kong and Chinese folklore, so anyone interested in that
story element might enjoy it. And I'm looking forward to
(35:32):
finding those books. They seem really good. All right. Well,
if you listen to this on Cool People Did Cool Stuff,
you should also check out it could Happen here. And
if you listen to this on it Could Happen Here.
You should also check out cool People Who Did Cool Stuff.
I'm Margaret Kildoy and I will talk to you all
next week with another episode of cool Zone Media book
Club Club It Could Happen Here, as a production of
(35:56):
cool Zone Media. For more podcasts from cool Zone Media,
visitor site cool Zonemedia dot com, or check us out
on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen
to podcasts. You can find sources for It Could Happen Here,
updated monthly at Coolzonmedia dot com slash sources. Thanks for listening,
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