10 Things I Hate About Pinky - Sandhya Menon Page 0,113
found herself saying. “I really want to save this place.”
“I know you do, sweetie,” Angie said, patting her shoulder. “It’s a good cause. Listen, even if other people don’t come, all of us here can give this developer’s crew a piece of our minds. Show them they can’t just come in here and do whatever they want and no one’s going to fight them.”
Pinky gave her a watery smile. “Yeah, that’s true.” Even though a whopping five protesters might send the exact opposite message of the one they were hoping to send. Pinky sighed and turned to get a bottle of water from her pack.
There was a faint rumble in the distance, like a big vehicle approaching. Pinky spun around, frowning. Was the crew here early? But then, out on the main road, she saw a long line of cars speeding along.
“Is that…?” Pinky said faintly. “Are all those cars headed here?”
Gloria, Dolores, Angie, and Charles turned to look, and she heard Charles swear under his breath in disbelief.
Gloria took Pinky’s hand on one side and Dolores’s on the other, squeezing them just as the first in the line of cars turned onto the gravel road leading to the habitat entrance. She looked first at Dolores and then at Pinky with shining eyes. “I think they are.”
“But… but there must be at least fifty cars!” Pinky said, her eyes going wide. “Where did they all come from?” A part of her thought they must be the developer’s cronies, that Di Ria wanted to put a lid on this protest before it even began.
But then people were piling out of the cars and Pinky saw that they held bright signs, with environmental slogans, and that they were wearing T-shirts with butterflies on them. The same Eastern swallowtail butterfly that had been on the flyers. Under the butterfly, the caption read: Save Our Habitat!
“Hi!” one of the women called. She was dark-skinned, with her hair up in a bun. “Gloria! Dolores! And Pinky! It’s Gabriella from the WhatsApp group!”
Pinky waved, laughing, as a wave of people started across the habitat toward where they stood.
The woman in the bun walked up to Pinky, Gloria, and Dolores and handed them all neon green T-shirts. “Here,” she said. “This is for you guys. My dad’s company made these for us based on your design, Gloria. Hope you don’t mind; we just ran with it. There was no time to ask if it was okay.”
“Hey, I’m all for people running with things.” Gloria grinned, slipping her T-shirt on over her clothes. “The habitat belongs to all of us.”
Pinky slipped her T-shirt on too. “Wow, thank you. But who’s your dad? I mean, you brought so many people, too.…”
The woman laughed. “My dad’s Hector Fernandez; he runs Hector’s Ellingsworth Print Shop in town. See?” She pointed to an older Hispanic man Pinky remembered from the town hall meeting. “After the town hall meeting, he began to reach out to all our family and friends and, well… The older generations of my family have lived in this town for over sixty years. We know a lot of people.”
Pinky looked around at the people swarming around her, adding their own supplies to the supplies already on the bench so they were spilling off and onto the ground. Crates of water and signs and poster boards and markers and fruit.
Gloria laughed. “I’d say so.”
“So.” Gabriella rubbed her hands together just as a little girl came running up, her hair in pigtails. Gabriella put her hands on the girl’s shoulders. “This is my daughter, Paloma. How can we help you all set up?”
Paloma squealed and pointed at DQ, who was lounging near Pinky, watching all the people. “Oh my gosh! Is that your pet rat?”
Pinky laughed. “She’s a possum. Actually, Paloma, it would be such a great help if you could be in charge of her this morning. What do you think? Does that sound good to you?”
Paloma looked as if all her dreams were coming true. Taking DQ’s leash from Pinky, she said solemnly, “It would be my pleasure to be your possum assistant.”
Pinky, Gloria, and Gabriella grinned at one another over Paloma’s head.
* * *
Pinky was running around between the various groups, spreading instructions or advice from Gloria, giving the little kids who’d come (there were at least a dozen) markers and positive feedback, when she felt a hand on her shoulder. She turned to see Dolly grinning at her in a Save Our Habitat! T-shirt.