Bloom Read Free Page A

two or three times over the following few months, and usually with something small, like a fresh vegetable or piece of fruit. Recently, however, Colton had found that he was able to somewhat control the ability. It didn’t always work, but over the past weeks he had failed less and less often.
    He only used fresh produce—no more lizards. The freshness of the object mattered, Colton had discovered. A can of sliced peaches was useless, but a fresh peach from Mr. Laretti’s produce stand worked just as well as the apple.
    Colton didn’t understand the process but he was getting used to it. The warmth he felt afterward calmed him down, even after the most stressful of days.
    He took the last bite of the second apple and tossed the core into the wastebasket just outside the homeless shelter. There was already a long line of homeless men and women wrapped around the edge of the building from the doorway. Colton squeezed inside and hurried over to the long row of tables at the back of the room.
    A strong odor of cooked vegetables and unwashed clothes hung thick in the air. He grabbed an apron hanging off a hook on the wall and put it on. The latex gloves from the “large” box barely fit his hands, but every volunteer had to wear them. He struggled to pull them down over his fingers as he walked over to the end of the long line of tables.
    The volunteers dipped big ladles into huge pots of steaming soup. On the other side of the table, the unceasing line of homeless shuffled past with bowls in hand. Every other volunteer would drop a chunk of stale bread into the soup.
    Colton took his spot at the end of the line and started handing out bread. The volunteer next to him was Sue Wallace, who ran the kitchen.
    “Nice to see you again, Mr. Ross. New haircut?”
    “Yes. Thanks. Sorry I’m late.”
    The elderly woman smiled and the skin at the outside corner of each eye bunched up into a hundred tiny lines. “Honey, the phrase ‘better late than never’ means more at this place than anywhere else I can think of.” She winked at him as she poured some soup into a bowl. “Your haircut looks good, by the way. A little short, but still. You get those nice, dark curls when it’s longer. You really need to let it grow.”
    Colton felt as if he was being lectured by an aging family member. He smiled and added a chunk of bread to another outstretched soup bowl. He nodded politely at each person who came through the line. Most of them seemed surprisingly healthy—Colton had noticed that the men and women who frequented that kitchen were either healthy or sickly in cycles. After a short period of declining health, old faces would never return and new faces would appear in the crowd.
    Maybe he wouldn’t have to use his talent that day, after all. He was starting to think he had destroyed the apple for nothing.
    The front door to the building was closed a few minutes later, signifying the end of lunch. The people still in line within the building would be allowed to stay, but everyone outside had to start looking elsewhere for food.
    “Sweetie,” said Sue. She tapped Colton’s arm and pointed to the old man standing on the other side of the table. He had dark circles under his eyes and his skin clung tightly to his bones.
    “Oh, sorry,” said Colton. He placed a piece of bread into the man’s bowl, then watched as he walked away and sat at a table, alone. The man coughed loudly into his sleeve and had to catch his breath before he could start eating. His breath wheezed as if his throat had all but closed. He ate slowly, raising the soup spoon to his lips with a shaking hand and spilling most of its contents on the way to his mouth.
    “That’s Henry,” whispered Sue. “I don’t think he’ll be around much longer.”
    Colton waited until the last person in line received their bread, then he took off his apron and threw away his gloves. He walked over and sat at the table next to Henry.
    “Hello,” said Colton.
    Henry